Reading Like a Writer: Protest

For the past several years, the BBF’s “Reading Like a Writer” series of craft-focused author discussions have become fan favorites, giving attendees an opportunity to dig deep and gain insights into the choices that shape a writer’s craft. In this session, host Michelle Hoover will guide us through close readings of excerpts from the work of three authors whose new novels contain elements of protest. In The Book of V., novelist (and past One City One Story author) Anna Solomon disrupts patriarchal norms with a tripartite reckoning with the Biblical story of Esther that the Washington Post calls a “multifaceted masterwork.” Debut novelist Asha Lemmie, in Fifty Words for Rain, offers an epic tale of family reckoning and coming of age, about a girl born to a Japanese noblewoman and a Black American GI during World War II. And in his debut novel, Winter Counts, David Heska Wanbli Weiden pens a thriller about a modern-day vigilante whose quest for justice provokes a reckoning with his own Native identity. These authors will provide context for their own excerpts and will interact with one another’s work as well—it’s like a master class for writers and readers alike! Register for this session in advance on Crowdcast to access the authors’ excerpts and to add your own questions and observations to the conversation. Sponsored by Greenough Brand Storytellers.