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Joanna Rakoff’s memoir My Salinger Year (Knopf, 2014) has been adapted into a feature film directed by Philippe Falardeau and starring Margaret Qualley and Sigourney Weaver. Set in 1995, an aspiring writer and poet takes a job at a literary agency in New York City that represents the notoriously reclusive J. D. Salinger and handles his fan mail.
“I think that the body does not let you forget.” In this PBS NewsHour video, Natasha Trethewey reflects on the trauma of her mother’s murder, the subject of her book Memorial Drive: A Daughter’s Memoir (Ecco, 2020), and how the events led her to become a poet and writer. Trethewey is interviewed by Joshunda Sanders in “A Poetics of Resilience” in the July/August 2020 issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
“I’ve never spoken to anyone about this. Until now, until you.” In this installment of the Poets House Presents video series, John Murillo reads two poems from his latest poetry collection, Kontemporary Amerikan Poetry (Four Way Books, 2020). For more Murillo, listen to his Page One author reading of “On Metaphor.”
Rebecca Dinerstein Knight’s debut novel, The Sunlit Night (Bloomsbury, 2015), has been adapted into a feature film directed by David Wnendt and starring Gillian Anderson, Zach Galifianakis, Alex Sharp, and Jenny Slate.
“Unnatural cycles seemed to be / establishing themselves, without regard to our lives.” In this reading and conversation hosted by Green Apple Books, Henri Cole reads from his latest poetry collection, Blizzard (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2020), and speaks to Pulitzer Prize–winning author Forrest Gander about inspiration and the writing process.
In this conversation for Writing Workshops Dallas, Danielle Morvan interviews Jenny Bhatt about her Desi Books podcast and debut story collection, Each of Us Killers (7.13 Books, 2020). For more Bhatt, read her Craft Capsule installment “We Are All Translators.”
In this virtual event for Quail Ridge Books in Raleigh, North Carolina, the late Randall Kenan, author of the story collection If I Had Two Wings (Norton, 2020), and Ron Rash, author of In the Valley: Stories and a Novella Based on Serena (Doubleday, 2020), read from their books and discuss growing up in the South and their writing. Kenan’s If I Had Two Wings is longlisted for the 2020 National Book Award in fiction.
Watch the trailer for the highly anticipated adaptation of Frank Herbert’s 1965 science fiction novel Dune. Directed by Denis Velleneuve, the film stars Josh Brolin, Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Oscar Isaac, and Zendaya.
“As a writer, the idea of readers coming to your work is what it’s all about,” says Brandon Taylor, whose debut novel, Real Life, is shortlisted for the 2020 Booker Prize. In this watch party video announcing the six finalists for the prize, literary director of the Booker Prize Foundation Gaby Wood introduces the 2020 judges and the nominated authors offer their reactions.
“You fill the pool with cough syrup, / and the hot tub with a thousand / hollowed-out cicada shells.” Noah Falck reads “Poem Excluding Modern Technology” from his new poetry collection, Exclusions (Tupelo Press, 2020), in this video poem directed by Kyle Marler with sound by Benjamin Jura.
