I suppose my mother's reading to me as a child could be logged as my first introduction to fiction. In-between my childhood delight with fiction and my fiction writing career, two masters and a Ph.D. in history happened. It was after my Ph.D. in 1985 that I returned to fiction. I guess I had exhausted my curiosity about the "truth." Or, more accurately, I had exhausted my curiosity about formal historical study as a path to understanding "reality."  Continue reading...

These blogs focus on all things related to the short story genre. Hey, if Nathanial Hawthorne, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway cut their teeth on short stories, why can't you?

I Read a Short Story Today

The Short Story Website

Luna Park

Five Chapters

The National Book Critics Circle announced its nominations for its prestigious annual awards earlier this month. Categories include fiction, nonfiction, biography, autobiography, poetry and criticism. Winners are announced on March 6th -- so hurry up and read everything before the results! Here are the fiction finalists:

Sacred Games by Vikram Chandra

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz

In the Country of Men by Hisham Matar

The Gravedigger's Daughter by Joyce Carol Oates

The Shadow Catcher by Marianne Wiggins

When I began No Place Safe: A Family Memoir, I didn't expect it to be a memoir at all. It was going to be me telling my mother's story of being a cop on a 1980s serial murder investigation. New to nonfiction, I wasn't sure if it should be a biography or a true crime story. Interviewing my mother helped me figure out exactly what story I was going to be telling. I also spent time looking through a box of files, notes and pictures she kept about the case, expecting someone eventually would write about it. She had hoped it would be me, but I resisted for years because I was a novelist, though I hadn't yet sold a novel.  Continue reading...

New York Magazine came up with a novel, so to speak, idea: Ask a bunch of critics to share their favorite underrated book of the past decade. Check out the entire list here. Below are a few of the intriguing titles:

Experience by Martin Amis

Desertion by Abdulrazak Gurnah

The Tender Land: A Family Love Story by Kathleen Finneran

The Fall of a Sparrow by Robert Hellenga

Want to brush up on your writing craft? How about attending a writing workshop? Here are a few of the many outstanding writing workshops and conferences held from coast to coast:

Writers Studio at UCLA Extension

Jackson Hole Writers Conference

Bread Loaf Writers Conference

Maui Writers Conference

(Click here to find more writer workshops and conferences)