Writers on Writing

Latest Episodes:

Liam Higginson, author of THE HILL IN THE DARK GROVE Aug 11, 2026

Show notes

Debut Welsh author Liam Higginson has written an atmospheric, psychologically suspenseful, creepy novels told in gorgeous literary prose. It’s also steeped in Welsh mythology and tradition but manages to also grapple with contemporary issues. The Hill in the Dark Grove will keep you up at night, whether you’re compulsively turning the pages or you can’t sleep after what you’ve just read.

Liam was born and raised in the deepest hinterlands of rural North Wales. Before writing this knockout novel, he was an extremely bored accountant, helped out at a B & B in a French watermill, ran errands for the CEO of a large consultancy firm, spent lockdown in an empty holiday cottage while a herd of goats took over the town, and now works with his wife at Llandudno Pier.

The Hill in the Dark Grove gives us much to dissect as writers. Bringing place to life. Writing effective suspense and how to leverage the reader’s rich imagination to do a lot of work for you. Managing time and backstory. Grappling with contemporary issues like wealth inequality and our housing crisis in the context of ancient mythology, and so much more. He also shares his unconventional but brillant approach for teaching himself to write.

For more information on Writers on Writing and to become a supporter, visit our Patreon page. For a one-time donation, visit Ko-fi. You can help out the show and indie bookstores by buying books at our bookstore on bookshop.org. It’s stocked with titles by our guest authors, as well as our personal favorites. And on Spotify, you’ll find an album’s worth of typewriter music like what you hear on the show. It’s perfect for writing. Look for the artist, Just My Type. You can find hundreds of past interviews on our website.
(Recorded on July 30, 2026)
Host: Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Host: Marrie Stone
Music: Travis Barrett (Stream his music on Spotify, Apple Music, Etc.)

Liam Higginson, author of THE HILL IN THE DARK GROVE Marrie Stone Download

Claire Vaye Watkins, author of YELLOW PINE Aug 04, 2026

Show notes

Claire Vaye Watkins was born in Bishop, California and raised in the Mojave Desert on the Amargosa River. A graduate of the University of Nevada Reno, she earned her MFA from the Ohio State University in 2010. Claire is the author of three novels—Gold Fame Citrus, I Love You but I've Chosen Darkness, and Yellow Pine—and the short story collection Battleborn. She has received the Story Prize, the Dylan Thomas Prize, the New York Public Library’s Young Lions Fiction Award, the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Silver Pen Award from the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame, as well as fellowships from the Lannan Foundation and the Guggenheim Foundation. Her fiction and essays have appeared in Alta, One Story, The Believer, The Paris Review, Tin House, McSweeny’s, BOMB, The New Republic,Either/Or, Freeman’s, New York Magazine, The Nevada Independent, The New York Times and elsewhere. She is was included in Granta’s “Best Young American Novelists” and the National Book Foundation’s “5 Under 35.” Claire is on the board of the Amargosa Conservancy and a professor in the Programs in Writing at the University of California, Irvine. She lives in Orange County and the Mojave Desert.

Claire joins Barbara DeMarco-Barrett to talk about voice, perfectionism, weaving in backstory, plotting, writing climate fiction, maintaining stamina, and much more.

For more information on Writers on Writing and to become a supporter, visit our Patreon page. For a one-time donation, visit Ko-fi. You can help out the show and indie bookstores by buying books at our bookstore on bookshop.org. It’s stocked with titles by our guests, as well as our personal favorites. And on Spotify, you’ll find an album’s worth of Travis Barrett’s typewriter music like what you hear on the show. There’s no lyrics, making It perfect for writing. Look for the artist, Just My Type. You can find hundreds of past interviews on our website.
(Recorded on June 12, 2026)
Host: Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Host: Marrie Stone
Music: Travis Barrett (Stream his music on Spotify, Apple Music, Etc.)

Claire Vaye Watkins, author of YELLOW PINE Barbara DeMarco-Barrett Download

Michael Cunningham, author of UNSAYABLE: A LIFE IN WRITING Jul 27, 2026

Show notes

Michael Cunningham is the author of eight novels, including the 1999 Pulitzer Prize winning book, The Hours and his 1990 novel, A Home at the End of the World. Both of these novels were adapted to screen and The Hours was made into an opera that premiered at the Metropolitan Opera in 2022. He’s also the author of the story collection, A Wild Swan and Other Tales. Unsayable: A Life in Writing is his latest. It feels written just for this audience, the folks who listen to this podcast. Unsayable goes from the specific stuff on the word-level (lessons on finding the right descriptions and opening lines) to the macro of living as a writer (like dealing with bad reviews and doing things in your personal life that make you seem more interesting).

