Sara McDermott Jain will discuss Wolves at Night, her debut novel, and explain the psychological impact of stories in the horror-thriller genre on Thursday, March 14, at 1:30 p.m. in the Meagher Theatre.

After the free presentation, she will sign copies of her novel, which is being adapted into a movie.

Wolves at Night tells the story of Eleni, a single mother with a two-year-old asthmatic child, who arrives at a remote cabin in the Alaskan wilderness to reunite with the child's father. Ben, the long-absent dad, has been on the run from the law for almost three years. Eleni believes in his innocence and wants him to see their son for the first time.

Two factors make her plan dangerous. The area is filled with voracious timber wolves, and the criminals that Ben double-crossed are tracking him, with revenge in mind.

Jain believes that tense and thrilling stories mimic the way in which people have psychological breakthroughs and guide readers through the process of identifying and overcoming the fears that might be holding them back from their full potential.

“The life you’re living right now was built out of the beliefs and habits you already have,” she writes on her website. “Some portion of those beliefs and habits stem from fear. If you want to get out of the ‘house’ you’ve built for yourself, you’re going to need to face - and overcome - those things that scare you. I’m here to help you do that.”

In summer 2024, she will become the first author in history to do a book tour on a cruise line, delivering talks on six different ships in the Holland America fleet in Alaska over a span of two weeks.

In addition to her best-selling novel, she is an award-winning screenwriter, who has worked with more than 75 authors in adapting their books to films (e.g., To Kill an Alien, Chance, The Dawn, and Foreign Nationals), and founder of PRINDIE, the Princeton Independent Film Festival, which ran from 2015-2022.

While she has been an adjunct professor at Neumann University since 2018 and at Immaculata University, her alma mater, since 2020, she is currently employed by Neumann full-time, creating a documentary on the Sisters of Saint Francis of Philadelphia.

Jain is also the director of the Neumann Inspires Film Festival, scheduled for April 19-20. The festival features screenings of the new film, Cabrini (a biopic about Francesca Cabrini, a champion for immigrant orphans) and Lucky Louie (a tale about ex-convicts who solve a mysterious bank robbery) as well as a collection of short, original films by students and independent filmmakers.

Jain has won awards in the 2019 Emerging Screenwriters “Get it Made” Competition and in 2012 at the Williamsburg International Film Festival and the Digital Film Academy's New Filmmakers' Screening in New York City.

Donations at her free March 14 book discussion are welcome with proceeds supporting the Dr. Margaret Mary Kearney student scholarship fund, which assists non-traditional students at Neumann.

To see the full schedule of 2023-24 Arts Guild events, visit www.neumann.edu/arts.