This week's 1st Books guest, Marybeth Whalen, is the author of four novels, including the just released The Wishing Tree, which Sheila Roberts calls, “A lovely journey of discovery and forgiveness.” She also runs She Reads, an online book club celebrating the best in women’s fiction. I met her at the Pulpwood Queens…

Mac and I spent several weeks in the English Lakes - home of poet William Wordsworth and Peter Rabbit author Beatrix Potter, among others - as an escape from the empty nest left when our youngest set off for college. We chose it for the simple reason that it was to be the setting for my next novel. We had no idea what a magical place it was until we got there, or how steeped…

I'm in the seventh literary heaven to be introducing today's guest: Karen Joy Fowler is the author of six novels and three story collections, including The Jane Austen Book Club, which spent thirteen weeks on the New York Times bestsellers list; Sister Noon, a finalist…

When I first met Sarah Jio - at the Pulpwood Queens Weekend in January of last year - she had both a new baby and a new book along with her (and a very supportive spouse). Since then, I've watched her do the career life balance thing at an awesome level, cranking out books and articles at a dizzying pace while raising children with a husband who works full-time. Her fourth novel, The…

I know, I know. Caramel. Crunch. Or maybe it's the Mocha Cookie Crumble that has your number. No doubt Jane Austen would have gone for the crunch rather than, say, Hume's multi-volume History of England, and where would we be now? If Scott wouldn't have made the decision on his own, Zelda would have insisted that last $5 be spent for a Mocha Cookie Crumble rather than A Farewell to Arms. If Beatrix Potter had had to pass by the Tazo Iced Green Tea Latte ...…

I first "met" today's guest author, Amy Sue Nathan, when she interviewed me for her blog, Women's Fiction Writers. I was on a layover at a packed, noisy airport, standing in a coffee line as we spoke by phone, but Amy somehow made that impossible interview so good that Ballantine bound it into The Four Ms. Bradwells paperback. We met in person at the Tribune Lit…

Joan Steinau Lester's second novel, Mama's Child released yesterday. Alice Walker calls it "an astonishing accomplishment ... riveting art," and it's an Ebony Magazine Editor's Pick. Joan is also the author of four other books, including the novel Black, White,…

The New York Times Modern Love column had already turned her down twenty times, but no matter: she lobbed in another submission—about her pet tortoise. And when her ninth novel was turned down by her publisher, she picked up her manuscript and accepted an original issue paperback offer from Algonquin. The beginning of the end of a literary career that started with winning Redbook’s Young Writers Contest and included a New York Foundation of the Arts Award, a National Magazine…

Having only recently learned to size my Timeline photos 403x403 square only to find that no longer works with the new face of Facebook timeline--or at least not all the time--I thought I'd share a few Facebook tips I've learned in the last few days, months, and years, often the hard way. Some of these are practical, some philosophical:

1. SIZE MATTERS: If you don't want your personal timeline photos to be randomly cropped by facebook, size them as 640 x 480 pixels. On a page timeline,…

Allie Larkin is the internationally bestselling author of the novel Stay. Jen Lancaster calls her "a master at creating complex characters who feel like old friends and crafting situations that you’d swear really happened," and says of her new novel, Why Can't I Be You, "I…

Elizabeth Benedict is the author of five novels, including the bestseller Almost, and the National Book Award finalist, Slow Dancing, as well as The Joy of Writing Sex: A Guide for Fiction Writers. She is the editor of two anthologies, the just-published What My Mother Gave Me:…

I'm delighted today to host Caroline Paul, whose Lost Cat is just out from Bloomsbury. Publisher's Weekly, in a starred review, calls it "Hilarious and moving" and says, "Even non–cat lovers will find this an engaging read, charmingly illustrated by Paul’s partner, [Wendy] MacNaughton, as Paul easily makes her strong emotions for her pets accessible and universal." Caroline is also the author of…

My fellow 85 Broad, Shannon Huffman Polson, has a first memoir being published by Zondervan/Harper Collins next Tuesday. Scott Russell Sanders calls North of Hope, "Daring, perceptive and eloquent," and says, "Polson's writing is clear and forceful. Like all true pilgrimages, this one is challenging, and well worth taking." Shannon has also published essays and articles in literary…

I could not be more delighted to be hosting Ellen Sussman today. Her third novel, The Paradise Guest House, released yesterday. Ellen's last novel, French Lessons, was a New York Times bestseller, and this one is even better. Publisher's Weekly, in a starred review, says of it, “Two survivors of Bali's terrorist bombing find love and spiritual rebirth on an island whose inhabitants…

Nichole Bernier's fabulous The Unfinished Work of Elizabeth D - which was a finalist for the New England Independent Booksellers fiction award - is just out in paperback. J. Courtney Sullivan calls it, "a compelling mystery and a wise meditation on friendship, marriage and motherhood in an age of great anxiety," and the Washington Post says, "Bernier’s…

I've just added The Company of Writers by Hilma Wolitzer to my favorite writing books list on the writers tips page of my website, in part because of the great advice it offers for successful writing groups. The reasons I love this book are too many to mention in one little blog post on a lazy Saturday, but I'm going to start with her first line:…

Monica Wesolowska's first book, Holding Silvan, was decades in the making, but when Monica was finally emotionally ready to write the story of her first child, the time she'd spent writing served her well. Kate Tuttle, writing in…

Playwright and novelist Lynne Kaufman is the author of eleven full-length plays which have been produced in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Washington D.C. and Louisville, at theaters including The Magic, Actors Theatre of Louisville,and Theatreworks. She's won the NEA/Kennedy Center Fund for New American Plays and Theatreworks Best New Play in California. She's also published three novels, as well as short stories in Cosmopolitan,…

The Murderer's Daughters author, Randy Sue Meyers, has a new novel, The Comfort of Lies, just out. I read the book in manuscript last spring (in Paris!), and could not agree more with the Boston Globe, which calls it "An impressively executed novel, disturbing and convincing.” Randy shared this post…

This week's guest author, Julie Kibler, began writing Calling Me Home after learning a bit of family lore: as a young woman, her grandmother fell in love with a young black man in an era and locale that made the relationship impossible. Like so many of us, Julie struggled at first to call herself “writer,” but now her debut novel, which Kirkus calls "an…