For a  photo of Martha Witt, click here.

Broken As Things Are:
Author Martha Witt Discusses Her First Novel Set in Hillsborough, NC
On North Carolina Bookwatch, Sunday, November 6, at 5 PM

Author Martha Witt's first novel Broken As Things Are captures the life of young Morgan-Lee and her extraordinarily beautiful and withdrawn older brother Ginx, who has been obsessed with his sister since the day she was born.

Ginx is not only emotionally dependent on his sister; he also suffers from Asperger's syndrome-a high-functioning form of Autism. Sharing a secret language, they escape together into a make-believe world. Unable to articulate his emotions, except through garbled, nonsensical words, Ginx becomes increasingly disturbed by Morgan Lee's desire for friendships beyond the closed circle of their sibling love.

In a luminous voice, Martha Witt creates both the intense, private world of childhood and imagination in Broken As Things Are. On the upcoming episode of UNC-TV's local literary series North Carolina Bookwatch with DG Martin, Sunday, November 6, at 5 PM, Witt introduces her novel's story of the inevitable and necessary pain of separation that comes when her protagonist Morgan Lee finds love beyond her fractured family.

Martha Witt grew up in Hillsborough, North Carolina, the setting of Broken As Things Are. From her childhood images of the people and places of this small Southern town, Witt crafts a timeless tale of intriguing adolescents struggling to understand love, loss, and sacrifice."

"It's funny, when I visit Hillsborough now, it is so different from how I remembered it and I don't think it's just because of the changes that have taken place over the years," admits Witt. "I think it is also because when you are a child you create an imaginary place for yourself and that's what Hillsborough is for me."

Witt's Broken As Things Are captures the summer that Morgan-Lee turns fourteen and is faced with having to choose between her love for her increasingly violent brother Ginx and a life without him.

"Morgan Lee and her older brother are extremely bonded and in fact, that is the whole issue in this book. She is going to grow up and go on to other things and he is not," says Witt. "So, it is in this summer that this bond is going to split apart and the book captures the deep pain of that splitting. In the end, Morgan-Lee recognizes she has to write because of this splitting and the story is, in many ways, about the coming of age of a writer."

Martha Witt received her MA in creative writing at Johns Hopkins University and an MFA in fiction writing at New York University, where she was a New York Times Fellow.~ Currently, she lives in New York City with her husband, son, and daughter.

Don't miss DG Martin's exclusive interview with Martha Witt on North Carolina Bookwatch, Sunday, November 6, at 5 PM, only on UNC-TV!

During this season of North Carolina Bookwatch, guests also include: Shannon Ravenel (New Stories from the South, 2005), Emily Herring Wilson (No One Gardens Alone), Randall Kenan (Walking On Water), Ann B. Ross (Miss Julia's School Of Beauty), Lawrence Earley (Looking for Longleaf), Peter Perret (A Well-Tempered Mind), Timothy Tyson (Blood Done Sign My Name), Moreton Neal (Remembering Bill Neal), Quinn Dalton (Bulletproof Girl), Henry Petroski (Pushing the Limits), Bill Morris (Saltwater Cowboys), Amy Tiemann (Mojo Mom), Robert Irwin (Robert Irwin 40 Years),  Tommy Hays (The Pleasure was Mine),  Mary Kay Andrews (Hissy Fit),  Jerry Shinn (Loonis: Celebrating a Lyrical Life ), (If You Want Me to Stay), Michael Parker (If You Want Me to Stay), Lawrence Naumoff (A Southern Tragedy in Crimson and Yellow) and Gerhard Weinberg (Visions of Victory: The Hopes of Eight World War II Leader).

Funding for North Carolina Bookwatch is provided by UNC-TV members and by Quail Ridge Books and Music, Raleigh's independent, full service bookstore, bringing readers and writers together since 1984.

North Carolina Bookwatch is part of UNC-TV's ongoing commitment to produce programs for and about North Carolina. UNC-TV is the statewide 11-station broadcast network of the University of North Carolina. For more information, please visit www.unctv.org/ncbookwatch.

For more information about North Carolina Bookwatch and UNC-TV's other local productions, please visit our website at www.unctv.org.

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