Michael takes us inside his process of choosing the right words and phrases. Inside his teaching process to how he guided one student to find a resonant ending. And inside his thinking process of becoming a writer in the first place. It’s extremely personal and therefore surprisingly universal. It’s all the things we love in the very best of our writers, and an embedded MFA experience cherried on top. He joins Marrie Stone to talk about it.

For more information on Writers on Writing and to become a supporter, visit our Patreon page. For a one-time donation, visit Ko-fi. You can help out the show and indie bookstores by buying books at our bookstore on bookshop.org. It’s stocked with titles by our guest authors, as well as our personal favorites. And on Spotify, you’ll find an album’s worth of typewriter music like what you hear on the show. It’s perfect for writing. Look for the artist, Just My Type. You can find hundreds of past interviews on our website.
(Recorded on July 16, 2026)
Host: Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Host: Marrie Stone
Music: Travis Barrett (Stream his music on Spotify, Apple Music, Etc.)

Michael Cunningham, author of UNSAYABLE: A LIFE IN WRITING Marrie Stone Download

Teddy Wayne, author of THE AU PAIR Jul 21, 2026

Show notes

Teddy Wayne is the author of the novels The Au Pair, The Winner, The Great Man Theory, Apartment, Loner, The Love Song of Jonny Valentine, and Kapitoil. He is the winner of a Whiting Writers’ Award and an NEA Creative Writing Fellowship as well as a finalist for the Young Lions Fiction Award, PEN/Bingham Prize, and Dayton Literary Peace Prize. A former columnist for the New York Times and McSweeney’s and a frequent contributor to The New Yorker, he has taught at Columbia University and Washington University in St. Louis.

Teddy joins Barbara DeMarco-Barrett to talk about what he needs to know before he begins writing, voice, fiction that makes a big statement, stakes, plotting via character relationships, the midpoint, finding sources, theme, and much more.

For more information on Writers on Writing and to become a supporter, visit our Patreon page. For a one-time donation, visit Ko-fi. You can help out the show and indie bookstores by buying books at our bookstore on bookshop.org. It’s stocked with titles by our guest authors, as well as our personal favorites. And on Spotify, you’ll find an album’s worth of typewriter music like what you hear on the show. It’s perfect for writing. Look for the artist, Just My Type. You can find hundreds of past interviews on our website.
(Recorded on June 19, 2026)
Host: Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Host: Marrie Stone
Music: Travis Barrett (Stream his music on Spotify, Apple Music, Etc.)

Teddy Wayne, author of THE AU PAIR Barbara DeMarco-Barrett Download

Stacey Abrams, author of CODED JUSTICE Jul 15, 2026

Show notes

Stacey Abrams served eleven years in the Georgia House of Representatives, seven as minority leader. She was the first Black woman to become the gubernatorial nominee for a major party in U.S. history. She’s also a prolific NYT bestselling writer across a variety of genres. Stacey has published 17 books over the past 25 years including fiction, nonfiction, romance, memoir, children’s books, political thrillers. She wrote her first novel while still in her third year of law school at Yale.

Stacey joins Marrie Stone to talk about her latest political thriller Coded Justice, now out in paperback published by Vintage, and the third in the Avery Keene series which includes While Justice Sleeps and Rogue Justice.

For readers who love Avery, you’re in for a serious treat. For writers who work in the political thriller genre, or work in a series and follow characters across multiple books, or are trying to stay ahead of fast-paced technology in your fiction, this conversation is for you. Even if you’re a writer just trying to keep your butt in the chair, or struggle with idea generation, or struggle with how much research to conduct on a topic so you sound like an expert but don’t fall into a bottomless rabbit hole, this is also for you. Stacey also talks about the writing advice she lives by.

