University of Iowa alum Laura Caldwell returned to Iowa City in April 2011 to read from Long Way Home: A Young Man Lost in the System and the Two Women Who Found Him. The book was Caldwell’s first work of nonfiction. She is also the author of more than ten novels, the most recent of which is 2014’s The Dog Park.
In this On the Fly interview, recorded at the time of her visit, Caldwell explains that she doesn’t require a quiet place to get her work done: “I could write on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. I really could.”
She also discusses the ways in which issues of innocence, broadly defined, have started to infuse her writing, including her Izzy McNeil series. The interview ends with her reflections on her “graduation system” for calling herself a writer, an author, and a novelist.
