William Echols

The first time I ever tried to write a novel, I was a kid sitting in a sweltering second-story bedroom in my grandma's farmhouse in Blountville, Tennessee. My vista was nothing but a country road, the hill on the other side, and a smattering of trailers and clapboard houses. I had a lot of dreams and no inputs. There was nowhere to go and nothing to do. So I wrote, or I tried to write anyways. That book went no where but I did, chasing those dreams right out into the world. Eventually I found a way to turn those dreams into words.

After escaping the American South, I served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Kazakhstan and got an MA in International Politics from Queen's University Belfast. I spent nearly 10 years living and traveling around the post-Soviet world, working as a volunteer, journalist, teacher and translator. I started a blog called Russian Avos, which eventually got me a few other gigs.

After leaving Russia, I did a stint as a freelance journalist in India, perhaps the best time of my life. From there I moved onto the Bangkok Post and other media outlets in Thailand.

I currently work at the Voice of America in Washington, D.C.

Lana Walked on the Shore is my first novel. I finished it in the New Laos Paris Hotel in Vientiane. That day, I pretty much understood everything I needed to know about living. I had to travel many a year, and a mile, from where I came from, to finally come home.