For more information on Writers on Writing and to become a supporter, visit our Patreon page. For a one-time donation, visit Ko-fi. You can help out the show and indie bookstores by buying books at our bookstore on bookshop.org. It’s stocked with titles by our guest authors, as well as our personal favorites. And on Spotify, you’ll find an album’s worth of typewriter music like what you hear on the show. It’s perfect for writing. Look for the artist, Just My Type. You can find hundreds of past interviews on our website.
(Recorded on June 25, 2026)
Host: Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Host: Marrie Stone
Music: Travis Barrett (Stream his music on Spotify, Apple Music, Etc.)

Stacey Abrams, author of CODED JUSTICE Marrie Stone Download

Elizabeth Strout, author of THE THINGS WE NEVER SAY Jul 08, 2026

Show notes

Elizabeth Strout is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Things We Never Say, Tell Me Everything; Lucy by the Sea; Oh William!, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize; Olive, Again; Anything Is Possible, winner of the Story Prize; My Name Is Lucy Barton; The Burgess Boys; Olive Kitteridge, winner of the Pulitzer Prize; Abide with Me; and Amy and Isabelle, winner of the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction and the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize. She has also been a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize in London.

Elizabeth joins Barbara DeMarco-Barrett to talk about finding her voice, how she’s never been a plotter, how her new novel, The Things We Never Say, came to her, how characters arrive, theme, setting, the worst advice she’s ever been given, exposing yourself as a writer, and so much more.

For more information on Writers on Writing and to become a supporter, visit our Patreon page. For a one-time donation, visit Ko-fi. You can help out the show and indie bookstores by buying books at our bookstore on bookshop.org. It’s stocked with titles by our guest authors, as well as our personal favorites. And on Spotify, you’ll find an album’s worth of typewriter music like what you hear on the show. It’s perfect for writing. Look for the artist, Just My Type. You can find hundreds of past interviews on our website.
(Recorded on July 6, 2026)
Host: Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Host: Marrie Stone
Music: Travis Barrett (Stream his music on Spotify, Apple Music, Etc.)

Elizabeth Strout, author of THE THINGS WE NEVER SAY Barbara DeMarco-Barrett Download

Douglas Stuart, author of JOHN OF JOHN Jun 29, 2026

Show notes

Douglas Stuart is one of those unicorn authors who seemed to have appeared out of thin air and took the literary world by storm. His 2019 debut novel, Shuggie Bain, would be rejected 44 times before winning the Booker Prize, becoming a finalist for the National Book Award and being named the Sunday Time’s 25 Best Novels of the 21st Century. Then would come Young Mungo in 2022, which sealed Douglas’s standing as a literary genius. He has since been published in the New Yorker at least three times.

John of John came out in May. It was an instant Oprah pick and another literary masterpiece. He joins Marrie Stone to talk about it. They chat about Douglas’s unlikely path to success and how he taught himself the craft. They discuss his research process and how he immersed himself in a part of the world – and a part of his own country – that he didn’t know. And he shares how his approach to every novel has differed, what his 20 years in the textile industry taught him about writing, why he feels unqualified to offer any advice, and so much more.

For more information on Writers on Writing and to become a supporter, visit our Patreon page. For a one-time donation, visit Ko-fi. You can help out the show and indie bookstores by buying books at our bookstore on bookshop.org. It’s stocked with titles by our guest authors, as well as our personal favorites. And on Spotify, you’ll find an album’s worth of typewriter music like what you hear on the show. It’s perfect for writing. Look for the artist, Just My Type. You can find hundreds of past interviews on our website.
(Recorded on June 23, 2026)
Host: Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Host: Marrie Stone
Music: Travis Barrett (Stream his music on Spotify, Apple Music, Etc.)

Douglas Stuart, author of JOHN OF JOHN Marrie Stone Download

Hafeez Lakhani, author of ABUNDANCE Jun 23, 2026

Show notes

Hafeez Lakhani was born in Hyderabad, India and raised in suburban South Florida. His fiction and essays have appeared in Crazyhorse, Exposition Review, Salt Hill, Tikkun, The Cortland Review, and The Southern Review, and have garnered fellowships from PEN America and The Center for Fiction. He was twice recognized with a Notable Essay in Best American Essays and twice nominated for a Pushcart Prize. He was profiled by the Huffington Post as one of “Eight Fantastic New Writers to Look Out For.” His debut novel, Abundance, following five members of an American Muslim family across Miami, New York, Monaco, and Gujarat, was a People Magazine Most Anticipated Book of 2026.

