After all, why should we have access to the characters' sex lives? Raven Leilani, author of Luster, says "I try to portray it in the way that moves me when I see it, when it is awkward and silly, which it often is. To depict it that way is to make it tender; what it looks like when two...
Maria Dahvana Headley, whose Mere Wife and new translation of Beowulf have electrified readers (and listeners) on a teenage inspiration: "I happened upon The Hearing Trumpet by Leonora Carrington, who was a surrealist painter and writer. ... I didn’t really know anything about surrealists then. The novel is full of wild characters that are very elderly women. It’s also...
Pam Jenoff - you may know her from The Diplomat's Wife, The Lost Girls of Paris, and many other novels - started taking writing classes just as soon as she began practicing law. "She has learned to be a tireless reviser — a skill acquired in the legal world, where 'people are always marking up your work.' She says,...
