A Conversation with Diana Spechler
Diana Spechler 's first novel, Who By Fire , has just been released to strong reviews from all over. It's a compelling story of three members of a family: a sister (Bits) whose life is a mess in all sorts of different ways, a brother (Ash) who has fled to Israel to study at an Orthodox yeshiva, and a mother (Ellie) who thinks Orthodox Judaism may be a cult from which her son must be saved at any cost. But that's just the beginning -- as the present-time events of the novel unfold, a complex past, full of guilt and blame and miscommunication, reveals itself. Diana Spechler’s fiction has appeared in Glimmer Train Stories , Moment , Lilith , and elsewhere. She received her MFA degree from the University of Montana and was a Steinbeck Fellow at San Jose State University . She lives in New York City, where she is at work on her second novel. Diana's about to begin a busy book tour , and I was pleased to grab some moments of her time for a few questions about the book and ...