Interviews - Late Last Night Books

INTERVIEW WITH LITERARY TRANSLATOR LINDA MARIANIELLO

10/4/13 — INTERVIEW WITH LINDA MARIANIELLO, LITERARY TRANSLATOR

Life takes us funny places. Decades ago I played in the Yale Symphony Orchestra with Lind a Marianiello, who had transferred to Yale and had the reputation – more than well-deserved – as a phenomenal flautist. I recently learned that Linda has turned her musical training, liberal arts education, and other considerable skills to literary and book translation, a field that constitutes 3% of all book publishing in the US today. I grabbed the chance to catch up with Linda to find out not only how her life took this turn but also learn something about what exactly literary translation requires of a writer.

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Carolyn Sienkiewicz, Washington Independent Review of Books, guest blogs

Carolyn Sienkiewicz does the extraordinary. Last night I heard the Peabody-trained oboist play with the American Balalaika Symphony. I’ve read her articles in Cruising World, Living Aboard, Chesapeake Bay Magazine and SpinSheet about living with her husband, Mark, aboard a sailboat for eight years—although from talking with her I know that she and Mark both got seasick the first time they sailed. When you next visit the “Charm City” of Baltimore, if you treat yourself to a visit aboard the sailing ambassador, the Pride of Baltimore II, know that Carolyn was among the volunteers who worked over a recent winter to keep the swift clipper shipshape. And she is a reviewer, editor, and member of the editorial board of the Washington Independent Review of Books.

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Interview with Nancy Hartney, Author of Washed in the Water

9/17/13 — INTERVIEW WITH NANCY HARTNEY, AUTHOR OF WASHED IN THE WATER

In my review of Washed in the Water earlier this month, I suggested this debut collection of short stories made Nancy Hartney an important new voice of the South. That was very much on my mind when I got a chance to talk to Hartney about her roots, how her upbringing influenced her writing, and how she feels about the region she grew up in. Here is our interview, slightly edited and condensed:

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Interview: Amy Franklin-Willis, The Lost Saints of Tennessee

9/10/13 – INTERVIEW WITH AMY FRANKLIN-WILLIS, AUTHOR OF THE LOST SAINTS OF TENNESSEE

When Amy Franklin-Willis’s debut novel, The Lost Saints of Tennessee, was released, The New York Times Book Review noted “the main characters are agreeably imperfect, their stories sensitively told.” The Christian Science Monitor said, “…she excels at making readers care about her characters, especially the ones who have made the biggest mistakes.”

I couldn’t agree more that characters are the soul of The Lost Saints of Tennessee, although the sense of place is powerful, too.

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AUTHOR AUSTIN CAMACHO ON WRITING DAMAGED GOODS AND THE ICE WOMAN ASSIGNMENT

9/1/13 Austin Camacho interviewed by Sonia Linebaugh. What does the writer experience as the words flow onto the page? That’s what I wanted to find out when I interviewed Austin Camacho, author of five detective novels and four thrillers.

Q. Austin, what are your moments of ecstasy in writing?

A. There’s a kind of ecstatic moment when I find just the right line of dialog to express what a character needs to say, or write a bit of description that tugs at my heart when I read it the next day. In Damaged Goods [page 81], Hannibal asks the slave girl where her collar is: “For a frozen moment,

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THE BOOKS I MISSED READING LAST YEAR

9/1/13 – THE BOOKS I MISSED READING LAST YEAR

I’ve been so submerged in the process of writing a new novel that I’ve missed pretty much every one of my monthly book club meetings over the past year—and, alas, many of the books that went with them. When I finally came up for air, I found myself gasping for fresh reading material, and I figured the ladies of my longstanding book club could rescue me.

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Fantasy novel Juggler’s Blade, author Rob Ross interviewed

9/1/13 –INTERVIEW WITH ROB ROSS, AUTHOR OF JUGGLER’S BLADE

Rob Ross’s fantasy novel, Juggler’s Blade, was published during summer. I’ll review it on the 20^th of the month on this site. Meantime I met the author for coffee in downtown Washington to ask him about his writing roots and about his reading taste. I find one of the best ways to discover good books to read is to ask authors of books I like what they recommend.

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Talking Books With Washington Post Fiction Editor Ron Charles

9/1/13 — TALKING ABOUT BOOKS WITH THE WASHINGTON POST‘S RON CHARLES

Next time you feel overwhelmed by the number of books on your to-read list, think of Ron Charles, the fiction editor at the Washington Post. Charles and his colleagues at the newspaper get 150 books a day to choose from, with a lot careers depending on their decisions. I chatted with Ron recently about his job and how he approaches it. Here is the transcript of our phone conversation, edited and condensed.

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