The poetry in Ananda Lima’s “Mother/Land” delves into the intersection of motherhood and immigration, combining English and Portuguese for a deeply moving and lyrically beautiful experience. The Brazilian-born author plays with both the meaning and sounds of words in both languages, as well as with various poetic forms. The result is poetry that can be Read More
Galia Gichon joins Writers Voices for a lively discussion of her novel – The Accidental Suffragist “What has come up in so many of these conversations, like I did a podcast in Georgia, I did a podcast in Texas just really around the book … and they say “How’s this book relevant today?” – because Read More
Historical novelist Liza Nash Taylor talks about her latest work – All in Good Faith – and how she manages writing from two perspectives. ” It’s funny for me My writing process is – I’ll sit down and some days I feel like I can write dialog , I can write a scene in dialog. Read More
Laura Galloway and her memoir – Dalvi – Six years in the Arctic tundra. … “I made a trip to the Arctic and I absolutely loved it…. it was such a profound juxtaposition from the life that I was living in New York,…. ..During my travels to the Arctic … I met a reindeer herder Read More
Dolores Johnson tells us about suffering and joys of her bi-racial family in – Say, I’m Dead, a family memoir of race, secrets and love. “Say I’m dead is a multi generational story of my family; who endured fear, secrets and separation and finally transformation; because they were not bound by the forbidding race mixing Read More
Winner of the Iowa Short Story Fiction Award Blake Sanz’s short story collection -The Boundaries of Their Dwelling takes us into the place where all of us are immigrants. He talks with us about his work. “The title comes from a line in the Bible, from Act’s I believe, and the full line is “and Read More
“Rob said to me, ‘Don’t think of what’s best for you, think of what’s best for your readers; because your readers want to learn more about what autism is, what kind of an impact you have on others, and more importantly the educators and the parents of kids who have autism…this is going to impact Read More
Daniel Handler aka. Lemony Snicket -talks about his love of writing and his new book for adults – Poison for Breakfast. “When I was young and first interested in books. I felt so deeply connected to books and the world of literature that I knew I wanted to participate in some way. It felt like Read More
I survived the attacks of September 11, 2001 – the graphic novel version of the latest in Lauren Tarshis popular I Survived – series for children. She talks about how it began. “I started writing the series more than ten years ago. And I would say it was shaped by a couple of different forces. Read More
Poet Maggie Smith shares her insights into life and suffering and :joy talking about her new book – Goldenrod, “You are not betraying your grief by feeling joy, You are not being graded and you do not receive extra credit for being miserable 100% of the time. Find pockets of relief, even happiness, where and Read More
A dancer and a writer Renee K Nicholson reflects on the experience of writing her memoir – Fierce and Delicate – Essays on dance and illness. “Anytime you’re writing a memoir, you’re excavating your past and there are things in our past that are always painful. But there was also something wonderfully cathartic about it. Read More
Kristin Contino talk about the craft of writing and her second novel – A House Full of Windsor. “The book is about Debbie and her daughter Sara. We follow Debbie from the 1980’s through the present day; her history of loving the royal family and being a royal family collector to the point where she Read More
Katherine Dean Mazerov talks about the inspiration behind her new novel -Summer Club. “I’m a life long career journalist. I worked as both a writer and an editor and I had never considered writing a book…especially fiction because I come from the nonfiction world. Quite a few years ago I decided to stay at home Read More
Alka Joshi returns to Writers Voices with the second installment of her historical fiction trilogy – The Secret Keeper of Jaipur. She talked with us about her novels and her writing process. ” I am not a good person for routines. I’ve never been good with routines. So for me the best thing to do Read More
The Agitators – Dorothy Wickedness’ new history of three friends who fought for abolition and women’s rights. “It’s so heart-breaking to think of all the women’s live that have been completely lost, and this of course is true for almost every African American, certainly, who are descendants of enslaved people. The histories are gone, mostly, Read More
Kathy Gereau talks about gathering the stories that went into her memoir – Serious Little Catholics “One of the things people ask me about is; How can you remember all that stuff that happened? When ever (my family ) would get together we would tell stories. Remember when this happened? So it’s kind of something Read More
