First Word #7: Jack Vening First Word

Fiction, comedy and TV writer Jack Vening is a funny bloke. We caught up over Zoom to talk about George Saunders, writing humour, and how to elegantly devastate your readers. In the course of our conversation Jacky mentions several authors he draws inspiration from, including Garielle Lutz, Donald Barthelme, Joy Williams and Benjamin Weissman. He recommends the episode featuring Roberto Bolaño’s Gomez Palacio by Daniel Alarcon on the New Yorker Fiction Podcast (which you can also read yo...