“I’m honored to be a lifelong Midwesterner and to write and think about place with central allegiance”: Melissa Scholes Young talks with Melissa Fraterrigo about her story collection, Glory Days.
Mary Stewart Atwell talks with Alan Heathcock as part of her interview series with writers of rural fiction, undertaken in partnership with The Art of the Rural. The two discuss Heathcock’s debut collection, Volt, as well as his Midwestern influences, film, politics, and more.
“William Gass’s ‘In the Heart of the Heart of the Country’ stands as an answer for what it means to write from the Midwest. Told in thirty-six discrete sections, this story is a devastatingly gorgeous meditation on loss and the rhythms of the Midwestern landscape.
Mary Stewart Atwell inaugerates a series of interviews with writers of rural fiction, undertaken in partnership with The Art of the Rural, by talking with Jack Driscoll. The two discuss his most recent collection, as well as the influence of place and weather on his fiction, how to “stay in the room,” and starting a story with the rhythm of the line.
Chad Simpson talks with Eugene Cross about writing the Midwest, choosing his debut collection from fifty stories, and all the jobs he worked (security guard, juvenile probation officer, AmeriCorps) on his way to becoming a teacher.
Our current feature is Peter Geye’s new novel, The Lighthouse Road, which was published by Unbridled Books in October. He is also the author of Safe from the Sea. Geye received his MFA from the University of New Orleans and his PhD from Western Michigan University, where he was editor of Third Coast. He’s also worked as a bartender, banker, bookseller, copywriter, and cook. Born and raised in Minneapolis, he continues to live there with his wife and three children. In the introduction to his recent review of The Lighthouse Road, Contributor Aaron Cance writes: Set at the cusp of […]
Anne Panning talks to Melissa Scholes Young about her debut novel, her writing process, the benefits of social media, and the advantages of working with a small press.
Hello again, FWR friends. Welcome to the latest installment of our “First Looks” series, which highlights soon-to-be released books that have piqued my interest as a reader-who-writes. We publish “First Looks” here on the FWR blog around the 15th of each month, and as always, I’d love to hear your comments and your recommendations of forthcoming titles. Please drop me a line anytime: erika(at)fictionwritersreview(dot)com, and thanks in advance. I can’t say I wasn’t warned that Chad Simpson’s essay, “An Epilogue to the Unread”—which connects the illness and passing of Simpson’s mother, her love for reading, examples of generosity in our […]
It’s no secret that we’re big fans of Eileen Pollack’s work at FWR. In fact, as our Founding and Features Editor, Anne Stameshkin, noted in an addendum to a 2009 interview with the author that we published on the site, Eileen Pollack–and her Contemporary Novel class at the University of Michigan–was one of the inspirations for the creation of Fiction Writers Review. So it’s with particular pleasure that we announce her new novel, Breaking and Entering, as our featured Book-of-the-Week title. Congratulations, Eileen! And we’re not alone in our admiration for this new book or Pollack’s work. In her laudatory […]
Last week we featured Once Upon a River as our Book-of-the-Week title, and we’re pleased to announce the winners. Congratulations to: Amused By Books (@amusedbybooks) Kevin Sampsell (@kevinsampsell) Ilie Ruby (@IlieRuby) To claim your signed copy of this novel, please email us at the following address: winners [at] fictionwritersreview.com If you’d like to be eligible for future giveaways, please visit our Twitter Page and “follow” us!
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
