Elizabeth McCracken is the author of eight books, including the National Book Award finalist, “The Giant’s House.” She’s been on the faculty at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and holds the James A. Michener Chair in Fiction at the University of Texas at Austin. Here, she talks about her new book, “A Long Game,” and her reading life.
Q. Your new book, “A Long Game: Notes on Writing Fiction,” is a joy. I grabbed it as I took my dog to the vet, and was glad to have your voice in my head while in the waiting room. (Turns out my dog was fine, just kind of goofy, and I realize now that I’m supposed to be asking you a question…)
Um, so tell readers about your new book, please.
First, I am glad that your dog is fine, even though it seems strange that you had to go to a vet to get a diagnosis of goofiness. I could have done that for you for free!
Second: my book is a guide to writing, sort of, full of advice and opinions, a little cranky, though all the crankiness is meant to be encouraging. It is divided into 280 sections, with an index.
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Q. “A Long Game: Notes on Writing Fiction” is funny and wise and seemslike it would be enjoyable even for readers who don’t plan to write fiction. Was that the plan, or did it just work out that way?
It wasn’t that way at the start, which may be (now that you mention it) why it took me a while to get it off the ground. The first draft was a slog—and also quite bad—because I was so fixated on who would read it. Once I started writing without aiming it at writers, I began to enjoy the process, which for me is a necessity.
Q. You write that this new book is meant to be of use. Was writing it useful to you as well? It seems like you had to sift through so many life experiences and work processes – things that typically run in the background of your mind – that I imagine it could have been exhausting.
Anything I write non-cynically is useful to me, I think, though I’m not sure I’ve thought of it that way before.
It’s possible that my first draft was a little cynical in its composition. Joan Didion famously said, “I write to find out what I am thinking,” which is how I feel. Composed sentences are how I organize my thoughts.
As a young writer, I was always afraid of exposure, of people knowing things about me. Now that I am middle-aged, if I have that glimmer of fear, I know I’m onto something.
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Q. You spent the last year as a judge for the National Book Awards. How many books did you need to read? What’s a book that didn’t win that you also loved? Can you share some gossip about judging or the judges?
We judges are expressly forbidden from gossiping about the process at all, never mind in newspapers, goddammit. (I do love gossip.) It’s safe to say that I admired every single book on both the long and short lists. I will say that I think the best book published last year is Yiyun Li’s extraordinary “Things in Nature Merely Grow,” which was shortlisted in nonfiction.
Q. Is there a book or books you always recommend to other readers?
Two books that I particularly love, both of which are very small: “Utz” by Bruce Chatwin (first recommended by my husband, Edward Carey) and “Maud Martha” by Gwendolyn Brooks (first recommended by my friend, Asali Solomon, whose astounding “Days of Afrekete” I recommend all the time, too).
Q. What are you reading now?
Lauren Hough’s “Monster of a Land,” which is coming out in 2026. It’s sort of like “Travels With Charley” for the 21st Century, though at the same time, there is no writer like her. She’s utterly brilliant.
Q. How do you decide what to read next?
It never feels exactly like a decision. Books fall into my lap, or my inbox.
Q. Do you remember the first book that made an impact on you?
Probably the most influential book of my childhood was “Eloise,” by Kay Thompson and Hilary Knight. I loved everything about it: the fantasy of living in a hotel, the underlying melancholy of a child raised by a nanny, the playing with form. Pages that fold out because the story can’t be confined! And I loved how complicated Eloise herself is, with her uncombed hair, her gumption, her dark imagination, her big heart and bad behavior.
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Q. Is there a book or type of book you’re reluctant to read?
Massive books that take place before 1400. I’m not proud of this. I do love “The Hunchback of Notre Dame,” which takes place in the 15th century.
Q. Can you recall a book that felt like it was written with you in mind (or conversely, one that most definitely wasn’t)?
All of Lucia Berlin’s stories sing to me.
Q. What’s something – a fact, a bit of dialogue or something else – that has stayed with you from a recent reading?
In “Monster of a Land,” Lauren Hough says people in Austin join polycules because they’ve forgotten they can join the Elks Club.
Q. Do you have any favorite book covers?
“Edith Holler” by Edward Carey, which (like most of his covers) features his artwork. I think the contents of his books are brilliant, too, but somehow it feels less stomach-turning to praise his covers in public than his writing.
Q. Do you listen to audiobooks? If so, are there any titles or narrators you’d recommend?
I listen to audiobooks only sometimes, and mostly on long car rides. I absolutely love the audiobooks of Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy.
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Q. Is there a genre or type of book you read the most – and what would you like to read more of?
I read mostly “literary” novels and short stories, whatever that means. I would like to read more books in translation.
Q. Do you have a favorite book or books?
I change my mind with the wind.
Q. Which books are you planning to read next?
“The Rest of Our Lives,” by Benjamin Markovits.
Q. Do you have a favorite character or quote from a book?
I think Betsy Trotwood, from “David Copperfield,” is my all-time favorite character. People sometimes say that Dickens was terrible at writing women. He could be terrible at writing young women, but Miss Havisham (from “Great Expectations”), Miss Flite (from “Bleak House”) and Jane Murdstone and Betsy Trotwood (from “David Copperfield”) are all immortal.
Q. Is there a person who made an impact on your reading life – a teacher, a parent, a librarian or someone else?
I was very lucky to have been surrounded by bookish people all my life, at home, at school, and at the library—I worked in my local public library from 15 to 22, and eventually got a degree in library science—but my mother always told me that my brother, Harry, taught me to read, aided by “Sesame Street.” So I’ll say Harry McCracken, my beloved older brother.
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Q. What do you find the most appealing in a book: the plot, the language, the cover, a recommendation? Do you have any examples?
Always language; terrible sentences are the one thing I can’t overlook.
Q. Are you someone who must finish every book you start – or is it OK toput down the ones you don’t connect with?
I used to finish every book I got five pages into; I felt, and still feel, that it’s useful for writers to read work they don’t love, and there’s also joy in being won over by a book you’re not sure about. Still, these days, if I can’t bear a book, I stop.
Q. What’s a memorable book experience – good or bad – you’re willing to share?
Years ago, I was the first person to ever read my friend Ann Patchett’s “Bel Canto.” I sat up at the bar in a place in Cambridge, Massachusetts. I don’t generally like barstools, and yet I didn’t notice anything but what was happening in the book. I swear I still remember the angle of the light through the window and my own angle to the bar, because I was reading something I knew was changing me, and would change everyone who read it.
Q. Is there a book that tapped into an emotion you didn’t expect?
Paul Lisicky’s “Song So Wild and Blue,” about his relationship to the music of Joni Mitchell, made me understand what it is like to listen to music with a musician’s ear, which I would have thought was impossible for me.
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Q. Do you have a favorite bookstore or bookstore experience?
Austin is full of astounding independent bookstores, but BookWoman has a special place in my heart: it saw me through the pandemic, with its curbside service; it didn’t close a single day.
Q. What’s something about your book that no one knows?
I have only just remembered that I composed the first draft in Scrivener, which many people I respect swear by. It is a program that organizes books. Apparently, exosomatic organization doesn’t suit me.
Q. If you could ask your readers something, what would it be?
I would ask for book recommendations.