Just as we got our December issue out the door to the printer came word that our How I Write subject for that month, Kim Barnes, had just won a prestigious honor for her novel A Country Called Home (Knopf).

PEN USA, the West Coast center for the renowned writers organization International PEN, awarded Barnes the fiction prize in its 2009 Literary Awards competition. The competition honors outstanding work by writers in 10 genres.

Barnes is a versatile writer, with two memoirs, two novels, and a whole bunch of critical praise to her credit. Her debut book, the memoir In the Wilderness: Coming of Age in Unknown Country, was a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize. Both Publishers Weekly and Booklist gave A Country Called Home a starred review and the book was included in three "best of 2008" roundups by three big newspapers.

PW described the novel thus: "A newly married couple abandon the comfort of upper-class Connecticut and stake their claim in 1960s Fife, Idaho, in Pulitzer-finalist Barnes's exquisite novel. … Barnes's descriptions of the rugged landscape are vivid, and the characters' sadness and desires are revealed with wrenching detail."

We put another accomplished writer to work interviewing Barnes for our article—Buddy Levy, an Idaho-based author, journalist and instructor. We think you'll find Barnes' observations quite interesting. The December issue is due out in just a couple weeks.

--Ron Kovach, senior editor

Have a comment? Please post it here in the forum.