Founded in July 2010 by writer A. N. Devers, Writers’ Houses is an online publication dedicated to the exploring writers’ spaces and art of literary pilgrimage.

The impulse to create a site dedicated to documenting writers’ houses came from a growing obsession, since childhood, with books, travel, and making connections between a writer’s work and place. It also came from a realization that there wasn’t a comprehensive resource online, or in print, that helped literary pilgrims find their way.

Of course, it is easy these days, to search online for a favorite author and find out if they have a house to visit. But sometimes there are multiple sites of interest, and not all have websites. The Writers’ Houses database is designed to be a field guide to deceased writers’ homes, searchable by author, city, state, and country.

Writers’ Houses seeks, in time (and crossing fingers), to document all writers’ houses open to the public in the world. This is no small task and can’t be done overnight or without help. There are apparently 290 writers’ houses in France alone. For that reason, the website is looking for experienced writers and editors to contribute to the blog and field guide. If you are interested, please feel free to get in touch, but please note that Writers’ Houses, being a labor of love, cannot offer compensation beyond the pleasure of having your work in its virtual pages.

Writers’ Houses presents its Editorial Team:

Contributing Editor Austin Ratner’s first novel, The Jump Artist, was praised as “a remarkable work” by Harper’s Magazine and featured in Publishers Weekly in 2009 as one of ten promising debuts.  In February it was shortlisted for the Sami Rohr Prize in Jewish Literature. His work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine and has been honored with the Missouri Review Editors’ Prize in Fiction.  He attended the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop.

Before turning his focus to writing he received his M.D. from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and he is co-author of the textbook Concepts in Medical Physiology.  He is Clinical Assistant Professor of Preventive Medicine at the Stony Brook University School of Medicine.

He grew up in Cleveland, Ohio and now lives in Brooklyn, New York with his wife and two sons. Austin blogs about books here.

Editorial Assistant Kelsey Ford previously interned at New Directions and A Public Space. When she’s not reading, she’s knitting, rearranging her bookshelves, or trying to get lost in New York City.