The 7am Novelist

Today, I’m talking to Courtney Maum, literary citizen extraordinaire, educator, writing coach, and author most recently of Alan Ops Out. She says the book took an “obscene” number of drafts because she couldn’t distance herself from her female character, when the story needed this character to be wildly different. She needed, as Courtney calls it, to “fictionalize” her fiction. Watch a recording h...

Today, I’m talking to Hank Phillippi Ryan, author of the upcoming thriller Mother Daughter Sister Stranger. Hank had sent what she calls a “best-it-could-be” draft of the book to her editor, when her editor turned it back around and told her to cut an entire point of view. That’s a tough message to hear when an author thinks they’ve already crossed the finish line. How did she do it? Watch a recor...

Today, I’m talking to Trisha Blanchet, author of the recently released debut, Murder Like Magic. Trisha is a former journalist, and I know plenty of journalists who are great with cranking the pages out. But Trisha often found that she just needed to slow down and give more. So we’ll talk about how she did it. Watch a recording here. This audio/video version is available for one month. Missed it?...

Today, I’m talking to Andrew Ridker, author of his upcoming third novel, Everything Must Go, which will be released next year . We’ll be discussing voice and how a writer might retain one’s voice while crossing into a new genre. This seems a particularly tricky issue, because different genres often demand different kinds of voices, but of course as a writer still wants their work to sound like the...

Today, I’m talking to Alexis M. Wright about how she’s built a writing career through literary citizenship. She’ll share concrete examples of how one act of service or connection tends to cascade into the next. For Alexis and others, being a good literary citizen is as career-defining as the writing itself. Watch a recording here. This audio/video version is available for one month. Missed it? Che...

Today, I’m talking to Rachel Kousser, author of Alexander at the End of the World: The Forgotten Final Years of Alexander the Great. As a Classics professor, she had to make a big adjustment from argument-focused academic writing to story-focused narrative nonfiction. Her writing partner, Ilyon Woo, was critical to her success. Watch a recording here. This audio/video version is available for one...

Today, I’m talking to Peter Ho Davies about the difficult task of writing about your loved ones. He struggled with this both in his recent novel and in the memoiristic frame he created for his book The Art of Revision . And he’s still struggling with it with his new work-in-progress. What advice does he have for us to get through it? Watch a recording here. This audio/video version is available fo...

Kelly J. Ford returns to the 7am Novelist to talk project management, finding your genre, and not giving up. I don’t charge for subscriptions, but if you’d like, you can support my work with with a small donation here . To find Ford’s latest book as well as many other books by our authors, visit our Bookshop page . Kelly J. Ford is the Anthony-nominated author of Real Bad Things; Cottonmouths , a...

Today, fabulous fiction duo Patricia Park and Desmond Hall talk about how writing is like exercise, how to invest in your writing career, and the importance of finding a great teacher and writing community. I don’t charge for subscriptions, but if you’d like, you can support my work with with a small donation here . To find Park and Hall’s latest book as well as many other books by our authors, vi...

Tessa Fontaine and Annie Hartnett return to talk about accountability (and their new writing retreat). I don’t charge for subscriptions, but if you’d like, you can support my work with with a small donation here . To find Fontaine and Hartnett’s latest books as well as many other books by our authors, visit our Bookshop page . Tessa Fontaine is the author of THE ELECTRIC WOMAN: A MEMOIR IN DEATH-D...

Today, I’m happy to be talk again with AE Osworth as we revisit the concept of Joy-Writing since their publication of their latest novel, AWAKENED. I don’t charge for subscriptions, but if you’d like, you can support my work with with a small donation here . To find Osworth’s latest book as well as many other books by our authors, visit our Bookshop page . A.E. Osworth is a transgender novelist. T...

Today, I finally get a chance to talk to Crystal King whose latest novel, THE HAPPINESS COLLECTOR, was released in December. We’re talking about how a writer might transition into using speculative elements in their fiction—something a lot of authors are playing with right now—as well as the thorny issue of technology, not only how to handle it, but how to make sure it doesn’t squash any mystery y...

Today, I’m talking to Rosie Sulton & Barbara Best, directors of a new initiative called Peer Coaching for Writers . Watch a recording here. This audio/video version is available for a few weeks. Missed it? Check out the podcast version above or on your favorite podcast platform. For more info, go here . Or email Rosie and Barbara directly: rosie@convu.com / barbara@convu.com I don’t charge for sub...