Ellen Michaelson’s award winning novella – The Care of Strangers. ” It’s about how we take care of each other in challenging times. And it’s also about how we get beyond our family expectations to be who we want to be or to do what we want to do in life. It covers a lot Read More
Write a poem, Save your life, A Guide for Teens, Teachers and Writers of All Ages “Well it’s my story, and It’s what motivated me and put me on the mission to teach others and show others this incredible path of writing for healing and empowerment and self expression.” ” I think the really challenging Read More
“The book title: It’s called The Field House ; A Writer’s Life Lost and Found on an Island in Maine. The Field House is the name of Rachel Field’s summer house. That is what it has been called for fifty years by Sutton Islanders. She called it – The Playhouse – because she used money Read More
Tracy Clark author of – Runner – the fourth in the Chicago Mystery series, talks about the research she did to give her novel authenticity “Once I knew that Cass ( the main character) had this sort of background in police work I took two police detectives, female, to breakfast. I said. Well, exactly how Read More
Anita Diamant and Melissa Berton the creators, respectively, of a book and an Oscar winning film dealing with menstrual injustice” – Period, end of sentence. Anita’s collection of essays was inspired by the film and her research. “The real question here is about dignity, One should be able to take care of ones necessary bodily Read More
Lori McMullen grew up in Florida. Her novel – Among the Beautiful Beasts – tells the story of the early life of Everglades advocate Marjory Stoneman Douglas. “Anybody who grew up in south Florida and went through the public school system … knows the name of Marjory Stoneman Douglas.” She is kind of a fixture Read More
“When we as white people adopted black children we learned that there was a whole lot that we did not know and we thought in writing this book that we could bring a perspective that might be helpful for white people in general.” Fern L. Johnson and Marlene G Fine share their insights in their Read More
When the Tempest Passes…and the Wicked is No More -is set in the l890’s; it’s author Linda Kephart-Nash tells her grandmothers story from the early the deaths of her siblings to the disappearance of the fiancé she loved so much and the humiliation of being left at the altar, “The wedding was set and the Read More
Romance writer RaeAnn Thayne talks about her novel – The Path to Sunshine Cove – and her motivations for writing. ” I like stories that make people feel good and that they can be happy at the end of the day, when they were reading them. That was sort of a better fit for my Read More
Gary Kelley talks about why he created his graphic novel – Moon of the Snow Blind, ” “My uncle ..taught me to draw, Gene Kelley, had a lot of books in his house, which was not far from where I was, growing up in Algona. Some of those books kind of got me attracted to Read More
Cozy mystery writer Mia P Manansala talks about her debut novel Arsenic and Adobo. and her motivations for writing it. “I still haven’t been able to find books that represent me and my experience and my family life the way I see it. I have yet to see Filipino Americans in most main stream media Read More
Musician and writer Doug Hoekstra has a new CD out – The Day Deserved . He talks with Writers Voices about his new short story collection – Ten Seconds In-Between – “I’d always written prose here an there… That’s something I’d always done in an on going way. And when I was focused on my Read More
Pam Jenoff is with us again talking about her latest novel – The Woman with the Blue Star – Historical fiction set in Poland during WW2 “I like to tell all the stories and I like the gray areas in people. When I grew up, history was very black and white, in broad brush strokes. Read More
Tami Charles talks about her new young adult novel – Muted – and why she became a writer. “It was through my teaching that I rediscovered my love of writing and my continued passion for books ” “it was my students who said, because we were writing stories together, .., Miss Charles you should really Read More
Historical Fiction writer Jane Healey describes the core of her fascinating new WW2 spy novel -The Secret Stealers. “The Secret Stealers is based on the trues stories of the women of the OSS, the office of strategic services, which was the precursor to the CIA in WW2… it’s also based on some of the true Read More
Writers Voices talks with Jennifer Jordan and Liza Rodman co-authors of -The Babysitter – My summers with a serial killer. A true crime memoir about Liza’s childhood caretaker, serial killer Tony Costa. Liza talks about her writing – ” I wrote my first book when I was ten years old…100 pages. After that I wrote Read More
Alan Gratz takes on 9/11 for young adult readers in his novel – Ground Zero. “I was getting requests from kids, ( they know I write about tough topics) – ‘ Write about 9/11! Write about 9/11!’. And I kept thinking, I don’t know if I can do that emotionally; if I’m ready to go Read More
Judithe Little talks with us about her latest work of historical fiction – The Chanel Sisters. “ I was first drawn to the idea when I found out Coco had a sister, because I had no idea that she even did. And then I was just so intrigued by the idea of what it would Read More