Hafeez and Barbara DeMarco-Barrett talk about how he knew the novel idea had legs and how he committed to it for the long haul: 12 years in the making! They also talk about when you know a novel is done, how to use your critique groups’ feedback, using a Venn diagram, not going to an MFA program, and much more.

For more information on Writers on Writing and to become a supporter, visit our Patreon page. For a one-time donation, visit Ko-fi. You can help out the show and indie bookstores by buying books at our bookstore on bookshop.org. It’s stocked with titles by our guest authors, as well as our personal favorites. And on Spotify, you’ll find an album’s worth of typewriter music like what you hear on the show. It’s perfect for writing. Look for the artist, Just My Type. You can find hundreds of past interviews on our website.
(Recorded on April 28, 2026)
Host: Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Host: Marrie Stone
Music: Travis Barrett (Stream his music on Spotify, Apple Music, Etc.)

Hafeez Lakhani, author of ABUNDANCE Barbara DeMarco-Barrett Download

Annie Hartnett, author of THE ROAD TO TENDER HEARTS Jun 15, 2026

Show notes

Annie Hartnett is the award-winning author of three novels: Rabbit Cake, Unlikely Animals, and the national bestseller The Road to Tender Hearts, which won the 2025 New England Book Award for fiction and was named a best book of 2025 from NPR, LitHub, and Southern Living. It’s now out and available in paperback, published by Ballentine.

Along with the writer Tessa Fontaine, Annie co-runs Accountability Workshops for writers, helping writers commit to routines and embrace the long, slow, joyful, terrible process of doing the work.

The Road to Tender Hearts gives us writers a lot to talk about. Structuring a novel around a road trip and how to weave in backstory while maintaining forward momentum. Writing heavy topics like death, addiction, grief, and abandonment with humor. Annie’s approach to third-person multiple points of view, tackling a range of viewpoints, and so much more. We also talked about her ambivalent relationship with Scrivener, how she uses spreadsheets, working with mind maps, and the importance of accountability for writers.

For more information on Writers on Writing and to become a supporter, visit our Patreon page. For a one-time donation, visit Ko-fi. You can help out the show and indie bookstores by buying books at our bookstore on bookshop.org. It’s stocked with titles by our guest authors, as well as our personal favorites. And on Spotify, you’ll find an album’s worth of typewriter music like what you hear on the show. It’s perfect for writing. Look for the artist, Just My Type. You can find hundreds of past interviews on our website.
(Recorded June 2, 2026)
Host: Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Host: Marrie Stone
Music: Travis Barrett (Stream his music on Spotify, Apple Music, Etc.)

Annie Hartnett, author of THE ROAD TO TENDER HEARTS Marrie Stone Download

Steven Rowley, author of TAKE ME WITH YOU Jun 09, 2026

Show notes

Steven Rowley is the New York Times bestselling author of Lily and the Octopus, a Washington Post Notable Book of 2016, The Editor, named by NPR as one of the Best Books of 2019, The Guncle, a Goodreads Choice Awards finalist for 2021 Novel of the Year and winner of the Thurber Prize for American Humor, The Celebrants, a TODAY Show Read With Jenna Book Club pick, and the instant USA Today Bestsellers The Guncle Abroad and The Dogs of Venice. His fiction has been published in twenty languages. Originally from Portland, Maine, he is a graduate of Emerson College and currently resides in Palm Springs with his husband, the writer Byron Lane, and three rescue dogs. His new novel is Take Me With You, and is the focus of our talk today.

Steven joins Barbara DeMarco-Barrett to talk about the moment he knew he had to write this book, how he outlines, side characters, the crossover from screenwriting, why he chose Joshua Tree, California, as the desert setting, endings, AI, and much more.
For more information on Writers on Writing and to become a supporter, visit our Patreon page. For a one-time donation, visit Ko-fi. You can help out the show and indie bookstores by buying books at our bookstore on bookshop.org. It’s stocked with titles by our guest authors, as well as our personal favorites. And on Spotify, you’ll find an album’s worth of typewriter music like what you hear on the show. It’s perfect for writing. Look for the artist, Just My Type. You can find hundreds of past interviews on our website.

(Recorded May 15, 2026)
Host: Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Host: Marrie Stone
Mu sic: Travis Barrett (Stream his music on Spotify, Apple Music, Etc.)

Steven Rowley, author of TAKE ME WITH YOU Barbara DeMarco-Barrett Download

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