“That’s how Chapter 11 became Chapter 1.” Barrett Bowlin and David James Poissant talk short stories vs. novels, comic books, the pandemic, and Poissant’s new novel, Lake Life, out next week from Simon & Schuster.
“Homes delivers exactly on her narrator’s opening promise”: Barrett Bowlin on A.M. Homes’s cult classic short story “A Real Doll.”
“I get worried each time I see a review that talks about just how angry the stories are—well, yeah, but they’re also really funny.” Amber Sparks chats with Barrett Bowlin about her new collection of stories, And I Do Not Forgive You, out tomorrow from Liveright.
“I don’t ever really think a work is done, but I’m excited when a work is doing something, anything further.” Kristen Arnett chats with Barrett Bowlin about representing queerness, Florida writers, and drafting her debut novel, Mostly Dead Things, out this week from Tin House books.
“Whenever I have 20–30 minutes free, I’m writing”: Keith Lesmeister chats with Barrett Bowlin about his debut collection, We Could’ve Been Happy Here, out this month from Midwestern Gothic Press.
“I hope to make a statement on rural people’s lives and how they’ve suffered under the loss of manufacturing in rural America”: Jaimee Wriston Colbert chats with Barrett Bowlin about her new collection, Wild Things (BkMk Press).
“Maybe all the books I read in childhood about faraway places helped to shape that part of my imaginative engine; I don’t know.”
Barrett Bowlin sits down with Jennifer Pashley over cocktails just before her tour to promote the release of The Scamp, talking with her about this new book, her literary and musical influences, true crime sagas, and, inevitably, dead bodies.
Surprising Things Can Happen: An Interview with Kristen Roupenian
Part of a Bigger Conversation: An Interview with Rebecca Makkai
If You See Me, Don’t Say Hi: An Interview with Neel Patel
Sometimes Taking Things Out Counts as Writing: an Interview with Celeste Ng
Influences: An Interview with Tobias Wolff
Stories We Love: “Blue Lenses,” by Daphne Du Maurier
Stories We Love: “White Angel,” by Michael Cunningham
Stories We Love: Donald Barthelme’s “The School,” In Which is Revealed the Meaning of Life
Stories We Love: "A Small, Good Thing" by Raymond Carver
Stories We Love: "The Fall River Axe Murders," by Angela Carter