Today, I’m talking to Elizabeth Searle , author most recently of the story collection: THE DRAMA ROOM: A Collection in Three Acts. We’re going to be talking about how her scriptwriting has helped her fiction and vice versa, for any of you who might be “script curious.” Watch a recording here. This audio/video version is available for one week. Missed it? Check out the podcast version above or on y...

Today, I’m talking to Charlene Wang , whose debut novel, I’LL FOLLOW YOU, was released in October. We’re going to be talking about how she woke up her passive protagonist by paying attention to the tactile and—simply or not simply—giving her character “something to do with her hands.” Watch a recording here. This audio/video version is available for one week. Missed it? Check out the podcast versi...

Today, I’m so happy to get the chance to talk again with Sheri Joseph . I’ve always been a fan of her work, and her latest, Angels at the Gate , is the kind of dark, academic mystery that also takes its time in digging into the realities of a certain kind of campus life. We’ll be talking about an idea she often teaches about at Georgia State University, and that is how revision is about pushing to...

Today, I’m excited to have acclaimed writer Peter Orner with us, author most recently of The Gossip Columnist’s Daughter . We’ll be talking about how he struggled with the structure and timeline of the book. It took him fourteen years. He explains that he was trying to say something slowly. We discuss exactly what that means and how to do it in a time when very little seems slow and it’s difficult...

Today, I’m talking to Kristin Vukovic and Jo Piazza , who are co-instructors of the Adriatic Writers Conference that takes place on the island of Lošinj in Croatia’s Kvarner Bay. Jo finished her most recent novel during the conference, titled THE PARISIAN HEIST which will be released on Bastille Day, and Kristin, who founded the conference, got her inspiration there for her debut, THE CHEESEMAKER’...

Today our roundtable focuses on Climate Fiction: What is it? Why do authors write it? What role does it have in today’s literature, in our environment, in the way writers and others see the world? We’ll discuss these questions and a whole lot more with our authors: Ash Davidson, author of Damnation Spring ; Wren James, creator of The Climate-Conscious Writers Handbook and founder of the Climate Fi...

A short and special episode for those of you interested in our unique in-person novel revision program, now in its fifteenth year. For more info: https://grubstreet.org/write/novel-incubator To attend our student showcase on January 12, register here: https://grubstreet.org/event/novel-incubator-alumni-celebration-showcase And for our next info session, visit: https://grubstreet.org/event/novel-in...

Today, we’re talking to Josh Barkan , an author of three books of fiction, who has turned at last to memoir writing. We discuss his experience in writing about a particular moment in his life before his subject gave him his ending. Ten years later, he revised the book again in the aftermath. How did the writing change him and his subject? How did those years benefit his book and his understanding...

Today, we’ve got one of my favorites, Milo, who has just published his debut novel to critical acclaim. It’s called THE LILAC PEOPLE. He’s going to be talking to us about writing challenging fiction in an age when we’re suffering a flattening and simplifying of our culture. I don’t charge for subscriptions, but if you’d like, you can support my work with with a small donation here . To find Todd’s...

Today, I’m talking to Jessica Francis Kane, author of the recently released novel, FONSECA, based on a trip that acclaimed English writer Penelope Fitzgerald took in the Winter of 1952 in an attempt to inherit a personal and creative lifeline from two elderly relatives. We’ll be talking about how Jessica wove personal letters into the narrative as well as how she managed the point of view of a lit...

Today, we’ve got one of our star Novel Incubator alums, Emily Ross, who has just published her second novel, SWALLOWTAIL , a book that combines mythology, teenage longing, and small-town murder. It’s one of the first books out from the new Galiot Press. We’ll be talking about how Emily, normally an intuitive writer, had to sink her teeth into the more intentional plotting and structure of a myster...

Today we have another of our roundtables and we’re focusing on voice: What really is voice? How does a writer create it? Change it? How do we differentiate between the writer’s voice and that of the narrator or character? When is voice too writerly or too uninspired? And how is it different from style? We’ll talk about these questions and a whole lot more with our four authors: Juliet Faithfull, S...