Write The Book

Stewart O'Nan has a new one coming out later this month: City of Secrets: A Novel. In this interview from 2012, I spoke with him about his book The Odds: A Love Story. This week’s Write the Book Prompt is to make a list of ten signs of spring in your area, and then use that list as a starting point for your writing. Good luck with this prompt, and please listen next week for another. Music credits:1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).

It's National Poetry Month! This week's interview is with Vermont PoetElizabeth Stabler, whose new collection of poetry, Wren, was published by Red Barn Books in 2015. This week’s Write the Book Prompt was generously suggested by my guest, Elizabeth Stabler. Perhaps because this year has been so unusual, weather-wise, or perhaps because each season is unique, Holly suggested that this week’s prompt be to write about THIS spring. Good luck with this prompt, and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).

AuthorKeith Lee Morris, whose new novel isTravelers Rest(Little Brown). This week’s Write the Book Prompt was inspired by the work of my guest Keith Lee Morris. During our interview, he mentioned that he has, for years, been writing stories based on dreams. “I take a piece of an actual dream, spin it out in the direction of a narrative, and see where it goes,” he said during our conversation. He went on to explain that dream logic doesn’t operate on any principal that we would think of as being real, and yet while we’re in the dream, we still believe it. Keeping this idea in mind, and trying to work within the parameters of what he calls dream logic, try to write a story or a scene or a poem this week, taking an actual dream as your starting point. Good luck with this prompt, and please listen next week for another. Music credits:1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).

Vermont Creativity Coach, Artist and TeacherCourtney Reckord. This week we have two Write the Book Prompts, suggested by my guest, Courtney Reckord. The first is a question that Courtney might ask one of her coaching clients to consider:What is one thing you’d like to accomplish by this time next year?Next is a writing prompt. Write about the most important place in your town.Is it a town building? It is a place that sells or serves food? Is it a meeting place? Describe its significance. Good luck with this prompt, and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).

Two years after this interview from the archives, Vermont author and gardener Ron Krupp published a new book:The Woodchuck Returns to Gardening(Whetstone Books, 2014). The Woodchuck Returns to Gardening is again rooted in organic gardening methods.... a jester called the "Chuckster" follows Ron around making fun of his gardening adventures and asking questions that allow for the inclusion of helpful insights. This week's Write the Book Prompt is to write a scene or a poem in which a character acts as a joker or heckler in some way, but manages to bring a larger truth to the page. Good luck with this prompt, and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).

Vermont authorLaura Williams McCaffrey, whose latest novel isMarked, published byClarion. This week’s Write the Book Prompt is to expand the vocabulary of the world about which you are writing. Laura Williams McCaffrey said in our interview that the fantastical vocabulary of the dystopian world of her novel Marked tends to be functional vocabulary. “Squatties” squat -- that’s what they do, she tells us. In considering the world you are perhaps creating in a piece of fiction, or poetry, or essay, even if you’re not working on a dystopian piece, think about the functional vocabulary of that place, time, or community. Are you writing about a faraway place? Might there be a vocabulary you could research and expand on, or a vocabulary that you should invent? Is there a workplace in your piece that might have specialized functional vocabulary? Perhaps an ad agency that has a code word to refer to an important client waiting in the lobby? Or maybe in your narrator’s family, are there words or expressions specific to their experience that you could add to amplify your reader’s understanding of their life together? Maybe the mother always shouts a certain phrase when she wants the kids to turn out their lights and go to sleep. Maybe she shouts, “BEDTIME!!” at the top of her lungs. Or does she come to the door and barely whisper it, her tone full of consequences. Good luck with this prompt, and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).

An interview from 2012 with authorEowyn Ivey, whose novelThe Snow Child(Reagan Arthur Books) was a 2013 Pulitzer Prize Finalist for Fiction. Eowyn Ivey set her novel, The Snow Child, in her home state of Alaska which, in 1920, was "a brutal place to homestead." The desolate solitude and Alaskan wildness of this setting are vital to the story that Ivey goes on to tell. This week's Write the Book Prompt is to write about a brutal place. Good luck with this prompt, and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).

A new interview withSydney Lea, who has just finished his term as Vermont's Poet Laureate. His new books areNo Doubt the Nameless(Four Way Books) andWhat's the Story? Reflections on a Life Grown Long(Green Writers Press). This week’s Write the Book Prompt is inspired by my new interview with Sydney Lea. Write about a dream, or the memory of a dream, or the almost memory of a dream. Good luck with this prompt, and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).

Interview from 2012 withMargot Livesey, whose novelThe Flight of Gemma Hardyhad just come out from Harper. It went on to win the New England Independent Booksellers Association 2012 book award in Fiction. The Flight of Gemma Hardy was Margot Livesey's homage to Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre. This week's Write the Book Prompt is to consider a favorite book - either a classic, or simply a book that you personally love - and play around with how you might go about paying homage if you were to write a new work. What themes would you maintain and how would you change the book? Would you set it in another time, another place? Would you create a main character who shares the circumstances of the original protagonist? Or would you create a portrayal that only you could recognize as related in any way to the original work? What draws you to this work in the first place? What characteristics do you so admire that it came to mind? Are those qualities that you already try to include in your writing? How might you consciously work toward that? Good luck with this prompt, and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).

Interview from the archives withTimothy D. Wilson, Sherrell J. Aston Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia and a researcher of self-knowledge and affective forecasting. In January 2012, we discussed his bookRedirect: The Surprising New Science of Psychological Change, published by Little, Brown. For this week's Write the Book Prompt, as I did when this interview first aired, I’m going to suggest checking out the Pennebaker writing page that Timothy D. Wilson mentions in his book, Redirect. On this page, you’ll find helpful advice about writing and health that you can read and think about. Good luck with your writing this week, and please listen next week for another prompt. Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).

NovelistSharon Guskin, whose debut novel,The Forgetting Time

Vermont author

Possum.

Julie Barton, author of the new memoirDog Medicine(Think Piece).This week’s Write the Book Prompt was suggested by my guest, Julie Barton, and is based on “Wild Writing” work she has done with San Francisco writing coachLaurie Wagner(who leads online workshops as well as well as bay area classes). Julie says that “wild writing” is a phenomenal writing practice. Here’s the basic assignment: write by hand. Read any one of the following poems (follow the links to read them), and then write for 15 minutes, allowing your read of that poem to inspire you. Write as fast as possible, and even as poorly as possible, without thinking. By letting your subconscious lead the way, you’ll be more likely to access work you might otherwise never have gotten to.These are the poems that Julie recommends:“Where I’m From,” by George Ella Lyon“Permission Granted,” by David Allen Sullivan"Work, Sometimes," by Mary OliverGood luck with this exercise and please listen next week for another.Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).

Award-winning children's author Kate Messner. Since our interview, she has published many new books, including a few in her new Ranger In Time series (Scholastic), about atime-traveling golden retriever.This week’s Write the Book Prompt is inspired by my interview with Kate Messner, who started to write Over and Under the Snow after her class’s snowshoeing field trip. Write a poem, story, or scene that has to do with a winter sport.Good luck with this exercise and please listen next week for another.Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several former South Burlington High School students).