Serving the Story: An Interview with Kate Reed Petty
by Amy Gustine
Amy Gustine talks with Kate Reed Petty about the structural features of her new novel, True Story, exploring not just what kind of story she’s written, but how she pulled it off.
Amy Gustine talks with Kate Reed Petty about the structural features of her new novel, True Story, exploring not just what kind of story she’s written, but how she pulled it off.
“A book only works when a reader understands it, and that is not always what a writer can judge.” Kate Lemery sits down with Tracy Chevalier to talk about reading, art, process, and her latest novel, A Single Thread, out now from Viking.
“If the end has truly come for the likes of the hoary old patriarchy, then let it happen on Ridker’s watch.” Michael A. Ferro reviews Andrew Ridker’s The Altruists, out now from Viking.
Jennifer Solheim talks with her former StoryStudio teacher, Rebecca Makkai, about research, getting behind a book, and braiding narratives in her new novel, The Great Believers.
“The events of 9/11 are integral to the novel’s structure and meaning, and to the Amendola family’s history and identity, but neither novel nor family are defined or constrained by the event.”
“I believe that if you’re looking closely at the world, it’s funny. Even the horrible things are funny in some way. And if you’re looking closely enough, everything’s also pretty sad. So I see it as my job not to shy away from either of those, and to let them coexist.”
Rebecca Scherm on using charts while working on her debut novel, Unbecoming: “It helps me remember how messy this process was, how difficult. I need to see the record of that mess to believe that I can do this again.”
“While each novel can stand on its own and conclude satisfactorily, Grossman has built a few essential worlds that help us understand fantasy and our relationship to it through through a progression of novels about people like us faced with the spectacular.”
A.M. Homes discusses the work of writing timeless human behavior in rapidly changing moment.
A writer named Ruth finds a Hello Kitty lunchbox on the beach near her Pacific-Northwest island home that contains artifacts from a young Japanese girl’s life, setting off a meditation on suicide, the reader-writer relationship, and the human experience of time.