Jenny Lacoat speaks with WRiters Voices about – The Girl from the Channel Islands – a World War II novel based on real events “The channel islands were the only ( part of Britain) that was occupied during the war…. The islanders were left completely defenseless against the might of the Wehrmacht (Nazi.s)” “This was Read More
I dream of Popo, a richly illustrated children’s book, shares it’s creators childhood immigrant experiences. It’s author, Livia Blackburn immigrated from Taiwan with her family at age five. The illustrator, Julia Kuo’s family immigrated from Taiwan before she was born, Both of them leaving their culture and extended families behind. “There are a lot of Read More
Writing team Maika and Maritza Moulite talk with us about their latest book – One of the Good Ones – and about what got them started wring in the first place. “We had grown up reading a ton of books… because our parents didn’t allow us to watch TV during the week. So we went Read More
Stacey Wise introduces us to a world of secrecy and revenge in her new novel -Lie, Lie Again. “I think a lot of (the book) was definitely inspired by just looking a round and seeing what is going on in my own neighborhood. And how, whether it’s on the soccer field or at dance class Read More
Michael Kaufman shares the premise of his new dystopian mystery novel – The Last Exit. “This is a world of growing inequality, of rising unemployment because of… automation, and growing population…By this point big pharma companies have developed longevity treatments,… they’ve made it staggeringly expensive – the ultra rich can live if not forever, then Read More
Annette Libeskind Berkovits on what led to the writing of her collection of poems – Erythra Thalesse a brain disrupted. “My son was 46, six years ago, when he had a massive brain bleed, which is called a hemorrhagic stroke. He was perfectly healthy, big strapping 6 foot 3, father of 3 little girls ..He Read More
Joy Jorden-Lake talks about -Under A Gilded Moon. A southern novel of historical fiction. “There’s something fascinating about the gilded age and this era…Very charming but also very worrisome The immense wealth that could be used in beautiful ways … some used their wealth in ways that some of us would be kind of horrified Read More
The Paris Apartment author Kelly Bowen talks about how she got started “When I had my first son I was on maternity leave and I actually sat down and thought, ‘I should try writing a novel. I love writing. Now seems to be a good time to do it’…. I love history, so I decided Read More
“Though this book tackles some really difficult subjects, it’s ultimately a really hopeful book.” Jennifer Dupee talks about the creation of her new novel. – Little French Bridal Shop. ” “As I began to delve into the writing, I realized Larissa ( the main character) is kind of engaging in more and more deception; and Read More
“I love to set my books in Minnesota. There’s just something that I find so unique about the people here and the culture. We’re so quirky, we’re deserving of books” Join us as we spend an hour talking with Gretchen Anthony as she shares with us the writing of her latest novel – The Kids Read More
“Looking for a way of making sense of things that I encounter, or experiences I’ve had;, reading I’ve done, people I’ve met. Trying to think about it for myself; and convey what I think I’ve found to others.” David Hamilton talks about his writing process and the essays in his new book – A Certain Read More
“An old Hungarian proverb: ‘Adam ate the apple and our teeth still ache.’ At what price do we choose incorrectly.” David Bluder talks about the writing of his novel – The Great Gamble. A thriller about the seamy side of sports. ” I’m a plot person so this is kind of plot heavy…. It kind Read More
“The challenge is to keep cutting, to get to the essence,” Hal Goldstein speaks about the making of his new book, “Meditating Entrepreneurs – Create Inner Freedom and Outer Abundance. – A curated collection of talks by entrepreneurs in the Fairfield Iowa meditating community. “One of the things that characterized all these entrepreneurs is how Read More
“I think when you’re writing for middle school it’s easy to fall into stereo types…One of the fun things is to try and disrupt those and turn those things upside down.” Rob Harrell talks about his new novel – Wink – Surviving middle school with one eye open. “So much change happens between…the end of Read More
“I grew up around a lot of music…I fell in love with it right away. I just became obsessed.” Dave Isaacs talks about his life and music in his new book ” The Perpetual Beginner – A musicians path to lifelong learning. “The book is for people who feel like their skills don’t match up Read More
“I have always been fascinated by Shakespeare. I have always been fascinated by the idea of what happened to Ariel, this all powerful spirit that has been released into the world ( Shakespeare’s play The Tempest)” Pat McKee talks about his new novel – Ariel’s Island .”If we could recognize it and agree upon it, Read More