In Search of the Elusive Comp
Come closer, child, and I shall tell you why your Uncle Jack gifts you with his storycraft, instead of peddling it to the masses for a fee, and also why he wears these rags and lives in what your father…
YA Wednesday, Halloween Edition: Is Dark YA Good or Bad for Teens, Creepy Fairy Tales, and Diverse Horror
It’s that time of year again. Every Halloween, my brother-in-law replaces his inner front door with a coffin door. He watches through a peephole as trick-or-treaters approach and at just the right moment jumps out of the door—Boo! Some kids…
Friday Feast: Interviews with Margaret Atwood, Marilynne Robinson, Hanya Yanagihara, Cristina Henríquez, and Marlon James
This week, I’m all about the authors. The ones I love. The ones whose books I want to read. The one whose book I’m currently reading for our next Novel Incubator alumni book club (A Little Life). It’s a smorgasbord…
Like a Virgin: Second Drafts
The great thing about the first draft is that it can be as stupid as you want. All you have to do is type shit into the keyboard. Then, after 80k words (or, you know, whatever) and one month to…
YA WEDNESDAY: New YA Novels Releasing This Fall, Do We Need a YA Canon, Buffy Studies, and the Manic Pixie Dream Girl (or Boy) YA Trope
I love autumn—the sweet smell of wood-smoke, pumpkins everywhere, trees laden with ripe apples and pears, the radiant bursts of red and orange that make me go wow on a regular basis. As Keats said, autumn truly is the “Season…
An Interview with Lauren Groff, Author of Fates and Furies
Lauren Groff’s Fates and Furies elbowed out some of its competition last Wednesday when the National Book Award announced its 2015 finalists, but of any writer I know, I don’t expect such adulation to go to Groff’s head. I first…