Whatever is exposed, I don’t feel bad about that because I know was writing about it from love. Not that you have to, but I am just saying, that is how I work.
— Elizabeth Strout
"Novelist Elizabeth Strout follows her way" Mary Pols Portland Press Herald March 30, 2014
Elizabeth's The Burgess Boys has been longlisted for the UK's Bailey's Women's Prize 2014 (formerly the Orange Prize).
Helen Fraser, Chair of Judges, says: “This is a fantastic selection of books of the highest quality – intensely readable, gripping, intelligent and surprising – that you would want to press on your friends, and the judges have been doing just that.”
The judges must now whittle these 20 books to six, before choosing an overall winner to be announced on 4th June 2014.
Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction Announce the 2014 Longlist Baileys Women’s Prize For Fiction News blog March 7, 2014
British writers Anna Metcalfe and Jonathan Tel go head-to-head with Pulitzer prize-winners Elizabeth Strout and Adam Johnson on the shortlist for the 2014 Sunday Times EFG Short Story Award. Now in its fifth year, the shortlist reflects the award's ability to showcase new talent - alongside new stories from literary giants.
Sunday Times EFG Short Story Award: Shortlist announced Booktrust News, February 28, 2014
For Italian readers, an interview with Elizabeth in il Fatto Quotidiano:
Elizabeth Strout ha il dono di trasformare donne normali, donne qualsiasi, in personaggi eccezionali. In Olive Kitteridge la protagonista è un’insegnante di provincia. In Amy e Isabelle, Isabelle è una segretaria qualunque e Amy un’adolescente piena di paure come tante. In Resta con me, Tyler è un reverendo di un piccolo paese del Maine e Connie una domestica. Anche I ragazzi Burgess è la storia di gente comune, Susan e Helen sono madri che hanno vissuto per i figli e basta, Bob e Jim due fratelli in competizione come migliaia di altri. Eppure è proprio da questo nucleo di normalità che la Strout tira fuori grandi storie e figure potenti, indimenticabili.
Elizabeth Strout: 'Disegnate i protagonisti dovete poterli vedere' Caterina Bonvicini il Fatto Quotidiano December 9, 2013
“In literature, the unreliable narrator gets all of the attention—though far more interesting a creation is the truly unlikable narrator, to say nothing of one the reader still identifies and empathizes with, deeply. Such an animal is Olive Kitteridge, the heroine of Strout’s eponymous follow-up to her justly praised Amy & Isabelle. ”
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