Sarah  Stone

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Tara
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Sarah Stone

Goodreads Author


Born
San Francisco, The United States
Website

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Member Since
September 2007


Sarah Stone’s new book, Marriage to the Sea: Linked Novellas, came out on March 15 (Four Way Books). Her previous books include The True Sources of the Nile and Hungry Ghost Theater, a finalist for the 38th Annual Northern California Book Awards. Sarah is also the co-author, with Ron Nyren, of Deepening Fiction: A Practical Guide for Intermediate and Advanced Writers. Her work has appeared in Image, Ploughshares, Necessary Fiction, 100 Word Story, StoryQuarterly, The Millions, Scoundrel Time, The Believer, CRAFT, Alta Journal online for the California Book Club, and A Kite in the Wind: Fiction Writers on Their Craft, and was included in the list of distinguished stories of 2020 in The Best American Short Stories 2021, Jesmyn Ward, editor. S ...more

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Sarah Stone When I get stuck, I try to get a sense of what's happening, to listen to my writing self. Am I trying to write a final draft, rather than a discovery …moreWhen I get stuck, I try to get a sense of what's happening, to listen to my writing self. Am I trying to write a final draft, rather than a discovery draft? Can I let myself just write badly? Can I skip the scene I'm writing and work on a different one? Is there something I need to learn in order to write the next piece? Is it time to do a freewrite to speculate about what might happen next, or even just to explore what the obstacle might be?

I used to panic when I couldn't write, but now I regard it as part of the process. So I give myself options and try to do whatever seems most alive or interesting in that moment.

And if all else fails, I go for a walk or let myself read and assume that my writing brain is working away, under the surface, and at some point I'll get the glimmer of an idea, or a phrase, and that will help unlock the door so I can move forward.
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Sarah Stone My favorite part of being a writer is the people -- the friends and colleagues and students I've come to know through reading, writing, and teaching. …moreMy favorite part of being a writer is the people -- the friends and colleagues and students I've come to know through reading, writing, and teaching. And also the people I invent, my characters, who come to feel alive to me. Then there are other people's characters, other people's books. When I write (or read), I get to live many lives, not just one. And when my books move or interest other people, and they write me letters -- that's one of the most exciting and happy moments for me as a writer, to know that I've made something that's meaningful to someone else.(less)
Average rating: 3.9 · 566 ratings · 85 reviews · 11 distinct worksSimilar authors
Believer Book of Writers Ta...

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3.91 avg rating — 311 ratings — published 2005 — 4 editions
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Deepening Fiction: A Practi...

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The True Sources of the Nile

3.46 avg rating — 102 ratings — published 1999 — 12 editions
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Hungry Ghost Theater

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A Kite in the Wind: Fiction...

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" My apologies--In trying to add my new book (Marriage to the Sea: Linked Novellas) to my author dashboard, I think I inadvertently created ghostly vers ...more "
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At Last by Marisa Silver
At Last
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I tore through At Last in two days: it's a marvelous family story, full of complexity and nuance. As I read, I fell in love with Helene and Evelyn: two complex, believable, memorable characters brought together by their children's marriage. It's a ch ...more
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Martha's Daughter by David Haynes
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I’m a huge fan of David Haynes’s rich, funny, character-driven fiction. He’s the kind of writer who can make the people in his books feel genuinely alive. They are impossible, lovable, unexpected, and human. The title novella here has Martha’s middle ...more
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Mercy by Joan Silber
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Some writers make you feel that you have the chance to understand people at a deeper level than ever seems possible in real life. Grace Paley, for example, and Joan Silber, for another. I’m a huge fan of Joan Silber’s books: brilliant, incisive, but ...more
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Residents of the Deep by Marianne Villanueva
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Hot Air by Marcy Dermansky
Hot Air
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Marcy Dermansky's novels are completely delicious, full of terrible behavior by people who shouldn't be sympathetic, but are, except when they really, really aren't. The superrich and all their lovely stuff. The wonderful mother (writer) and enchanti ...more
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34733 Friends of City Lights — 527 members — last activity Oct 29, 2018 03:34AM
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50920 Beta Reader Group — 29869 members — last activity 14 minutes ago
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220 Goodreads Librarians Group — 325108 members — last activity 4 minutes ago
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