Ashley Whitaker is the author of BITTER TEXAS HONEY (Dutton). She received her MFA in Prose from the University of Michigan Helen Zell Writers’ Program. Her work has appeared in Tin House, StoryQuarterly, and has received support from the Ragdale Foundation. She lives in Austin with her family. Lillian Li (LL): You have a great […]
Walking up to a large, colorful brick building with art pasted to the windows, I realized that I had always passed by the center without properly seeing it. I learned about the Neutral Zone’s youth-driven programs, including sound-mixing classes, poetry workshops, and a printing press called Red Beard, which I would come to know and love in the coming year.
A Brick House for Books: Lillian Li on Writing with the Youth of the Neutral Zone Read More »
While grabbing more bags from the basement, overhear one of your co-workers mentioning to a customer that the book they are buying was written by a bookseller at this very store! Hear another co-worker chime in that the book is “amazing,” and feel so much warmth in your heart that you could cry. Then hide
The Ten Stages of Selling Your Debut Novel at the Bookstore Where You Work Read More »
Sometimes, you circle and you circle, and you never find the point. But here is mine. I don’t know who will read my novel. I don’t know in what numbers. To ask these questions is to drive myself insane. So here is a better question to drive myself crazy as the days count down. Why do I read in the first place? Why do you?
I had so many of these little notes that I would sometimes scroll down the screen just to see them riffle up, a blur of words that sang of possibility. They belonged to the future, and I carried them, clustered, in my pocket.
Hoarding Notes: The Uselessness of the Writer’s Notebook Read More »
