Folks, I’m sorry I haven’t done a new post in a while. I’ve been busy with a few events for the release of my new novel, Break the Skin, which, much to my great fortune, got a very good review in The New York Times. Here’s a link in case you’d like to check it…

Anyone who’s read my memoirs, From Our House and Turning Bones, knows that my father was a farmer who lost both of his hands in an accident in November, 1956. He wore prostheses the rest of his life, and he continued to farm. My relationship was uneasy with him until my later teen years when…

I thought I should make a post on this day, the pub day for my new novel, Break the Skin. Such a thing doesn’t happen without the help of  a number of people. A book doesn’t make its way into the world only because of the efforts of the author. There are the people who…

To My Dear Undergraduate Students, Don’t be afraid of your talents, but also be sure to humble yourself to them and to what will be a lifelong apprenticeship if you decide to keep writing. Never think yourself greater than the craft itself. We are all amateurs from time to time, no matter how long we’ve…

Last night was a glorious evening for The Ohio State University MFA Program, where I teach. We held our end-of-the-year gala celebration for our graduating students. It was an evening of fancy clothes and stunning readings. A public performance of the excellent poetry, creative nonfiction, and fiction that those receiving their degrees have written. Our…

On this Memorial Day, I’m thinking about peonies, which, for some reason, folks in my part of southeastern Illinois always called “pineys,” with a long “i” as in “pine,” meaning to long for. On our farm, when I was a boy, we had peony bushes along the edge of the side yard where each summer…

In my last post, a question and answer session about my soon-to-be released novel, Break the Skin, that novelist Dani Shapiro conducted for Amazon.com, I respond to a question about how the experience of writing a novel differs for me than what happens when I write memoir. I say that the memoir perhaps allows me…

Here we are, a little over three weeks until the publication date of my new novel, and Amazon.com has posted a Q & A that I did with novelist, Dani Shapiro. Many thanks to Dani for making time to pose some questions. I hope you’ll find my responses of interest. Please feel free to leave…

Some of you may have read my previous post about the soldier in Iraq who emailed me to ask whether I’d inscribe one of my books for his girlfriend on her birthday. “Sure,” I said. He sent me the book, a book by another Lee Martin, and I looked up that fine gentleman on the…

I had a very pleasant experience last week. I serve as the Fiction Editor at a literary journal, which means that every so often, the Managing Editor sends me a packet of stories that have made it through the first readers and now get my consideration. I choose a few each time that I think…