Barbara Stark-Nemon

How did you become a writer? / Name your writing influences. I believe there is a through line having to do with an attraction to stories, beginning in my childhood at the dinner table of my German immigrant grandfather who was a master storyteller (and his wife, my grandmother, was a wonderful letter writer.) My grandfather intentionally cultivated storytelling in his grandchildren (we got a better dessert for a well-told story). The lives of his family became the basis of my first novel, Even in Darkness.

Then I became an avid reader. Notable early influences — To Kill a Mockingbird, A Tale of Two Cities, the work of D.H. Lawrence, and A.S. Byatt’s Possession These were some of the books that made me say to myself I want to do THAT.

I had the proverbial commanding and demanding seventh grade English teacher who taught me skills I’ve built on throughout my career. I studied English literature, art history and journalism (literary, visual and cultural stories!) at the University of Michigan.

From there I became an English teacher with a special interest in children who had challenges reading and writing. That led me to become a speech and language therapist working with deaf and language disabled children who all had stories but had a hard time communicating them verbally and therefore in reading or writing. Figuring out how we work with language and helping kids do that more easily has made me a better communicator as well.

After a 30-year career working in schools, I retired to write novels. I gifted myself attendance at the week-long Bear River Writer’s Conference where my instructor was Elizabeth Kostova, the historical novelist whose book The Historian I’d recently read and loved. I went in thinking I wanted to write. I came out with the beginning of a novel, and the belief that I would become an author.

Everyone has stories. I love hearing them, telling them and writing them.

When and where do you write? My favorite place to write is at our home on Lake Michigan in the northwest corner of Michigan. Dunes, water, sky and forest. My second novel, Hard Cider, is set there.

I can sit down at 7:30 in the morning, and the next thing I know it’s 4:00 in the afternoon. I love it when I can escape there and work for four or five days in a row. I am not one of those writers who can dash off some words in 40 minutes between other responsibilities, though I admire people who can do that. I need at least a three-hour block to really engage with what I’m writing. I treasure early morning time when no one else is up yet.

What are you working on now? I just finished writing my third novel, Isabela’s Way, which comes out in September, 2025 and I’m finishing incorporating edits and proofreading into a final manuscript. After this, I’m toying with some ideas for short stories, or perhaps even a memoir. I’m not sure yet.

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block? I have certainly been stalled at a plot point, or gotten stuck trying to figure out where a character is going, but I’ve never felt the kind of block I’ve read other writers describe, and I can imagine how demoralizing that must feel. I will say this is the first time in nearly 20 years of work as a novelist that I don’t have some book screaming inside my head to be written. Maybe that’s going to be my version of writer’s block!

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received? Quiet the inner critic when you’re working on developing a new piece. Get down as much as you can without worrying about the shape it takes to start with. (Now ask me how successful I am at taking that advice!!)

What’s your advice to new writers? Trust your story. Work on what you’ve written until the story you really want to tell finds its form. Don’t settle for almost right, because you may be living with that story for a long time. Write the story you can fight for, be proud of and ask someone else to believe in. Listen to advice with an open mind and an open heart, but ultimately, it’s your story.

Join a writer’s group. My writing group has made all three of my novels better by far. It’s a place to get advice, try ideas out and get a reality check on your work.

Read, read and read some more.

Barbara Stark-Nemon, author of award-winning novels Even in Darkness and Hard Cider, lives, writes, cycles, swims, does fiber art and gardens in Ann Arbor and Northport, Michigan. She has degrees in English literature, art history and speech-language pathology from the University of Michigan and worked with deaf and language disabled children. Even in Darkness is historical fiction based on a family story in 20th century Germany. Hard Cider, contemporary fiction, is set in northern Michigan. Her third novel, Isabela’s Way is a 17th century European coming of age refugee story. It will be published in September, 2025. You can learn more at www.barbarastarknemon.com.

