Lisa Birk

How Not to Write I used to keep a book on my shelf to remind myself how not to write. The book, call it Stricken, consisted of a...

Novels are my second love, the roast beef in my diet. And I relish the meal. But I down short stories like chocolates. For their density....

I have just spent two-and-a-half years revising my novel.* The odds on getting it published feel, well, long. My writer friends...

All my favorite books come from a “deep place of junior high trauma.”* From Harriet the Spy to The Outsiders, right on up through Rick...

Some years ago I taught Communications 201 at Boston University. It was a plum job, as adjunct jobs go, because our students longed to be...

I lost nearly all my sense of smell when I was eight. One day my socks itched and the next day I was allergic to seemingly everything...