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"In 1929, three decades into what were the great years for the blue-collar town of Portsmouth, on the Ohio River, a private swimming pool opened and they called it Dreamland." Journalist Sam Quinones discusses his book Dreamland: The True Story of America's Opiate Epidemic (Bloomsbury, 2015), which was awarded the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award in nonfiction.
"I liked that ending and I held onto it through draft after draft.... You know we talk about 'kill your darlings' a lot as writers but this was one darling that I wanted to hold on to, and I knew that it was the right thing." Matthew Salesses, author of The Hundred-Year Flood (Little A, 2015), talks about struggling with writing the end of his novel, and knowing when to keep your darlings.
"You have to research the type of people your characters are—you're getting to know them, and you're also discovering the contours of their stories...." Belinda McKeon, author of the novel Tender (Lee Boudreaux Books, 2016), talks to Frank J. Cunningham about her writing background and process at the 2015 Nantucket Book Festival.
Kwame Dawes talks about the importance of literary activism at the National Book Foundation's 2016 "Why Reading Matters" conference in New York City. Dawes is the founder of the African Poetry Book Fund, which was an honoree of the National Book Foundation's 2015 Innovations in Reading Prize.
Jérémie Guez, author of the new novel, Eyes Full of Empty (Unnamed Press, 2015), translated from the French by Edward Gauvin, talks about being inspired by James Ellroy's work. Ellroy enthusiastically introduces Guez at Skylight Books in Los Angeles for a reading of the new novel.
In an interview with Tonny Vorm, Umberto Eco speaks from his home in Milan about the "pleasure of spending six, seven, eight years to prepare a story" and shares other words of wisdom and advice to offer to aspiring young writers. Eco's latest novel, Numero Zero, translated from the Italian by Richard Dixon, was published in November by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
"I wanted to regain control of experiencing my life in time." Heidi Julavits speaks about the inspiration behind her latest book, The Folded Clock: A Diary (Doubleday, 2015), and why bad book reviews prompted her to start the Believer.
The second year of Poets & Writers Live debuted with an event at the Brava Theater in San Francisco on January 10, 2015, featuring a "poetry keynote" by Pulitzer Prize–winner and former U.S. poet laureate Kay Ryan; conversations about inspiration and the writing life with dozens of authors, including Michelle Tea, David Shields, Wendy Lesser, and D. A. Powell; advice from agent Danielle Svetcov and other publishing professionals; a multigenre, multimedia “inspiration experiment” featuring dancer Sarah Fiske and musician Ben Arthur; and much more.
Acclaimed author Joyce Carol Oates, singer-songwriter Ben Arthur, poet and filmmaker Nick Twemlow, award-winning illustrator Roman Muradov, and dancer Sarah Fiske will present an inspired series of linked performances, followed by a conversation, led by Kevin Larimer, about the creative process and the roots of inspiration.
Melissa Faliveno, associate editor of Poets & Writers Magazine, leads a conversation with authors Wendy Lesser, Yiyun Li, Alejandro Murguia, D. A. Powell, and Michelle Tea about the personal, political, and professional reasons we choose to write while living in a culture, a family, or a community that doesn’t always value what we do.
