Planting Roots and Crossing Borders in Sara Johnson Allen’s Down Here We Come Up

Podcast: Download (Duration: 59:48 — 54.8MB)

In this episode 369, we feature Sara Johnson Allen’s award-winning literary fiction debut Down Here We Come Up, a novel about three women who have lost connection with their children, through alienation, adoption, and across a militarized border. Ana Reyes, author of The House in the Pines, says “In exquisite prose, Sara Johnson Allen explores motherhood in the face of wrenching economic and racial realities of the American south yet weaves moments of joy and exhilaration throughout. Down Here We Come Up is written with such empathy and grace that I felt I knew these women and will carry them with me for a long time.”

Show discussion highlights:

  • The importance of figuring out your unique creative process and how Sara carved out space for her writing between work and family
  • The value of hiring a publicist, even for a traditionally-published author
  • Exercises to imagine your characters and settings more deeply
  • How a combination of internet and personal sources can enrich research
  • The role that other writers can play in your life even if you don’t have time for beta reads and critique groups

Brief author bio: 

Sara Johnson Allen was raised (mostly) in North Carolina. Down Here We Come Up, winner of the Big Moose Prize from Black Lawrence Press, is her debut novel. A recipient of the Marianne Russo Award for Emerging Writers by the Key West Literary Seminar, the Stockholm Writers Festival First Pages Prize, an artistic grant from the Elizabeth George Foundation, and MacDowell fellowships, she has published work in PANK Magazine, SmokeLong Quarterly, and Reckon Review, among others. When she is not teaching or shuttling her three kids around, she writes about place and how it shapes us.

Learn more about the author and her books HERE.

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