Jenny Offill is the author of Dept. of Speculation.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Steven Schwartz is the author of Little Raw Souls, Therapy, and Madagascar: New and Selected Stories.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Karen Thompson Walker was born and raised in San Diego, California, where The Age of Miracles is set. She studied English and creative writing at UCLA, where she wrote for the UCLA Daily Bruin. After college, she worked as a newspaper reporter in the San Diego area before moving to New York City to attend the Columbia University MFA program.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jamie Quatro’s debut collection, I Want To Show You More, was a New York Times Notable Book, NPR Best Book of 2013, Indie Next pick, The Oprah Magazine summer reading pick, and New York Times Editors’ Choice.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elizabeth Strout was born in Portland, Maine, and grew up in small towns in Maine and New Hampshire. Her novels include Amy and Isabelle, Olive Kitteridge, Abide With Me, and The Burgess Boys. This interview was recorded in 2013.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Boris Fishman was born in Minsk, Belarus, and immigrated to the United States in 1988 at nine. His journalism, essays, and criticism have appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine and Book Review, The New Republic, The London Review of Books, The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, Travel & Leisure, New York Magazine, and other publications His novels include A Replacement Life and Don’t Let My Baby Do Rodeo.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Elliot Ackerman served five tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan and is the recipient of the Silver Star, the Bronze Star for Valor, and the Purple Heart. A former White House Fellow, his essays and fiction have appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The New Republic, and Ecotone, among others.  His novels include Green on Blue and Dark at the Crossing.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Kate Manne is an assistant professor of the Sage School of Philosophy at Cornell University. She was a junior fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows from 2011 to 2013 and has a PhD in Philosophy from MIT. Her book is called Down Girl: The Logic of Misogyny.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Joan Silber's first book, the novel Household Words won the PEN/Hemingway Award. Her other works of fiction are In the City, In My Other Life, Lucky Us, Ideas of Heaven, finalist for the National Book Award and the Story Prize, The Size of the World, finalist for the Los Angeles Times Prize in Fiction, and Fools, longlisted for the National Book Award and finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award. Her latest novel is called Improvement..

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alice McDermott is the author of eight novels, including National Book Award winner Charming Billy and The Ninth Hour.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices