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June 16, 2017Writers Working With Actors
Prep for the audio book: it was fun for me to Skype about my characters’ accents with narrator Pascal Langdale before the recording sessions for my new novel. Few people are interested in such arcane ...
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May 05, 2022"Our World is an Amazing Place" Laura Alary on Her New Kids' Book Exploring Photosynthesis, Food, & Connection
It's easy to forget how fascinating the idea that plants can "eat" sunlight and use it to grow and thrive actually is, but in Laura Alary's Sun in My Tummy (Pajama Press, with artwork by Andrea Blinick) ...
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October 08, 2020On Querying into an Apocalypse
"I feel so cooped up in my house with this smoke and the moths that keep flying by my window. Is a weekend really a weekend in 2020 if it doesn't include plague, pestilence, and Hell fire?" - @a_h_reaumeI ...
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May 20, 2023The Joys and Challenges of Writing for Adults AND for Kids
I’ve had May 2 circled on my calendar for months and months—it marks the pub date of my debut picture book, Dear Street. As the launch approaches, I’ve been thinking about how different the processes ...
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March 16, 2021
A love letter (to libraries)
(—and other public places I once wrote to escape violence.)My life is very different from what it was when I began writing. While working on my latest novel, Girl Minus X, I often wrote in public ...
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June 21, 2021Playwright Makambe K Simamba on Fearlessly Exploring "How Far Characters are Willing to Go in Order to Live Their Truths"
CW: discussion of anti-Black violenceIt's a gutting image: a seventeen-year old Black boy, a child in a hoodie, dead far too soon because of hateful and unchecked anti-Black racism. Makambe K Simamba's Our ...
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October 11, 2016The In Character Interview, with Monica Arnaldo
Worry worms its way in with all of us at times, but what if our worries become a little bit over the top? This is the problem Margo encounters in Monica Arnaldo's sweetly funny Margo Thinks Twice (Owl ...
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July 11, 2025Read an Excerpt from Dark Like Under by Acclaimed Author Alice Chadwick
After winning international acclaim for her debut novel, Alice Chadwick is sure to be an author on the rise and one that avid fiction readers will become increasingly familiar with in years to come. ...
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December 02, 201617 for 2017: Sheila Heti recommends The Normal Personality: A New Way of Thinking about People
2. The Normal Personality: A New Way of Thinking about People by Steven Reiss recommended by Sheila Heti.Throughout my tenure as the December Writer-In-Residence, I will be assembling a list of 17 must-read-books ...
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May 23, 2025Unlocking Out of Editing
In my April 2025 column for Open Book, I wrote about the difficulties of locking into editing. Coming back to a manuscript you feel you’ve completed is tricky, especially when you’re at the stage ...
