#136: Tessa Hadley – The Secrets of Literary Fiction: How to Craft Powerful, Resonant Stories, Creating Compelling Stories, Publishing in your 40s, 50s and beyond

Best-selling Author Tessa Hadley on getting published in her 40s and beyond, the craft of literary fiction, developing character and conflict, and the importance of conflict.

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ABOUT TESSA HADLEY:
Tessa Hadley is the author of eight highly acclaimed novels, including Clever Girl and Free Love, as well as four short story collections, most recently Bad Dreams and Other Stories, which won the Edge Hill Short Story Prize. Her latest book is the novella The Party. Her work regularly appears in The New Yorker and Granta, and she has won the Windham Campbell Prize and the Hawthornden Prize. After two decades of struggling to publish, she landed her first book deal at 46 and has since become one of the most respected literary fiction writers of our time.

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RESOURCES & LINKS

• 📑 Interview Transcript (Unedited)
• The Party by Tessa Hadley
• Free Love by Tessa Hadley
• Tom’s Midnight Garden by Philippa Pearce
• Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook 2025 

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