Finding Fiction in Fractured Families for Author Judith Turner-Yamamoto

Author Express

Judith Turner-Yamamoto grew up in rural North Carolina in a small mill town where people either worked the land or left the land to work the mills. As an art historian, she first came to writing through learning to appraise what she saw and to describe what moved her. Her work has appeared in StorySOUTH, Mississippi Review, Snake Nation Review, and American Literary Review, among others, and in many anthologies, including Walking the Edge: A Southern Gothic Anthology, Show Us Your Papers, and Gravity Dancers.

Her debut novel and Petrichor Prize finalist, Loving the Dead and Gone, is the 2023 IPPY Awards Gold Medalist in Southern Fiction, was shortlisted for the 2023 Eric Hoffer Book Award Grand Prize, and was General Fiction Honorable Mention and finalist for the Hoffer First Horizon Award.

In Loving the Dead and Gone, a freak car crash in rural 1960s North Carolina puts in motion moments of grace that bring redemption to two generations of women and the lives they touch. Compact in setting; and large in emotional scope, this lyrical novel set in the tobacco farms and textile mills of central North Carolina transports readers to a very small place to experience life's biggest emotions. Full of character and common tragedy, fans of unveiled family and community secrets will appreciate this intergenerational story of love, loss, grief, and grace that offers humanity hope for healing.

Judith's other awards include two Virginia Arts Commission fellowships, an Ohio Arts Council fellowship, VCCA and Fundaciön Valparaiso fellowship residencies, the Thomas Wolfe Fiction Prize, the Washington Prize for Fiction, and the Virginia Screenwriting Award.

An inveterate traveler, her article assignments, which include interviews with such luminaries as Frank Gehry, Annie Leibovitz, Alison Krauss, and Lucinda Williams, have taken her all over the world, and she has published more than a thousand cover stories and features on the arts, design, architecture, interiors and gardens, travel, food, fashion, and books in such publications as The Boston Globe Magazine, Elle, Interiors, Art & Antiques, The Los Angeles Times, and Travel & Leisure.

Her on-air interviews were featured on NPR affiliate WVXU. She has taught fiction at the Chautauqua Writers' Center, Chautauqua Institution, the Danville Writer's Conference, and the Writers' Center, Bethesda, Maryland. She lives in Cincinnati, OH with her husband, visual artist Shinji Turner-Yamamoto.

You can learn more about Judith on her website: turneryamamoto.com. Follow her on Instagram and Twitter @jturneryamamoto and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/judith.turneryamamoto.

Get your copy of Loving the Dead and Gone at your favorite bookstore or on Amazon at www.amazon.com/Loving-Dead-Gone-Judith-Turner-Yamamoto or support your local bookstore & this podcast by getting your copy of Loving the Dead and Gone at www.bookshop.org/a/90599/9781646032587

A little about today's host-

Author and musical composer Kathleen Basi is mother to three boys and one chromosomally-gifted daughter. Her debut novel, A SONG FOR THE ROAD, follows a musician on an unconventional road trip. Bestselling author Kerry Anne King writes, “In a novel filled with music, heartbreak, and surprising laughter, Basi takes us on a journey that encompasses both unimaginable loss and the powerful resilience of the human heart.”

Meaty, earnest, occasionally humorous, and ultimately uplifting, Kathleen’s fiction highlights the best within ourselves and each other. She writes monthly reflections on life, writing and beauty on her newsletter. Subscribe at https://kathleenbasi.substack.com/.

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