14 January 2020 Dear Friends Who Read and Readers Who are Friends, This month I want to celebrate two remarkable women. An ER doctor and a midwife. Both are characters from novels of mine. First of all, I want you to meet Alexis Remnick — the heroine in my next book, THE RED LOTUS, a […]
Category Archives: The Writing Process
26
Mar
Mar
Dear Friends Who Read and Readers Who are Friends, It’s official: the audiobook of my first play, WINGSPAN, landed today. You can download it wherever you download your ebooks. If you enjoy reading scripts, there is an ebook, too. The one-act play premiered last year at 59E59 in New York City and ran throughout the […]
17
Mar
Mar
Dear Friends Who Read and Readers Who are Friends, I’m asked often about the process of writing: how I approach my day. Invariably, my day begins by watching movie trailers or music videos to get into the right emotional space for whatever scene I am going to write that morning. Movie trailers and music videos […]
04
Apr
Apr
When I was a boy, I had an uncle who married a flight attendant—or what we called back then a (forgive me) stewardess. It was his second marriage and I was too young to understand the enticing aroma of scandal that swirled around the divorce from his first wife, but even as an elementary school […]
04
Apr
Apr
“Filled with turbulence and sudden plunges in altitude, ‘The Flight Attendant’ is a very rare thriller whose penultimate chapter made me think to myself, ‘I didn’t see that coming.’ The novel — Bohjalian’s 20th — is also enhanced by his deftness in sketching out vivid characters and locales and by his obvious research into the […]
Good Reads, The Writing Process, Untold Stories
The novel, “Midwives,” 20 years later: What was the early reaction to the novel like? Has it changed over time?
12
May
May
It was twenty years ago that “Midwives” was published: 1997. Seinfeld was still on the air. The Spice Girls had two of the year’s biggest hits. The Dow Jones closed for the first time at. . .7,000. Throughout this month I will be answering questions from the Reading Group Center to celebrate the new, twentieth […]
The Writing Process, Untold Stories, Vermont
The novel, “Midwives,” 20 years later: Is there anything I would update or change?
10
May
May
It was twenty years ago that “Midwives” was published: 1997. I had hair then. Our phones were considerably less smart. Our books were made of paper. Throughout this month I will be answering questions from the Reading Group Center to celebrate the new, twentieth anniversary edition of the novel. Here is their first one. As […]
04
Feb
Feb
Of the million and a half words (at least a million and a half) that Howard Frank Mosher published, the sentence I think about most often is the very first sentence of his very first novel: “My father was a man of indefatigable optimism.” It is, like most of his sentences, rhythmically perfect. It has […]
Good Reads, The Writing Process, Untold Stories
An interview in which I reveal my favorite children’s book, what I did before I became a novelist, and my response to one very garish dust jacket
04
Jan
Jan
Over the holidays, I was interviewed about my work and “The Sleepwalker” by Laura Hamlett of Playback St. Louis. I thought her questions were really interesting. Here is the complete interview. Happy reading! * * * LAURA HAMLETT: When I read The Guest Room last fall, I found a new writer to love. I […]
29
Nov
Nov
Dear Friends Who Read and Readers Who Are Friends, When I finish a novel and the book works — and heaven knows that’s not always the case — I am left with a distinct postpartum sadness. I miss the characters and spending time with them in my library everyday. The truth is, I never write from […]
