The benefactress Drue Heinz passed away recently, and there was outpouring of sadness from all Hawthornden alums. The impact she had on writers around the world was amazing.
June 2012, self availed of one of Ms. Heinz’s enduring legacies: the Hawthornden Retreat for Writers, near Edinburgh (40 minutes by public bus from). Four wonderful weeks, with five other writers: Allison Amend, Richard Lemm, Jenny Lewis, Marylee McDonald, and Joan McGavin.
One of us volunteered to write down every book recommendation, every movie recommendation, every poem recommendation, every television series recommendation and every short story recommendation. Self completely forgot about this list, until today.
She’s going through her house in Redwood City, inch by inch. At the back of a drawer, she pulled out this list. She didn’t have time to look at it in Redwood City, which must be why she brought it with her to Mendocino. Here are some of the book recommendations (The list is three pages long, double-sided. Self has no time)
FANTASY
- Guy Gavriel Kay: The Fionavar Tapestry
MEMOIR
- John Steinbeck: Travels with Charlie
NONFICTION
- Jim Rosenberger: High Steel
NOVELS
- Bhira Backhaus: Under the Lemon Trees
- John Banville: Doctor Copernicus
- Andrea Barrett: The Voyage of the Narwhal
- Joseph Boyden: Three Day Road
- Michael Byers: Percival’s Planet
- Sarah Shun-lien Bynum: The Ms. Hempel Chronicles
- Michael Crummey: Galore
- Richard Flanagan: Wanting and Death of a River Guide
- Katherine Govier: Angel Walk
- Eleanor Henderson: Ten Thousand Saints
- Guy Gavriel Kay: Under Heaven
- Larry McMurtry: Hud
- Howard Norman: The Bird Artist
- Marge Piercy: Gone to Soldiers
- John Steffler: The Afterlife of George Cartwright
- Elizabeth Strout: Abide With Me and Olive Kitteridge
- Rosemary Sutcliffe: The Eagle of the Ninth
- Adam Thorpe: Ulverton
- Sigrid Undset: Kristin Lavransdatter
NOVELLAS
- Josh Weil: The New Valley (3 novellas)
POETRY
- Tamar Yoseloff: The City With Horns
SHORT STORY COLLECTIONS
- Andrea Barrett: Ship Fever
- Evgenia Citkowitz (Hawthornden Alum): Ether: Seven Stories and a Novella
- Michael Faber: The Apple: Crimson Petal Stories and The Fahrenheit Twins
- Tim O’Brien: Going After Cacciato, The Things They Carried, The Lake in the Woods
- Tobias Wolff: In the Garden of the North American Martyrs
