I’ve Got Questions for Kevin M. McIntosh

Editor’s Note: This exchange is part of a series of brief interviews with emerging writers of recent or forthcoming books. If you enjoyed it, please visit other interviews in the I’ve Got Questions feature.

Class Dismissed by Kevin M. McIntosh
  • What’s the title of your book? Fiction? Nonfiction? Poetry? Who is the publisher and what’s the publication date?

My book is Class Dismissed, a novel. It is being released by Regal House Publishing on July 1, 2021.

  • In a couple of sentences, what’s the book about?

A young Midwestern teacher is cast down a NYC rabbit hole of Board of Ed bureaucracy and union politics when a privileged but learning-disabled student is injured in his classroom.

  • What’s the book’s genre (for fiction and nonfiction) or primary style (for poetry)?

Class Dismissed is realistic literary fiction.

  • What’s the nicest thing anyone has said about the book so far?

Jane Hamilton called my novel “pitch-perfect . . . elegantly plotted . . . very funny . . . not to mention harrowing.”

  • What book or books is yours comparable to or a cross between? [Is your book like Moby Dick or maybe it’s more like Frankenstein meets Peter Pan?]

If Richard Russo and To Sir with Love had a baby.

  • Why this book? Why now?

Although Class Dismissed is set in mid-’90s Manhattan, the race and class tensions are just as strong today. Maybe stronger. The inequities between urban and suburban schools have not been addressed.

  • Other than writing this book, what’s the best job you’ve ever had?

Teaching 8th graders how to write, speak, think critically. City or suburb, 8th graders are a wild and fascinating bunch.

  • What do you want readers to take away from the book?

What a complex task teaching is, what a small miracle it is when it’s done really well. How much work is left to be done to make education a level playing field nationally.

  • What food and/or music do you associate with the book?

Certain scenes and chapter titles riff on music from Frank Sinatra to ’60s rock ’n’ roll.

  • What book(s) are you reading currently?

I’m reading American Prometheus, a biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer, and re-reading The Radetsky March, a brilliant novel by Joseph Roth.

Kevin M. McIntosh (photo by Small Circle Studio)

Learn more about Kevin at his website.

Follow Kevin on Twitter.

Buy the book from Regal House Publishing, Bookshop.org, or Indiebound.

About the author

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.