by Jennifer Haupt
I returned from Rwanda with a laptop full of stories from genocide survivors and aid workers, stories of reconciliation and forgiveness, stories of inhumane atrocities and superhuman resilience, stories of grace when there can be no forgiveness—stories of amahoro, the Rwandan greeting that literally means peace.
by Sonya Chung
“When I said to my students that we’re all in this together, it was true . . . I needed to show them it’s never too late and to persevere is essential (with publishing) but more than anything else, to honor one’s creative side is the most important thing.”
by Elaine Neil Orr
The re-living of that November morning with my father—through the conjuring of my character—was so powerful, I had to lie down in the hallway to recompose myself. It was as if part of me still lingered behind in that other realm.
by Mollie Weisenfeld
Here for your TBR pleasure are five Bloomers with books coming out in 2018.
by Jan English Leary
“I turned to fiction writing because I wanted to dive beneath what we can see, to delve into what drives us, our feelings, our yearnings and desires, our fears and our revulsions, the whole thicket of our emotions.” Continue reading
by Joan Schweighardt
“I don’t want to miss anything. All my life my goal was to photograph beauty, and as a result I never before had a chance to be ‘in’ it.” Continue reading
by Ericka Taylor
“I wanted to try a construction where you could see both before- and after-images of characters as they exist outside the main events of the novel.” Continue reading
by Steve Wiegenstein
I was struck by the parallels between the war in Iraq and Missouri’s experience in the Civil War: an occupying army, a restive civilian population whose loyalties were hard to determine, a landscape in which separating enemy from ally was a constant problem, bands of freelance fighters who used the larger war as an excuse to carry out their own vendettas, and a pervasive atmosphere of uncertainty and violence. Continue reading
by Shoba Viswanathan
“As for the relationship between faith and feminist activism in the real world . . . there’s such a troubled history of institutional religions supporting the powerful against the powerless . . . That legacy will have to be reckoned with.” Continue reading
by Evelyn Somers
“I’ve compared the short-story to a garbage can with a rat inside; you can hear the rat hit the can again and again, and then at the end he lifts the lid off the can and breaks free.” Continue reading
by Sonya Chung
I wanted to invent a specific, believable family, throw a naïf into their mix, and see what could happen. I love Alice Munro, [her stories] feel so lived that it’s as if the woman has had a hundred different lives. I wanted to try to create something that could approach that level of credibility. Continue reading