Jessica Anya Blau

How did you become a writer? Well, I always wrote. I was a compulsive diarist from about the time I was eight. When I moved to Canada with the man I was married to at the time, I started writing every morning. I was lonely, not allowed to work legally, and felt like I was losing my mind from isolation and lack of human contact (my husband was at work all day, we moved there around Halloween when it was already snowing, you could barely make eye-contact with people because they were so bundled up). I found that on days that I wrote, I felt okay, or great even! Eventually I sent a story out to a magazine and it was accepted for publication. That moment, that acceptance, changed everything for me. Mostly, it changed how I saw myself and gave me permission to really write, to take the task seriously.

Name your writing influences (writers, books, teachers, etc.). I've always been a reader, so every book I've read has fed me, or filtered into me and left something behind. When I was in graduate school at Johns Hopkins, the people around me inspired me. My two best friends in grad school were Marcia Lerner and ZZ Packer. They both were/are brilliant writers. I cried the first time I read the work they each turned in because I thought I could never be that good, or catch up to them. John Barth was one of my professors and he spent so much time talking to me about my work (praising it!) that he also changed my life. His support gave me courage. And, it takes a lot of courage to write.

When and where do you write? I write anywhere and any time. I had kids in my 20s so have been writing in the in-between times forever. I used to bring my computer with me when I picked the kids up from school and I'd write while waiting in the carpool line. If you decide that you have to have certain conditions to write, it will be hard to get anything done. The world around you can't be controlled, something will always claw in and interrupt you. (Okay, maybe there are people who can retreat to an office and not be bothered, but I've never even had a desk. I'm typing this interview at the kitchen counter.) I write in 25 minute segments, so I will always open the computer if I have at least 25 minutes. When something is due, or I feel pressure to finish something, I'll write if I only have 15 minutes. It's amazing what you can get done in 15 minutes when that's all the time you have. I write on planes and trains, too. I can't write in a car or I get carsick!

What are you working on now? I have a new book coming out this May. It's called SHOPGIRLS. Right now, I'm doing a lot pre-publicity stuff for it. I did start a novel but I'm only about ten pages in so I can't say much about it. (I never really know what's going to happen in a book until I get there. When I start, I know the character and I know one complication. But that's about it.)

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block? Not really. I've never had time for writer's block. I do remember someone saying once that the cure for writers block is to lower your standards and expectations. Just write anything. When you're writing in 25 minute chunks throughout your day, you don't have the luxury to sit there and stare at the screen.

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received? Lynn Freed once said to me, "Just cut the palaver." She also said, "Say it once, say it well, and don't say it again." I think of those two bits of advice often when I'm writing. I need to follow them when I'm talking. I think I might repeat myself when I tell stories. I'm trying to change that!

What’s your advice to new writers? My advice is to avoid people who don't bolster you and support you (don't even tell them that you're writing!). Have courage. And, don't wait for the time or conditions to be perfect. They never will be.

Jessica Anya Blau is the author of the bestselling MARY JANE. She wrote the screenplay for MARY JANE for SONY and has written five other novels. Her books have been featured on The Today Show, Good Morning America, CNN and NPR, and have been featured in Cosmo, Vanity Fair, In Style, Country Living, Oprah Summer Reads and other national publications. Jessica's newest novel, SHOPGIRLS, will be out in May, 2025. You can find her on Instagram or at http://www.jessicaanyablau.com.

Crystal King

How did you become a writer? I was an early reader (I started at age two....wild, I know), and that turned me into an early writer, composing poems and little stories by the time I hit kindergarten. When I was ten some teacher had the foresight to send me to a young writer's conference, and I met Madeleine L'Engle, whose books I devoured, and she was very encouraging. And while I had some half-started novels in my teenage years, I never truly began writing until I was in my forties. They seemed too big, and my attention span too short. But by 2005, I had a newly minted M.A. in Critical and Creative Thinking, in which my thesis transformed brainstorming exercises from the business and science sectors into tools writers stuck in the middle of their books could use. But when I tried to shop this book idea around, agents told me that I should a. teach, b. write a book using the exercises, or c. find someone else to write a book using them. I started with teaching but then finally realized I should just write a book. My first novel, Feast of Sorrow, came out in 2017. And while I've had two more published since then (and another coming out next year), I'm actually starting work on my 7th novel now. I realized I loved the research and the storytelling and now I can't imagine not sitting down every morning to do a little dreaming on the page.

