Write The Book

Interview from the archives with novelist Alice Lichtenstein. We discussed her book, Lost, which was published in March 2010 by Scribner.Today's Write The Book Prompt is to write about either an arrogant, opinionated person committing a subtle act, or a shy, nervous person creating a public disturbance. Good luck with these exercises and please listen next week for another.Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several South Burlington High School students

Interviews highlighting three local groups that are making the Burlington area writing community much richer: The Burlington Writers' Workshop (Peter Biello), The Renegade Writers' Collective (Angela Palm and Jessica Hendry Nelson), and The Writers' Barn (Lin Stone and Daniel Lusk).Today I have two Write The Book Prompts. The first is to write about two interactions between lifelong friends: the first time they meet, and the last time they meet. Limit each scene to a page, but try to intimate a whole friendship into those two pages, letting us know who these people are, how they eventually influence each other, how important they become in each other's lives. Today's second prompt was suggested by my guest, the poet Daniel Lusk. It's a prompt he used recently in the poetry group at the Writers Barn: Write a poem with a red dress in it. Good luck with these exercises and please listen next week for another.Music credits: 1) “Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) “Filter” - Dorset Greens (a Vermont band featuring several South Burlington High School students

2010 interview with novelist Ginnah Howard, whose new book, Doing Time Outside, comes out this month from Standing Stone Books. Given that we're moving into August, and the nights are growing cooler - at least in Vermont - today's Write The Book Prompt is to write about the end of summer.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 South Burlington High School students.

Literary Agent Stéphanie Abou, of Foundry Literary + Media. Today's Write The Book Prompt was suggested by my guest, Stéphanie Abou. It's really threefold. First, Stéphanie says that sometimes, when you're stuck, it's best to gnaw at it for a while. Second, she recommends trying Proust's famous pastiche: when you get sick of your writing and you feel stuck, read a classic work and then write a paragraph or a page "in the voice of" that author, imitating that other voice. There's no pressure, because it's just to get you unstuck; you're not trying to access your own voice as much as do an exercise to get the world spinning again, get out of your own head. And then third, go back to writing pages about your character that aren't pretty or voice driven. Even just a bulleted list: she's 5'6" - brunette - she has brown eyes - she had a messed-up childhood. Going back like this will help you know your character better. What's her favorite color? Her favorite music? If you don't know your character well enough, the reader will pick up on it. So do this exercise, not necessarily to use in the work, but to better familiarize yourself with the person you're writing about.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 South Burlington High School students.

PoetJenny Mary Brown, Editor-in-Chief of New South, Georgia State University’s journal of art and literature. Today's Write The Book Prompt was suggested by my guest, Jenny Mary Brown. It's a prompt that was, in turn, suggested to her by her friend, the poet Christine Swint. Choose a poem by one of the great old poets and type it into your computer. After you've typed it, go line by line and respond with your own original line. Delete the old poem's lines as you go. This is a useful process to learn someone's rhythms. Christine did it once with one of Roethke's greenhouse poems, one where he is on top of the greenhouse. Her poem ended up being about looking down at something from a great height. 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 South Burlington High School students

Vermont Poet Laureate Sydney Lea, whose tenth collection of poems, I Was Thinking of Beauty, is now available from Four Way Books. Skyhorse Publishing has just published A North Country Life: Tales of Woodsmen, Waters and Wildlife. This interview is also available to watch, thanks to production by RETN, the Regional Educational Technology Network in Burlington, VT. Today's Write The Book Prompt is to write a poem that involves a recollection of an old friend, and a reaction to the natural world. 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 South Burlington High School students

2013 Interview with the writer Abby Frucht, whose collection of stories, The Bell at the End of a Rope, is new from Narrative Library.Today's Write The Book Prompt was mentioned by my guest, Abby Frucht, during our interview. You may recall that when we spoke, she said that she will ask new students to read the opening line or lines of a story, and then to use those lines to "project the objects, events, circumstances, characters, techniques, perspectives ... structural inclinations, anything that will take place over the course of the story." So today's prompt is to do this. Read the opening lines of a story - not one of your own, of course - and make a list of these story elements for which you might see the opening lines laying the groundwork. Then put down your list of gleaned ideas, read the full story, and see how the piece of fiction emerges from those early sentences. Don't look at this as a test of your ability to predict the story, but to understand how that author uses the early sentences to lead the reader into the story. In our interview, Abby said that the first lines have both the responsibility and the privilege of that introduction -- they lay down the clues about how the rest of the story might be drawn. 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 South Burlington High School students

Interview with bestselling Vermont authorChris Bohjalian about his 2010 book,Secrets of Eden. Chris's latest novel, The Light in the Ruins, comes out July 8th, at the start of his Rock and Roll Book Tour with Vermont author Stephen Kiernan. Today'sWrite The Book Prompt is inspired by Chris Bohjalian’s newest novel, The Light in the Ruins, which is described on his website - among other things - as a story of moral paradox. This week, write about a moral paradox. 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 South Burlington High School students

Interview with poetLeslie Ullman. Prompt: This week'sWrite The Book Prompt is to write a story, a scene, or a poem that includes the words thump, pummel, stovetop and egg yolk. 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 South Burlington High School students

