Day 8: Character Desire with Ilan Mochari & Marjan Kamali

Ilan Mochari is the author of the acclaimed debut novel Zinsky the Obscure which earned rave reviews from Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, and Booklist. Boston’s NPR station named it one of 10 “Good Reads for the Summer.” Ilan’s short stories, poems, and essays have been widely published, appearing or forthcoming in McSweeney’s, Salamander, Solstice, Hobart, Juked, J Journal, Slate, Valparaiso Fiction Review and elsewhere. His work has been nominated for multiple Pushcart Prizes as well as the Derringer Award, and he is the recipient of a Literature Artist Fellowship grant from the Somerville Arts Council.

Marjan Kamali is the award-winning author of The Stationery Shop , a national bestseller, and Together Tea , a Massachusetts Book Award finalist. Kamali’s novels are published in translation in more than 20 languages. Her essays have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Literary Hub, and the Los Angeles Review of Books. Kamali holds a bachelor’s degree in English literature from the University of California, Berkeley, an MBA from Columbia University, and a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing from New York University. She currently teaches creative writing at GrubStreet. She is a 2022 recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowship.