As I Get Older I Find Myself

On The Last Drafts, I Focus On The Words Themselves, Including The Rub Of Vowels And Consonants, Stressed And Unstressed Syllables. Yet Even At This Stage I'm Often Surprised. A Different Ending Or A New Character Shows Up And I'm Back To Where I Began, Letting The Story Happen, Just Trying To Stay Out Of The Way.

I Usually Do At Least A Dozen Drafts And Progressively Make More-conscious Decisions. Because I've Always Believed Stories Are Closer To Poems Than Novels, I Spend A Lot Of Time On The Story's Larger Rhythms, Such As Sentence And Paragraph Length, Placement Of Flashbacks And Dialogue.

Intensely Moving But Never Sentimental, Academy Street Is A Profound Meditation On What Faulkner Called 'the Human Heart In Conflict With Itself'. In Tess Lohan, Mary Costello Has Created One Of The Most Fully Realized Characters In Contemporary Fiction. What A Marvel Of A Book.

What I've Become Convinced Makes A Writer Are The Days You Hate It, The Days You'd Rather Stick Those Pencils In Your Eyes. Sometimes I Almost Punish Myself - If I'm Not Going Be Able To Write, I'm Not Going Be Able To Do Anything Else. I Just Sit There And Wait.

John Lane Has Long Been Recognized As One Of The South's Finest Poets And Memoirists. This Debut Establishes Him As One Of Our Finest Novelists As Well. His Poet's Eye For Detail Seamlessly Merges With A Born Storyteller's Gift For Narrative. Fate Moreland's Widow Gives Voice To Those Who Endured One Of The Most Painful And Neglected Chapters In American History.