February 15: Edith Pearlman and Elizabeth Ziemska

Reviewing Edith Pearlman’s Binocular Vision on the front page of the January 14th New York Times Book Review, Roxana Robinson wrote that in Pearlman’s stories “we’re caught up in a stream of beguiling details. . .as Pearlman describes a world that’s familiar, beloved and fascinating all at once.” But then, says Robinson, Pearlman “slips in an emotion. . . which permeates the landscape, leaving it known but dreaded, familiar but unbearable, a place we never want to inhabit, but do.”

Edith Pearlman’s Binocular Vision: New and Selected Stories has just been published by Lookout Press. She is the author of three other collections of stories: Vaquita (1996), Love Among The Greats (2002), and How To Fall (2005). She has published more than 250 works of short fiction and short non-fiction in national magazines, literary journals, anthologies, and on-line publications. Her work has been selected by Best American Short Stories, the O. Henry Prize Collection, Best Short Stories from the South, and The Pushcart Prize Collection. Her essays have appeared in the Atlantic Monthly, Smithsonian, Preservation, and Yankee. Her travel writing has been published in the New York Times, The Boston Globe, and salon.com.

Elizabeth Ziemska's first published story "A Murder of Crows," appeared in Tin House (Spring 2007), was a finalist for the 2008 Shirley Jackson Award, and made the extended list for Best American Non-Required Reading. "Count Poniatowski and the Beautiful Chicken" was published in Interfictions:2 (2009). Elizabeth is currently at work on a novel that combines Russia, mythology, sturgeon, and two women.

Born in Poland, Elizabeth grew up in New York and L.A. She went to Vassar and UCLA, where she earned a degree in Biology. After several years working as an agent first in the New York publishing industry and then in L.A.’s film industry, she decided to pursue writing at the Bennington Writing Seminars. She earned her MFA in 2008 and lives in L.A. with her husband, stepson, and three crazy dogs.