Ten Questions for Khaled Mattawa
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“Don’t ever find your voice.” —Khaled Mattawa, author of Fugitive Atlas
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Read weekly interviews with authors to learn the inside stories of how their books were written, edited, and published; insights into the creative process; the best writing advice they’ve ever heard; and more.
“Don’t ever find your voice.” —Khaled Mattawa, author of Fugitive Atlas
“There are so many ways.” —Destiny O. Birdsong, author of Negotiations
“You may not see it, but I am always writing.” —Heid E. Erdrich, author of Little Big Bully
“Write with yourself and your own healing in mind, before you think of anyone else.” —Cicely Belle Blain, author of Burning Sugar
“We are all authors. Let us acknowledge everyone.” —Juan Felipe Herrera, author of Every Day We Get More Illegal
“I’ve been writing it for eighteen years. More than half my life.” —Fariha Róisín, author of Like a Bird
“Choose the bilingual, the multilingual, and the polyglot.” —Ricardo Alberto Maldonado, author of The Life Assignment
This week’s installment of Ten Questions features Marie NDiaye and Jordan Stump, the author and the translator of That Time of Year.
“I had to sit with the fear and let it talk to me.” —Joshua Bennett, author of Owed.
“The glimmer of an idea appears in my notebook long before I begin writing.” —Daisy Johnson, author of Sisters
"Writing is part of my life, and life is part of my writing.” —Khadijah Queen, author of Anodyne
“Often it was the help of an outside perspective that allowed me see what I was trying to do.” —Shruti Swamy, author of A House Is a Body
“It’s pretty clear that the entire system is due for a serious reckoning.” —Melissa Faliveno, author of Tomboyland
“I write sporadically and edit often.” —francine j. harris, author of Here Is the Sweet Hand
“I would remind myself that every book has its own life and to just have faith in the story.” —Cherie Dimaline, author of Empire of Wild
“We need the industry to be more reflective of the audience.” —Adrian Tomine, author of The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Cartoonist
This week’s installment of Ten Questions features Ryad Girod and Chris Clarke, the author and the translator of the novel Mansour’s Eyes.
“Feel for the thread. Follow it through the dark.” —Kendra Atleework, author of Miracle Country
“Kevin Killian always told me great fiction lets you know how things smell.” —Andrew Durbin, author of Skyland
“There’s a balance to be struck between what you reveal and what you hold back.” —Sophie Mackintosh, author of Blue Ticket
“Writing is supposed to be fun. Enjoy yourself.” —Kyle McCarthy, author Everyone Knows How Much I Love You
“I always write better from a place of joy than I do from a place of discipline.” —Emily Temple, author of The Lightness
“The uneven rhythms of grief don’t allow you to do or to feel life as you did before.” —Rachel Eliza Griffiths, author of Seeing the Body
“What’s most fundamental is being able to listen.” —Lauren Russell, author of Descent
“I have a deeply unhealthy work-life balance in that the Venn diagram of those things is a circle.” —Ilana Masad, author of All My Mother’s Lovers