Name your writing influences (writers, books, teachers, etc.). I mentioned Madeleine L'Engle, and along the way there were a number of teachers. Mr. North, my high school journalism teacher. My professors at Whitworth College (now University), particularly Doug Sugano, Laura Bloxham, Leonard Oakland, and Vic Bobb. My friend Greg McCormick, now one of the forces behind the events at the Toronto Public Library, ran a literary magazine with me in the early 2000s, and he gifted me The Art of Eating by M.F.K. Fisher. She opened a door into a world of food writing that I really connected with. Historian Roy Strong's Feast, a book about feasts throughout history, gave me the one-line spark I needed to write Feast Of Sorrow. Among my other influences, I would say Italo Calvino, Margaret Atwood, Ursula K. LeGuin, Czeslaw Milosz, Anne Carson, Catherynne Valente, Tolkein, Virgil, Ovid, and SO many more. I also devoured every fairy tale and ancient myth I could find when I was young, ranging from Grimm to the ancient Greek and Roman myths. One of the books I loved most as a child was East O' the Sun and West O' the Moon, a collection of Norse fairytales. Fairytales gave me the permission to explore imagination and to question the way the world worked. 

When and where do you write? I have a home office where I write for an hour every morning. I didn't always write every day, but I find that the way the stories live in my head is so much richer, and of course, I am so much more prolific. And in this business, you get ahead by being lucky or prolific. I don't have control over luck, but I can sit my butt in the chair every day.

What are you working on now? I have a couple of ideas brewing, but I'm leaning heavily into a story about Morpheus, the god of dreams. I've been plotting that, and it's the most challenging story I have attempted to tackle so far. 

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block? No, never. Part of it is that I weave so much history through my novels, and our historical past is a goldmine of ideas. All those exercises I developed for writers In Medias Res have helped immensely as well. I have gone through periods of my life where I don't feel like writing, but I wouldn't call that writer's block...I've never not had an idea that begged to be developed. But writing is a lot of lonely work, and sometimes it's more about getting the butt in the chair. Again, that's where daily consistency helps, at least for me. It keeps the ideas flowing.

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received? Not so much advice, but a comment that helped transform my thinking. Early on, when my writing group began meeting (going on 16 years now!), we were at a restaurant talking about our pages, and the waitress asked us if we were writers. All of us sort of hedged at that. We weren't published after all (but now we all are). She just looked at us and said something along the lines of, "But you are talking about your novels, right? As far as I'm concerned, that makes you a writer. You should just own it." I feel like that was a pivotal moment for the three of us. Damn straight, we are writers. And we have owned it ever since. There is a LOT to be said for believing in yourself. Every novelist was unpublished at some point, but it didn't make them less of a writer. 

What’s your advice to new writers? If you've read this far, then you can probably guess that I am going to be an advocate for consistency. Stephen King has always been someone who said you need to write every day, and I used to scoff at this because I have a day job and a life that doesn't give me the leisure to write all day. But when I made the decision to write SOMETHING every day (I aim for 400 words (roughly a page and a half) or one hour of writing/editing), my work completely transformed. The stories began to live in my head, and the characters really came alive. And I realized if I do this every day, I can write a book a year. Even if you only have 15-20 minutes a day, that can make a big difference. Really, just stop scrolling Instagram and sit down with the page instead. 

Crystal King is the author of In The Garden of Monsters, The Chef’s Secret, and Feast of Sorrow, which was long-listed at the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize and designated as a Mass Book Awards Must Read. A social media and AI professor by trade, her writing is fueled by a love of history and a passion for the food, language, and culture of Italy. Crystal has taught writing, creativity, and social media at Harvard Extension School, Boston University, and UMass Boston. A Pushcart Prize-nominated poet and former co-editor of Plum Ruby Review, she holds an MA in critical and creative thinking from UMass Boston. You can find her at crystalking.com.