Daniel Nieh

How did you become a writer? 

My family moved around a lot when I was in grade school, and I developed a tendency to escape into books. I was that loner kid who read at recess. When I was in international school in Kobe, my third-grade teacher assigned The Golden Fleece and the Heroes Who Lived Before Achilles. I remember feeling completely enraptured in the sojourn of Jason and the Argonauts. I still have my paperback copy. Castor, Pollux, Orpheus, Medea. All of us are storytellers; we're continually creating narratives in our heads that help us make sense of our lives. That book of Greek myths helped me fall in love with written stories in particular, and I've always looked back on it as something that shaped me.

Name your writing influences (writers, books, teachers, etc.). 

I've sought to emulate literary authors who play within genre. Some examples are Susanna Clarke, Ian McEwan, Jonathan Lethem, Cormac McCarthy, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Patrick Yu. Two marvelous recent books that hit that sweet spot of combining genre thrills with memorable characters and beautiful writing are City of Thieves and Piranesi. 

When and where do you write? 

I write in the mornings in my home office. I also like to write for an hour or two in the early evening, before dinner, wherever I find myself. 

What are you working on now? 

Right now I'm working on my third book in a diffuse and gentle way. I'm reading lots of novels, which is something I didn't do while writing my second book. I'm working my various other jobs and putting myself out in the world to learn. I have about a dozen ideas for my third book, and I'm dancing with all of them without committing to one quite yet.

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block?

I don't like to use the term, because it sounds like a disease or a phenomenon. The writing process has uphill moments and downhill moments, even uphill months and downhill months. All jobs are like that, right? Life is like that. So, I'd say, no, I have not ever suffered from writer's block, but I've suffered from being a writer.

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received?

Trust your instincts.

What’s your advice to new writers?

Focus on the process. Write longhand as much as possible. Write stories like the stories you like to read, and read a lot. Embrace the sacrifices. Beans and rice are delicious. Never compare yourself to others.

Daniel Nieh is a writer and translator. He was born in Portland, Oregon, and has also lived in China, Japan, Singapore, Mexico, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. He is the author of two international crime thrillers, Beijing Payback and Take No Names, both of which were New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice selections. His nonfiction writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Esquire.

Don Lee

How did you become a writer?

It was a total fluke. At UCLA, my initial plan was to get a bachelor's in mechanical engineering and then a PhD in physical oceanography so I could design, build, and pilot submersibles. I watched a lot of Jacques Cousteau as a kid. But I was bored silly with the science and math courses and took a creative writing class as an elective. I loved it mostly because I loved my classmates—a bunch of renegades and bohemians, so much more interesting than engineering students. That class led to more workshops and an eventual switch in majors to English. 

Name your writing influences (writers, books, teachers, etc.).

I like to answer this by citing some favorite books: Stoner by John Williams, Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro, Wind-up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami, So Long, See You Tomorrow by William Maxwell, and Selected Stories by Alice Munro. But probably one of the most important mentors I had was Richard Yates. I met him in a restaurant/bar in Boston when I was 24 and saw him fairly often for a couple of years. He only read one story of mine, which he didn't particularly like, but he served as a model for the type of dedication that a writer needs. 

When and where do you write?

Since I teach full-time, I mostly binge-write during the summer. Every day, all day. 

What are you working on now?

I usually take a break after a book comes out, so that's what I'm doing now, not working on anything. But I'm letting an idea for a short neo-noir novel gestate in my head. 

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block?

Not writer's block, per se, but I have suffered from false starts. In fact, with my last two novels, The Collective and Lonesome Lies Before Us, I wasted a year on each, working on an entirely different storyline before abandoning it and starting what would be the eventual novel. Those weren't fun experiences, but I wonder now if that's become my method for writing novels. Yikes. 

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received?

I don't know where I picked this up, but the best tip I've ever gotten is to use a kitchen timer (or phone or whatever) when you're slogging. Set it for 20 minutes, and make a deal with yourself. Once you start the timer, you cannot go on the internet, look at your phone, check Twitter or Instagram or Facebook, etc. You can't even get up to go to the bathroom. You can only do one of two things: write, or just sit there. You get so bored, you end up writing. When the timer goes off, take a break, then start the timer again. 

What’s your advice to new writers?

Don't take yourself so seriously. I didn't really improve as a writer until I finally did just that and stopped being so goddamn pretentious. 

Don Lee's latest book, the story collection The Partition, has just been published by Akashic Books. He is also the author of the collection Yellow and the novels Country of Origin, Wrack and Ruin, The Collective, and Lonesome Lies Before Us. He has received an American Book Award, the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature, and the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction. He lives near Baltimore with his wife, the writer Jane Delury, and directs the MFA program in creative writing at Temple University in Philadelphia. don-lee.com

Lawrence Block

How did you become a writer?

During my third year in high school, I began finding satisfaction, and some low-level recognition, in my writing assignments for English class. It occurred to me for the first time that I could make writing my profession, and from that moment on I never seriously considered anything else. I made a couple of small sales, and a job at a literary agency gave me an inside track, and I just kept on writing and publishing.

Name your writing influences (writers, books, teachers, etc.).

The Twentieth Century American realists—James T. Farrell, John O’Hara, Thomas Wolfe, John Steinbeck, etc.

When and where do you write?

For quite a few years I tended to go away to write—to an artist colony like Ragdale or the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, or to the isolation of a hotel room or apartment in some other town. These days I work in what my wife wishes were our dining room. I work in the morning, and not for terribly long.

What are you working on now?

A memoir of a fictional character, Matthew Scudder.

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block?

I’ve had times when I haven’t felt like writing, and times when I’ve had to stop work on particular books, or abandon them altogether. I wouldn’t call these incidents writer’s block, which is different in much the same way that a really bad mood is different from clinical depression. My late friend Jerrold Mundis was an expert on coping with writer’s block, and his book Break Writer’s Block Now! (https://amzn.to/3Rn2gQN) is an indispensable tool for any blocked writer. The strategies he developed are effective for anybody who’s having trouble getting words on the page or screen.

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received?

Henry Morrison, my agent back in the day, read a book I’d written and told me to put my second chapter first.

What’s your advice to new writers?

Write to please yourself. And don’t expect too much.

Lawrence Block is a Mystery Writers of America Grand Master.  His work over the past half century has earned him multiple Edgar Allan Poe and Shamus awards, the U.K. Diamond Dagger for lifetime achievement, and recognition in Germany, France, Taiwan, and Japan. His recent works include Dead Girl Blues, A Time to Scatter Stones, Keller’s Fedora, and the forthcoming  The Burglar Who Met Fredric Brown. In addition to novels and short fiction, he has written episodic television (Tilt!) and the Wong Kar-wai film, My Blueberry Nights. Block wrote a fiction column in Writer’s Digest for fourteen years, and has published several books for writers, including the classic Telling Lies for Fun & Profit and the updated and expanded Writing the Novel from Plot to Print to Pixel—and, most recently, A Writer Prepares, a memoir of his beginnings as a writer. He has lately found a new career as an anthologist (Collectibles, At Home in the Dark, In Sunlight or in Shadow) and recently spent a semester as writer-in-residence at South Carolina’s Newberry College. He is a modest and humble fellow, although you would never guess as much from this biographical note.