Q&A with 2012 Featured Author Stewart O’Nan

Stewart O’Nan is the award-winning author of more than a dozen novels, most recently, “The Odds: A Love Story.” His other works include “Snow Angels,” “A Prayer for the Dying,” “Last Night at the Lobster,” and “Emily, Alone.” Granta named him one of America’s Best Young Novelists. He lives in Pittsburgh.

Where do you find inspiration?
Everywhere

What advice do you have for aspiring authors?
Read.

What are you reading right now?
Fitzgerald.

What’s your favorite opening line from a book?
“They threw me off the hay truck about noon.”

What book has inspired or affected you in some way?
“So Long, See You Tomorrow” by William Maxwell

If you could sit down at dinner with three other authors, living or dead, which three authors would you choose, and why?
Shakespeare, Chekhov, and Virginia Woolf.  Because they know so much about so many.