Caroline Leavitt's Blog, page 135

Laurie Hertzel talks about News to Me: Adventures of an Accidental Journalist

Laurie Hertzel fell into journalism after taking a job as a clerk at the Duluth News-Tribune and is now is the books editor at the Star Tribune in Minneapolis. She's been a fellow at Duke University, a writer-in-residence at the James Thurber House in Columbus, Ohio, and a faculty member and speaker at the Nieman Conferences on Narrative Writing and Editing at Harvard. Oh, and let's not forget that she has spectacularly great hair, a hilariously dry and warm wit, and she's written an...

Kate Ledger talks about Remedies

Kate Ledger's Remedies, now in paperback, is the kind of intelligent page-turner I absolutely love. A portrait of a marriage, a study of a doctor's life, and a look at the kind of grief and pain that affects both the body and the soul, Remedies is a knockout. Of course, after reading it, I wanted to seek out Kate and we met through Facebook, Twitter and even e-mail. Remedies is also an Indie Next Notable Book, a Self Magazine's Book Pick and the official "Community Read" of the 2009...

Kevin Canty talks about everything and Everything

Kevin Canty is smart, funny, generous to other writers, and brilliant. There, I said it. You want to buy him a beer and have pizza with him and then watch the conversation happen. Everything, his new novel, is a sublime study of love and yearning, loss and need. He's also the award-winning author of the novels Into the Great Wide Open , Nine Below Zero , and Winslow in Love , as well as the short story collections Honeymoon and Other Stories , A Stranger in This World and Where the Money Went ...

Sitting in a movie, and there is her novel...

Okay, imagine this. You're at the new Julia Roberts movie, Eat, Pray, Love, with friends. The popcorn's in your lap, the drink's in that little holder by your seat. No one's kicking your seat or on their cell phone. Fifteen minutes in, to your amazement, you suddenly see YOUR book in Julia Robert's hands--ten feet high on the screen! You had no idea--the book is out of print, no one told you, no one even mentioned there might be a possibility of this happening.

It happened to my friend...

Previews of Coming Attractions, Blessings on PW and how to look at reviews!

I'm thrilled to announce that the great Kevin Canty will be here talking about his marvel of a novel, called Everything (I wish I had thought of that title.) Also coming up is the wonderful journalist and Star Tribune book editor Laurie Hertzel, answering my questions about her memoir, News to Me: Adventures of an Accidental Journalist; Emma Donoghue to answer questions about her brilliantly unsettling new novel, Room; and Susan Henderson, who will discuss her debut Up From The Blue, which...

process, process, process

For a long time (and I have no idea why I thought this), I believed that every other writer on the planet had an easy time of it. Words flowed from their minds right onto the page! They never had angst or self-doubt or bad days or moments when they seriously considered becoming a dentist instead. Everyone loved them, they got reviewed every place on the planet, their readings were packed, and every thing they wrote was lauded.
Now, of course, I know the reality is different different....

Welcome to writerland

Writing a novel is hallucinatory. You get deep enough into the work and the two worlds--the fictional world and the real one--start to blur. I admit it's a state I love. I'm caught between beginning to promote my new novel, Pictures of You, which is exciting and thrilling, and writing my new novel, tentatively titled The Missing One. I'm carrying two sets of characters in my head all the time, and they are talking, talking, talking.
But in between life goes on. My niece is having twins! My...

Work for the Afghan Women's Writing Project

By way of my friend Jeff Lyons:

The Afghan Women's Writing Project (AWWP) is looking to bring on board three volunteer Creative Outreach Assistants to help in our creative outreach efforts. These volunteers will report directly to the Director of Creative Outreach and will be non-paid positions. Jobs will entail working with the Director and other staff in organizing, planning, implementing, and promoting a national effort to stage multiple theatrical stage presentations of the AWWP's...

Novelist Dawn Tripp and I talk candidly about writing, angst, obsession and inspiration

Recently, I met the author Dawn Tripp (whose third novel, Game of Secrets, will be out in 2011). We met on Facebook. We instantly hit it off, and we began having a series of conversations about writing that was so intense, so exhilarating, that it felt as if the world had suddenly changed. I wanted to reprint the whole thing here so that other writers could join the conversation if they wished. So here, reprinted in all its glory, is our talk about writing, obsession, inspiration and...

Read This Book: Elizabeth Brundage's A Stranger Like You

Elizabeth Brundage (author of The Doctor's Wife and Somebody Else's Daughter) emailed me to ask if I'd be interested in a book that combined dark character study and the world of film. (That's like asking me if I like Junior Mints!) I knew and admired her previous novels, and this one, A Stranger Like You, which pubs today (order or buy wherever books are sold!) is truly wonderful. I'm pulling out all the best adjectives here: quirky, dark, full of unexpected surprises, and oh yes, a...