Author Lewis Buzbee, interviewed at the request of a listener. (Thanks, Shannon!) We discuss his middle-grade novel Bridge of Time, published by Feiwel and Friends, and his nonfiction book for all readers, The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop, published by Graywolf. Today's Write The Book Prompt was suggested by my guest, Lewis Buzbee. He calls this "the memory thief," and it's a timed writing exercise. The memory thief is on his way to your house. You have just ten minutes before he gets there. You get to keep any of your memories that you manage to write down before he arrives. Anything you don't get on paper is lost to you. Write madly, without censoring yourself or taking time to edit. Lewis says that wonderful, weird images will come out of this prompt, and people almost always start in childhood. Good luck with this exercise and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) "Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) "Filter" - Dorset Greens (a former Vermont band featuring several South Burlington High School graduates)

Roxana Robinson, author of five novels and three collections of short stories. Her latest novel is Sparta, published June 4th by Sarah Crichton Books. Today's Write The Book Prompt was suggested by my guest, Roxana Robinson. The first exercise she always offers to her students is this: write one page, no more, and include two voices and a conflict: nothing but dialogue, and no description. She says what comes from this setup is always interesting. With only dialogue and conflict, the writer naturally supplies everything the reader needs to understand. Good luck with this exercise and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) "Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) "Filter" - Dorset Greens (a former Vermont band featuring several South Burlington High School graduates).

An interview with author and librarian Josh Hanagarne, who has Tourette's Syndrome, and whose memoir The World's Strongest Librarian was published in May by Gotham. Also, the first of a new series of WTB Book Chats with the owner of Bear Pond Books in Montpelier, Claire Benedict. (The Woman Upstairs, by Claire Messud; And The Mountains Echoed, by Khaled Hosseini; Flora, by Gail Godwin; The Unchangeable Spots of Leopards, by Kristopher Jansma; and The Orphan Master's Son (Pulitzer Prize for Fiction) by Adam Johnson.) Today’s Write The Book Prompt is inspired by the work of today’s first guest, Josh Hanagarne. The inside jacket of his book, The World's Strongest Librarian, refers to Josh as an unlikely hero. This week, write about an unlikely hero. Good luck with this exercise and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) "Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) "Filter" - Dorset Greens (a former Vermont band featuring several South Burlington High School graduates).

Creator of the long-running and critically acclaimed graphic novel series Proof, and novelist, Alex Grecian. Writing about the famous London Murder Squad, Alex Grecian's latest is The Black Country, published by Putnam. Today's Write The Book Prompt is to write about the first sunny day after a long period of rain or sleet or snow. Good luck with this exercise and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) "Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) "Filter" - Dorset Greens (a former Vermont band featuring several South Burlington High School graduates)

Author and teacher Lawrence Sutin, who publishes books in multiple genres including biography, memoir, history and the novel. At the time we spoke, in December 2009, his latest was When To Go into the Water, published by Sarabande Books. Today’s Write The Book Prompt is inspired by something I found on Lawrence Sutin’s website - a project he calls Erasure Books. He works with “old, sturdy” texts, and erases or crosses out most of the original text in an attempt to find something unexpected and alive. He also erases image, and creates collage out of images in new texts. You can find a more detailed explanation, with examples, on his website. This week, your prompt is to take a discarded piece of your own work, something you didn’t like or use for whatever reason, and practice erasure to salvage something pleasing or worthwhile or new. Here’s an example, using the opening paragraph of a story I never did anything with: Billy liked to watch the rainbow puddles form on the cracked slopes of the garage floor. So many cars dripped oil through here, and puddles formed, swirling with color when the temperature rose above freezing. It was almost spring, so he didn't need the heat on inside the booth anymore. In the winter, he sometimes slipped off his boots and rubbed his woolen feet over the small heater's scalding surface. But now it was warmer out, almost spring. The metal box remained on the floor, and once summer came, he'd flip a switch and turn it into a fan. It was off today, though. Billy liked rainbow puddles on cracked swirling color. Freezing inside the booth. In the winter, boots rubbed the scalding surface. Once summer, turn today. So I’m pretty sure I need to keep going - playing with these erasures - but that’s an interesting start to something different. Maybe a poem, or maybe a new way to present Billy’s world, by erasing some extraneous words to turn the paragraph on its side and see it differently. Good luck with this exercise and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) "Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) "Filter" - Dorset Greens (a former Vermont band featuring several South Burlington High School graduates)

Robert and Martha Manning, Vermont authors of Walking Distance: Extraordinary Hikes for Ordinary People, published by Oregon State University Press. Today's Write The Book Prompt, of course, involves walking. On a piece of paper, write down a problem you've been having in your written work. You might write something very general, like setting. Or you might write something more detailed, like, Why is Melody so afraid of dogs? You might write a few lines from a poem, and then add "structure," or "line breaks," if the poem's structure has been giving you a hard time. Fold up the piece of paper and put it in your pocket. Then go for a walk. While walking, look around, enjoy the day, enjoy the beauty of the environment. Do not re-read the words while you're out. Don't focus on the problem, but let it sit in your pocket, a quiet presence that needs resolution. Then go back to your desk, right away when you get home, and start to write. Good luck with this exercise and please listen next week for another. Music credits: 1) "Dreaming 1″ - John Fink; 2) "Filter" - Dorset Greens (a former Vermont band featuring several South Burlington High School graduates)