Elizabeth Strout is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the novel Lucy by the Sea, available from Random House.

Strout is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Oh William!; Olive, Again; Anything Is Possible, winner of the Story Prize; My Name Is Lucy Barton; The Burgess Boys; Olive Kitteridge, winner of the Pulitzer Prize; Abide with Me; and Amy and Isabelle, winner of the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction and the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize. She has also been a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize in London. She lives in Maine.

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Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today’s leading writers.

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Clearly, Emma, you are a liar. Your book, Fly-Over State, is billed as a novella, when everyone can see that it is nothing more than a short story. How do you sleep at night?

I had no idea this interview was going to be so hostile. But, yes, you’re right, it is a short story. It is a long short story, at least by my own standards. When Flatmancrooked approached me about their New Novella series and Launch program, the emphasis seemed to be on the ‘New’ and ‘Launch.’ It is also possible that I am a bad listener. Hopefully, the story is satisfying enough that one feels as though they’ve read a novella.