Elizabeth McCracken, author of A LONG GAME: NOTES ON WRITING FICTION
Elizabeth McCracken is the author of nine books across several genres — novels, short story collections, autofiction, and now a craft book about writing. Her novel, The Giant’s House, was a finalist for the National Book Award in 1996. Thunderstruck & Other Stories won the Story Prize in 2015 and was longlisted for the National Book Award. She’s appeared in five editions of The Best American Short Stories. And she has taught fiction off and on (mostly on) since 1989 including at the University of Iowa, where she also received her MFA. She’s retiring from the University of Texas (Austin) this year.
Ann Patchett once said that Elizabeth was the only person she allowed to read her manuscripts as she was writing them. We discuss a great interview Elizabeth and Ann did back in 2005 that can be found here.
A Long Game: Notes on Writing Fiction is out and she joined Marrie to talk about it. Basically, if this podcast were a book, we would hope it might look something like Elizabeth’s book — full of insights, wisdoms, anecdotes, and advice on craft, but sometimes second-guessing itself, contradicting itself, and understanding that all the “rules” we hear about art are meant to be broken. It gave us endless things to talk about.
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(Recorded December 19, 2025)
Host: Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Host: Marrie Stone
Music: Travis Barrett (Stream his music on Spotify, Apple Music, Etc.)