“I like writing characters who are in those vulnerable, intense moments, whether it’s at the end or the beginning of a new relationship, arrival in a new city, the beginning of sobriety, or on the eve of or just post a gender transition.” Emily Nagin talks with Lydia Conklin about their debut collection, Rainbow Rainbow.
From the Archives: The debut novelist talks to Zachary Watterson about writing religions, communities, and landscapes not his own, all with complexity and compassion.
“What makes Let’s Get Back to the Party so successful ultimately is the way in which it ignores or transcends so many of the issues that normally feel like an obligation when you’re writing stories that involve LGBTQIA+ characters”: Deborah Solo Collins on Zak Salih’s debut novel.
“The horror of the residency is not that one can’t leave; it’s that one doesn’t have to”: Nora Kipnis on Carmen Maria Machado’s version of the cabin in the woods.
“As I get older, I’m less attached to this idea of home as a single space, and I try to envision home as something more expansive, more queer”: Carter Sickels talks with Megan Kruse about his new novel, The Prettiest Star,” building community, writing from a place of empathy, and more.
“I’m interested specifically in the inner turmoil, the emotional price and weight, of self-betrayal and deception as it is experienced and enacted by queer people.” Lee Thomas talks with Peter Kispert about his debut collection.
Elizabeth Earley talks with Rosalie Morales Kearns about her new novel, Like Wings, Your Hands, formative influences, her writing process, and the intriguing new project she’s working on now.
Carley Moore talks with Eleanor J. Bader about her first novel, The Not Wives, as well as about writing, revision, teaching, disability, and the possibility of progressive activism in Trumpian times.
“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.
“These are complex emotional states that capture the performance of intimacy and affection”: Heather Ryan on Garth Greenwell’s debut novel, What Belongs to You.
