When it comes to putting together their first short story collections, some writers start out with a theme or a plan and stick to it. Then there’s writers like Izzy Wasserstein, who, in assembling hers, All The Hometowns You Can’t Stay Away From (paperback), found that a theme emerged anyway.
In the following email interview, Wasserstein discusses what inspired and influenced these stories, and why she ran with the emergent theme as opposed to running away from it.