Suspend Your Disbelief

Shop Talk

Book of the Week: The Adults, by Alison Espach

by Jeremiah Chamberlin

Each week we give away several free copies of a featured novel or story collection as part of our Book-of-the-Week program. Last week we featured Lori Ostlund’s The Bigness of the World, and we’re pleased to announce the winners: Susan Kleinman, David Northington, and Dan Cafaro. Congratulations! Each will receive a signed copy of this novel. This week we’re featuring Alison Espach’s debut novel The Adults. Espach received her MFA in Fiction from Washington University in St. Louis and now lives in New York City. Her short fiction has appeared in such places as McSweeney’s, Five Chapters, Del Sol Review, […]


Kids + Books = ?

by Celeste Ng

What happens when you give a kid a book as a present? Sometimes, outrage, as in this video that lit up the liternets in December (via): But I prefer this video, aptly titled “Adorable French Girl Breathlessly Recounts Winnie The Pooh Plot.” (Or his adventures as she recalls them, anyway…) Once upon a time… from Capucha on Vimeo. It’s a stunningly cute example of the magic and wonder a book can create for a child. Don’t you remember getting so gloriously entangled in the world of a book that you sort of forgot where reality stopped and imagination began? (Via.) […]


The Benefits of the Virtual Book Tour

by Celeste Ng

The DIY book tour has become more and more popular (or should we say, necessary?) as publishers cut funding for traditional book tours and as self-publishing becomes more feasible for emerging writers. For the author arranging his or her own publicity, the most obvious route is old-fashioned in-person bookstore visits, which we’ve discussed quite a bit here at FWR over the past year—a sign that writers increasingly need to act as their own marketers, perhaps. But while the internet era makes life harder for writers in some ways—the increased challenges it causes for traditional publishing, for one—it also gives the […]


After 18 Years, Train of Thought Comes to a Halt

by Celeste Ng

Whenever I’m in NYC, I love riding the subway. It’s cheap. It gets you (almost) anywhere you need to go. You get to see a wide spectrum of people: the crazies, the businesspeople, and everyone in between. And, possibly best of all, the subway cars had literary quotes. You’d sit there, waiting for your stop (because of course you ended up on the local), looking up idly at ads for banks and special gym deals, and suddenly you’d see a quote by T. S. Eliot or Franz Kafka. The MTA’s “Train of Thought” program was an extension of an earlier […]


Control your own book tour destiny

by Lee Thomas

We’ve written several posts over the years about the emergence of DIY book tours, marketing and self-publicity (read them here, and here, and here). Not only do self-published authors need to get their hustle on, but writers who publish with small presses, or find themselves mid-level (or lower) on a big house’s list can find their book off the radar within months of a debut. Yet many writers find they’re woefully unprepared to find the right venue in Kansas City or drum up buzz ahead of time so they don’t show up to an empty house at an Austin coffee […]


Boston's Most Powerful Women: Sheriffs, Senators, Attorneys General, and… Writers?

by Celeste Ng

Boston Magazine recently compiled “The 50 Most Powerful Women in Boston,” listing “the players who pull the strings around here.” The list included Beantown superwomen like the county sheriff, a state senator, the founder of Zipcar, the Massachusetts Attorney General, bank executives, lawyers, the presidents of Harvard and MIT, and… Eve Bridburg, the founder and executive director of the nonprofit writing center Grub Street. The magazine describes Bridburg as “[g]uiding more than 10,000 writers over the literary center’s 14 years, including everyone from untried hopefuls to award-winning novelists such as Iris Gomez and Randy Susan Meyers.” How refreshing that a […]


"To train our hearts and our minds in the art of complexity"

by Celeste Ng

Do yourself a favor and read this fantastic essay, “How Reading Junot Diaz Can Help America Prosper,” by friend of FWR Dean Bakopoulos, right now. It’s one of the most eloquent, passionate explanations for why fiction matters that I’ve ever seen. I’d like to quote the whole thing, but here’s just a taste: Another morning, after I lectured on Junot Diaz’s story “Nilda,” a heartbreaking coming-of-age story in which the narrator, Junior, learns that nobody is invincible, not even his once mythically heroic brother, struck down by cancer at seventeen. Despite Junior’s intentions on leaving his neighborhood and moving on, […]


Thursday morning candy: Vectors

by Lee Thomas

In homage to the conversation about teaching creative writing in 21st century that we published last week, I’d like to highlight something a little different to jolt your creativity this Thursday morning. Vectors: A Journal of Culture and Technology in a Dynamic Vernacular. I first heard of it via Anna Leahy’s shout out in Part 2 of the aforementioned essay, “Where Are We Going Next?” The USC-based journal may not be a lit magazine in the traditional sense, but spending some time on the site has certainly gotten my mind racing with ideas, connections, energy – all vital to the […]


HuffPo, $315 mil, and when to write for free

by Lee Thomas

At 9 a.m. on the Saturday of AWP, I rallied for “When Should We Write for Free?” – a panel that, just like it sounds, featured writers discussing their own guidelines to answer that question. The panel gave insight into a marketplace that has rapidly grown accustomed to free content. There was much discussion during the audience Q&A about providing free content – mostly in the form of blogging – and folks mentioned the Huffington Post several times, since their bloggers are not paid. Fast forward to last week, when the Huffington Post announced that AOL would acquire it for […]


DO Judge a Book By Its Cover.

by Celeste Ng

Speaking of judging books by their covers, one branch of the New York Public Library recently asked readers to do just that. The NYPL blog explains: At the Webster Branch, we recently put up a display with all of the books covered in brown paper. Above it there is a sign that reads: “Do You Judge a Book by Its Cover?” The rules are if you unwrap a book—based on the short description taped to it—you must check it out. Even if you’ve read it before, or if you think you won’t like it. Take it home, give it a […]


Best American Short Fiction from Storyville

by Lee Thomas

Many of you blog readers may recall Michael’s great post about the launch of Storyville – the mobile short story magazine that sends a short story to your iPhone or iPad every week for $4.99 / 6 month subscription. Quite a steal. Starting today, and for the next two Tuesdays, Storyville will feature one story from each of the three collections that are Finalists for The Story Prize, the largest cash prize – $20,000 – for best story collection published the previous year. The stories will be drawn from the three finalist collections: Memory Wall by Anthony Doerr (Scribners), Death […]


Book of the Week: The Bigness of the World, by Lori Ostlund

by Jeremiah Chamberlin

Each week we give away several free copies of a featured novel or story collection as part of our Book-of-the-Week program. Last week we featured Urban Waite’s debut novel The Terror of Living, and we’re pleased to announce the winners: John Taylor, Jodi Paloni, and Michelle Hoover. Congratulations! Each will receive a signed copy of this novel. This week we’re featuring Lori Ostlund’s debut collection The Bigness of the World. Stories from this book have appeared in The Georgia Review, New England Review, The Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, Bellingham Review, Hobart, and Blue Mesa Review. Additionally, “All Boy” was selected […]




Literary Partners