Alison Smith
A touching, triumphant memoir that's drawn comparisons to Alice Sebold's novel The Lovely Bones, Name All the Animals marks the promising debut of Alison Smith.
Good To Know
In our interview, Smith shared some fun facts about herself: "I love oysters! I will only eat them raw. Last summer my friends and I rented a house for a week on Long Island. We bought an oyster knife and fresh oysters from the local fisherman and learned to shuck them ourselves. Then we had an oyster eating contest. I ate 30 in one sitting."
"The current song with which I am obsessed: Rod Stewart's Maggie May. Yes, you heard right, Rod Stewart. Listen to it -- it's a good song -- great lyrics. And the mandolin at the end -- lovely."
"When I am completely stuck with a piece of writing, I like to try standing on my head and talking myself through it. There is something about being upside down that can help me shift into a new mode."
"When I was in grade school I wanted to be a farmer so that I could hang out with the livestock. When I was in high school I wanted to be a cemeterologist so that I could hang out in Mount Hope Cemetery all day taking rubbings of gravestones. When I was in college, I though that I would be a teacher -- in order to do something useful with my life. I thought being a writer was too self-indulgent."
