Lunt grew up in the island fishing village of Frenchboro and in village of Bernard on Mount Desert Island. His ancestors settled on Mount Desert Island  in the late 1700s.

Lunt will discuss the life and works of Ruth Moore, the upcoming anthology of her writing that he is editing, and his book, Hauling by Hand, which recounts the history of Frenchboro. Both Moore and Lunt grew up in fishing villages on small Maine islands located off Mount Desert Island.

Ruth Moore was a literary giant of regional fiction during the mid-twentieth century, compared favorably to William Faulkner, John Steinbeck, and Flannery O’Connor. Moore was born in the tiny Maine fishing village of Gotts Island and brought her upbringing to her writing. Few other authors have so authentically captured coastal Maine, its people, and the midcentury as Moore, while also telling universal tales of human drama that went beyond the patch of rocky soil on which her stories were set. The New York Times declared, “It is doubtful if any American writer has ever done a better job of communicating a people, their talk, their thoughts, their geography, and their way of life.” The new collection of her work Voices Off the Ocean features excerpts from Moore’s novels, ballads, and poetry that showcase her brilliant writing and prove its staying power and influence on regional writing today.

Lunt was born in the Maine island fishing village of Frenchboro, a member of the eighth generation of Lunts that called the remote island home. He attended the island’s one-room school and Mount Desert Island High School before earning a dual degree from Syracuse University. Following graduation, he worked as an award-winning newspaper reporter in three New England states for nearly twelve years, and later worked as a freelance writer, editor and project manager. Lunt founded Islandport Press in 2000 and has since edited or published more than 200 books, most tied in some way to the culture and heritage of Maine or New England. Lunt also founded Islandport Magazine in 2017 and has written two nonfiction books, Hauling by Hand and Here for Generations. His third and fourth books, Voices off the Ocean and Speaking Maine, are now scheduled for release in early 2021. A revised edition of Hauling by Hand is scheduled for release in the Spring of 2021.