Blue in Chicago

Bette Howland was born Bette Lee Sotonoff on January 28, 1937 in Chicago, Illinois. In 1961, she met Saul Bellow at a writers' conference on Staten Island and they started writing letters to each other that year. As a single mother with two young sons, she struggled. In 1968, she tried to commit suicide and was temporary confined to a psychiatric ward. Her first book, W-3, was about the suicide attempt and its aftermath and was published in 1974. She also wrote Blue in Chicago, Things to Come and Go: Three Stories, and Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage. She died on December 13, 2017 at the age of 80.

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