Key West Sketches

An eclectic collection by writers who have lived, worked, and played in Key West, Florida. 

Key West has long been America’s most vibrant writers' colony, tracing its writerly roots to Ernest Hemingway, Tennessee Williams, Robert Frost, John Hersey, Richard Wilbur, James Merrill, and Elizabeth Bishop. More recently, Thomas McGuane, Robert Stone, Judy Blume, Robert Richardson, Ann Beattie, Philip Caputo, Alison Lurie, and Meg Cabot have added their luster to the island’s literary heritage. This collection includes a treasure trove of more than sixty essays, reminiscences, musings, and poems about Key West. It features the town’s best-known writers: Lurie, Blume, Caputo, Cabot, McGuane, Beattie, Shames, Lee Smith, Frank Deford, Phyllis Rose, Glenn Frankel, Joy Williams, Barbara Ehrenreich, Billy Collins, and on and on.