Barb Johnson worked as a carpenter in New Orleans for more than 20 years before entering the MFA program at the University of New Orleans. While in the writing program, she won a grant from the

The twelve stories in Susan Steinberg’s stunning third book, Spectacle, limn the desperate, neon-lit reality we’re forced to confront when we wake up from the American dream. They make me want to

I read for the same reason that I fish. So I can feel what I can’t see.

"Thought of you and our conversations this morning when I read David Shields' Riff column in the NYT Magazine. I get the sense that you're not particularly engaged with him one way or

Hello, readers. This is the first of two interviews with writer Ron Currie Jr. on the occasion of the publication of his new—and positively badass—novel Flimsy Little Plastic Miracles. Why two

And then there's Rob Delaney. The next time Rob Delaney tweets—which is probably going to be in the next half hour or so—almost 750,000 people will have it pop up in their feeds. (Give or take a

When I see them on Saturday in St. Louis, it will be the sixth time I will have seen Rush live, and I will have seen them in three different decades of my life – my 20s, 30s and 40s.

Texas gets a bad rap because it's filled with assholes, but really if you take any area the size of Texas anywhere it will be filled with assholes, because that's what people are.​

Of course, I think that Mark Twain is true.   I think that Samuel Clemens is the lie.  Only a dishonest person wants you to know that a story they are telling "really happened."

Spend enough time on Twitter and you will eventually discover there is within it an odd, alternate world of very funny, 140-character prankster surrealists. A shortcut to discovering them: Go to

A short interview about punk rock and aging with NoMeansNo drummer John Wright & guitarist Tom Holliston

In 2010, Michael Martone began conducting a series of interviews. Each of these interviews was written under the pen name Matthew Baker, each of these interviews was titled “An Interview with

"I think I'm just trying to be a good listener."

An interview with Ted Sanders, author of No Animals We Could Name.

Tom Williams: What do you find funny?

John Warner: I find lots of things funny, and have pretty broad tastes, but you know who I think is the number one comedic genius of the last

We are working toward converting all of the old into the new. We are not forsaking our past! But... it's going to take time. In the meantime...

the ARCHIVES!

What follows is a conversation with Stacey Levine. I have wanted to talk to Levine about her amazing work for a long time, and have generally found myself too hypnotized by it to try to unpack it.

Doug Nufer is one of the foremost constraint-based writers in the United States. You could even say he's part of the definition of constrained writing. Seriously, type it into Wikipedia and see

Its been quite a few years since I first met fellow Michigander Davy Rothbart. I, a bookseller in Seattle. He, a collector and presenter of found objects, the man behind FOUND MAGAZINE, a

Dark Sky is a fine new publisher whose books are strange and stunning and uncommonly good. Their most recent release, Ryan Ridge’s kinetic collection of short stories, Hunters & Gamblers,

The epigraph to Alex Shakar’s Luminarium could be a request or a demand; “Lead me from the unreal to the real.” For Fred Brounian, it is a plea. Fred finds himself in the middle of “a spiritual

Julia Wertz's first two books are called Fart Party, a great, attention-grabbing title. I remember grabbing the book off the shelf at the comic bookstore, poking my boyfriend and laughing

Exley, Brock Clarke’s third novel, is the story of Miller le Ray, a boy whose father may or may not have left Miller and his mother to go and serve in Iraq.  Told from Miller’s point of view — and

Memory is its Medium: 
A Conversation with Bradford Morrow

Bradford Morrow's latest novel, The Diviner's Tale, uses some tropes of the traditional murder mystery and elements of the

Editor’s Note:

The following interview was sent to Hobart unsolicited and un-pitched. It was also un-emailed. I was sent it through the mail, and it was the only file on a 3 ½”