Books That Matter: Julie Buntin on THE STONE DIARIES by Carol Shields
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit fictionmatters.substack.com Welcome to Books That Matter. In this series, I ask writers to share a book that matters to them. I read it and we deep dive into the world of the text, exploring story, craft, and the way a great book can become part of someone. You’ll hear your favorite authors on their favorite authors and come away with expertly curated reading lists. Today, Julie Buntin, author of Famous Men and Marlena, joins me to talk about Carol Shields’s Pulitzer-winning novel The Stone Diaries. This is one of the best books I’ve read all year and getting the chance to talk about the book’s emotional and intellectual prowess with Julie was an absolute joy. The Stone Diaries is a birth to death novel told with technical assurance and stylistic originality—its innovative without ever making the reader feel like their witnessing a trick or gimmick. It’s moving in the truest sense of the word, helping readers to see the world in an slightly altered state upon finishing. Julie’s insights into the book, both personal and analytical, helped me appreciate it all the more and understand better how she herself is able to bring such depth and complexity to her work. I also got the chance to ask Julie about her wonderful new novel Famous Men. This is book that takes a story you think you know and continues adding layers until you realize you’re reading something infinitely more complex than you could have imagined. It was such a treat to get to hear all of the pieces that Julie pulled together in crafting this work and what made the writing process so different from her first book, Marlena. You can purchase Famous Men, Marlena, and Carol Shields’s The Stone Diaries on Bookshop.org or wherever you get your books! Julie Buntin’s new novel, Famous Men, is out now from Random House. Her debut, Marlena, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle’s John Leonard Prize and longlisted for the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize. It was a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Pick, an Indie Next pick, a Nevada Statewide Read, a Michigan Notable Book, and named a best book of the year by over a dozen outlets, including The Washington Post, NPR, and Kirkus Reviews. Buntin’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Harper’s, and The New York Times, among other publications, and has been translated into nine languages. She's the recipient of fellowships from the MacDowell Colony and the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, and was the winner - for Famous Men - of the Ellen Levine Fund for Writers Award from the New York Community Trust. Her collaborative nonfiction project, Notes to New Mothers, co-edited with Rebecca Dinerstein Knight and published by W.W. Norton, is an independent press bestseller. Previously, Buntin was an editor and director of writing programs at Catapult. She has taught creative writing at NYU, Columbia University, the Yale Writers’ Workshop, and elsewhere. Now, she writes and teaches in Ann Arbor, where she is an associate professor at the University of Michigan. Connect with Julie: Website | Instagram | Famous Men on Bookshop * Roald Dahl Collection * The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis * Redwall by Brian Jacques * Stephen King * Annie Ernaud * Tove Ditlevsen * Elena Ferrante * Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo * I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jeannette McCurdy * Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling * Percy Jackson by Rick Riordan * Great Expectations by Charles Dickens * Such a Fun Age by Kylie Reid * The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields * To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf * Marlena by Julie Buntin * Tara Nichols on Instagram * Famous Men on Audio * Zuckerman Unbound by Phillip Roth * Brandon Taylor’s sweater weather * “That Crafty Feeling” by Zadie Smith *This post contains affiliate links.
