Prompt to Page with Andrew Shaffer

Each month, we interview a published writer who shares their favorite writing prompt. Whether you’re just getting started or have written for years, you’ll find ideas and advice to inspire you and help you become a better writer.

Prompt to Page is brought to you in partnership with the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning.

Listen to Episode 17

For our seventeenth episode, we talk to Andrew Shaffer, author of Feel the Bern: A Bernie Sanders Mystery. Andrew describes what it’s like to write fiction about public figures and how studying comedy writing at The Second City has influenced his writing process. He shares a writing prompt from his wife, author Tiffany Reisz, who appeared on episode seven.

Andrew believes that the well known saying to write what you know “doesn’t mean that you can only write stuff about your own life.” Instead of taking that advice literally, you should “write what you know in terms of emotional truths.” Listen below!

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About Andrew Shaffer

Author Andrew Shaffer, a white man with black hair and blue eyes. He is wearing black glasses and a humorous expression.

Andrew Shaffer is the New York Times bestselling author of Hope Never Dies: An Obama Biden Mystery and over a dozen other humorous works of genre fiction from mystery to horror. He is a five-time Goodreads Choice Award nominee.

An Iowa native, Shaffer lives in Louisville with his wife, novelist Tiffany Reisz. His latest release is the cozy mystery Feel the Bern: A Bernie Sanders Mystery.