Anyone who reads Wally Lamb's first two books will no doubt be inspired to seek out more. His other novels include "The Hour I First Believed," "We Are Water," and "I'll Take You There." He also penned the comic novella "Wishin' and Hopin': A Christmas Story," which was turned into one of the best Lifetime Christmas movies ever made, per IMDb. (Keep an eye out for Lamb's cameo as a janitor.)
Lamb knows how lucky he's been in his career, especially his good fortune to be anointed by Oprah Winfrey twice. "I like to think of it as I had two rides on the roller coaster and then I came back and I was scratching my head. There are so many writers that are good or way better than I am so why did this happen to me? I could never figure out why," he told the CT Examiner. "I began to think about what I could do to give back."
His way of giving back was to start teaching a writing workshop at a women's prison in Connecticut. "I've never been involved with writers who have been so enthusiastic and involved in creating and revising their work. I didn't know that the women would give me more of an education than I was giving them," he told Publishers Weekly. He went on to edit two collections of their essays: "Couldn't Keep It to Myself" and "I'll Fly Away."
