Vermont author, educator, environmentalist, and Co-founder of 350.org and Th!rd Act Bill McKibben, in a conversation about his 2022 memoir, The Flag, the Cross, and the Station Wagon: A Graying American Looks Back at His Suburban Boyhood and Wonders What the Hell Happened (Henry Holt & Co).

This week’s Write the Book Prompt was generously offered by my guest, Bill McKibben, and it’s a wonderful back-to-basics exercise that I love as our final prompt. Describe your childhood home. As you heard, Bill’s looked like a square with a triangle on top. What would you remember and share if you were to write about yours? 

Good luck with your work in the coming week.

Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro

Final Show: #772

Vermont Author Nathaniel Ian Miller in a conversation about his novel, The Memoirs of Stockholm Sven (Little Brown).

This week’s Write the Book Prompt was generously offered by my guest, Nathaniel Ian Miller, who recently heard someone extoll the virtues of writing about one’s work. Nathaniel commented that he liked this idea, and that he would like to see more of it. The supposedly mundane aspects of a job, the things you might consider boring about your work, might be full of detail and very rich for readers. So this week, give it a try: write about work.

Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.

Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro

771

Award-winning Vermont Author Brad Kessler in conversation about his 2021 novel, North (Overlook Press).

One review of Brad Kessler’s work, a blurb by the author Chris Abani, mentions  the way that Brad lets his characters’ dignity lead the story. I love this observation, and have been thinking a lot about it. This week’s Write the Book Prompt is to consider the dignity of your characters, no matter what their goals, obstacles, or plight. Consider their dignity as you work to make them real, honest, not caricatures of good or bad. Keep their dignity in mind as you try to find your way, and help them find theirs.

Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.

Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro

770

British Author Caroline Lea, whose new novel is PrizeWomen (Harper Perennial). 

This week's Write the Book Prompt was suggested by my guest, Caroline Lea. It's an assignment she sometimes gives to her students. Go somewhere you wouldn't normally go, and write about it. (Don’t get arrested, she says. Or if you do, don’t blame her!) Her students have visited cemeteries, they've gone to other dorms and spoken with students they wouldn’t usually speak to. Caroline says that there's something about putting yourself in a different space or hopefully a slightly uncomfortably position that forces something often very brilliant into your writing. 

Good luck with your work in the coming week and please tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion. 

Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro

769

An interview from 2015 (with our old music!) with literary agent Emily Forland, of the Brandt Hochman Agency in New York. 

This week’s  Write The Book Prompt is to write about a season you are not presently experiencing. Is it warm where you are? Write about the cold. Is spring coming on? Write about the fall. Work from memory, as much as you can, and then in revising, allow yourself to look at pictures, read online, and check your weather app to be sure you're not forgetting what that other season actually feels like.    Good luck with this exercise and please listen next week for another.     Music Credit: John Fink 768

Vermont Author Annie Seyler, whose debut novel is The Wisdom of Winter (Atmosphere Press). 

This week's Write the Book Prompt was generously offered by my guest, Annie Seyler. Identify a moment from your childhood that shaped you somehow and write it out as a scene, but with a different ending or outcome than the way you lived it.

Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.

 

Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro

767

Olena Kharchenko and Michael Sampson, co-authors The Story of Ukraine (Brown Books Kids).

We have two Write the Book Prompts this week.  Michael Sampson offered one that seemed rather dark, so he turned it on its head and offered another that’s more upbeat. First, describe a nightmare you’ve had, including setting and details that explain why it is so terrifying. Second, look into the future and write about the happiest day you can imagine, including the location, and making your emotions come alive in your descriptions.

Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.

 

Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro

766

Award-winning science writer and journalist Jessica Nordell, author of The End of Bias: A Beginning (Metropolitan). 

This week's Write the Book Prompt was generously suggested by my guest, Jessica Nordell, who points out that observing our own bias can be a challenge. She suggests considering, What would you write if you could be certain that you had infinite love and acceptance - if you didn't have to worry about others' love and acceptance going away? What would you write if you felt that free? 

Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.

Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro

765

 

Fall 2022 Green Mountain Book Festival panel on Mysteries and Thrillers, moderated by Rachel Carter and featuring  authors Miciah Bay Gault, Margot Harrison, Sarah Stewart Taylor, and Sarah Strohmeyer.

This week’s Write the Book Prompt is to play two truths and a lie with a few writing friends. Think of the three scary stories to tell: two that are true and one, a lie. Let the game with friends be fun, but also let it fuel and energize your writing in the coming week and beyond!

Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.

Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro

764

Vermont Author Erika Nichols-Frazer, speaking about her new memoir, Feed Me: A Story of Food, Love and Mental Illness (Casper Press).

This week's Write the Book Prompt was generously offered by my guest, Erika Nichols-Frazer. Feed Me is all about memories and food. Think of a food that holds some emotional significance: a pie you used to bake with your grandmother, something that you eat on special occasions, maybe something you've discovered in your travels. Describe that food in all its sensory details—the tastes, smells, textures—as well as you can, and connect that with the the emotions you feel when you eat that food as well as the circumstances: what's around you, where you are, who's there. See where that takes you.

Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.

Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro

762

Vermont Author Andrew Liptak, whose recent book is Cosplay: A History: The Builders, Fans, and Makers Who Bring Your Favorite Stories to Life (Saga Press).

This week’s first Write the Book Prompt won’t surprise you, if you listened to the interview. Dress in costume and write about the person you see yourself representing. If you have a costume that works for a character you’re working on, great. If not, try to change one thing about your appearance to help you access that character. Does he have a mustache and you do not? Stick on a fake, or draw one above your lip. Does she wear a tiara, pencil skirts, stilettos, sandals, penny loafers? Find something you can try on and see if it helps you embody the person you are trying to get right on the page. Maybe a character you’re working on is on vacation, and he dresses like any number of other men - nothing really worthy of being labeled a costume. But as he’s away from work for a while, you might try to write with a tie, to get a feel for what he’s presently released from, and then wear a collared shirt with the top button undone. Maybe that will give you some idea of how he feels, physically, at this stage in his life.

Andrew Liptak kindly sent in a prompt as well, one that I really like. Take a favorite character, and then go back three generations to their great-great-grand parents. What personality / family / traits or habits does your character have that might have originated from their ancestors?

Good luck with your work in the coming week, and tune in next week for another prompt or suggestion.

Music Credit: Aaron Shapiro

761