Larger Than Life

Louise Erdrich is the author of more than a dozen novels as well as volumes of poetry, children’s books, short stories, and a memoir of early motherhood. Her novel The Round House won the National Book Award for Fiction. The Plague of Doves won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and her debut novel, Love Medicine, was the winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award. Erdrich has received the Library of Congress Prize in American Fiction, the prestigious PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction, and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. Her most recent work is the bestselling, critically acclaimed novel The Night Watchman. Erdrich lives in Minnesota with her daughters and is the owner of Birchbark Books, a small independent bookstore. Her next novel, The Sentence will be published in November.

Jane Kaczmarek is best known for her role as Lois on Malcolm in the Middle, for which she received 7 consecutive Emmy nominations as well as nominations for the Golden Globe and SAG Awards. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin and Yale School of Drama, Kaczmarek made her television debut on The Paper Chase and Hill Street Blues and most recently can be seen on The Big Bang Theory, This Is Us, Carol's Second Act, and Mixed-ish. In New York, Kaczmarek has appeared on Broadway and off at the Manhattan Theatre Club, Second Stage, the Public Theatre, New York Theater Workshop, and 6 seasons at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. Her recent theater credits include in Long Day's Journey Into Night, Our Town with Deaf West Theatre, and The Year to Come at La Jolla Playhouse. Kaczmarek’s favorite job is raising her three kids and reading/hosting Selected Shorts across America.

Stana Katic has starred in two major TV series: Absentia, produced by Sony Pictures Television and available on Amazon Prime, and for 8 seasons on ABC’s Castle. Her feature film work includes CBGB, about the Punk Rock club in NYC, Big Sur based on the Jack Kerouac novel, Frank Miller's film The Spirit, Robert Benton's Feast of Love, The Double with Richard Gere, Quantum of Solace with Daniel Craig, as well as The Rendezvous, Lost in Florence, A Call to Spy, and The Possession of Hannah Grace. She made her off-Broadway debut in 2016 in White Rabbit Red Rabbit. Katic will voice the role of Wonder Woman in forthcoming animated adventure Justice Society: World War II.

Mary Orr (1910 - 2006) was an actress and author, best known for her short story “The Wisdom of Eve,” which was adapted into the Academy Award-winning film All About Eve. She frequently collaborated with her husband, Reginald Denham, and wrote five books and forty television scripts. She and Denham also collaborated on the plays Wallflower, Round Trip, Dark Hammock, and Be Your Age.

Elizabeth Reaser’s film and television credits include Sweet Land, Grey’s Anatomy, The Twilight Saga, The Ex List, The Good Wife, Bonnie & Clyde, Mad Men, Manhunt: Unabomber, Law & Order True Crime,The Haunting of Hill House, Embattled, Easy, 50 States of Fright, and The Handmaid’s Tale. She has also been featured off-Broadway in The Winter’s Tale, How I Learned to Drive, The Money Shot, and The Babylon Line at the Lincoln Center Theater.

Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney is the author of the instant New York Times bestselling novels The Nest and Good Company. The Nest was a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writer’s pick and named one of the best books of 2016 by People, the Washington Post, NPR, Amazon, and others. Sweeney’s work has been translated into more than 28 languages. The Nest has been optioned by AMC Studios and is in development as a limited series. Sweeney holds an MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars and lives in Los Angeles with her family.