WRITING FOR YOUR LIFE #2

Publishers Weekly, a trade journal for the book industry, allows its regular author interviews a roomier format (some 2,200 words) and a more detailed examination of the publishing process than most consumer periodicals. As a result, the 50 profiles collected here give a pleasingly concrete and nuanced portrait of the working writer's life. In contrast with the first volume (not reviewed), which drew on a decade's worth of material, number two reprints pieces that appeared in the magazine from January 1991 through July 1994. Nonetheless, an impressive number of well-known names appear, from bestsellers like John Grisham and Terry McMillan to critical favorites such as E.L. Doctorow and V.S. Naipaul. In a book devoted to writers, however, it seems little churlish not to credit the people who actually penned the interviews in the Table of Contents; they merely get their name appended to each article's conclusion, just above the publication date.