Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
This enthralling collection contains 22 conversations between novelists, memoirists, poets, journalists, screenwriters, and combinations thereof about the craft of writing and the rewards (and torments) that it offers. The interviews, previously published in the Believer, tend to focus on idiosyncratic processes and each author's career trajectory, as well as on how authors understand their work and its relationship to the world. The "conversations" here are more like interviews, with younger authors asking questions of established figures, including Mary Gaitskill, Michael Ondaatje, Victor LaValle, Pankaj Mishra, and Joan Didion. The book's pieces de resistance include a muted exchange between Bret Easton Ellis and Don DeLillo about their respective careers, a high-minded discussion between Aleksander Hemon and Colum McCann on the ethics of novel writing, and a dialogue between Alain Mabanckou and Dany Laferriere on the emergence in literature of African and Caribbean voices. From the troubled state of literature and today's narrowly commercial publishing world to the exasperation of working with Hollywood, the interviews both inspire and charm with their blend of urgency and irony. Moreover, the conversations offer a degree of insight into the development of M.F.A. culture that rivals McGurl's The Program Era. Agent: The Wylie Agency. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Editors at Believer magazine present an eclectic series of interviews. Some of the writers are household names--at least in the households of serious readers: Don DeLillo, Paula Fox, Maureen Howard, Will Self and Joan Didion among them. Others in the collection are known more to the literati or to small legions of zealous fans. But all have provocative things to say about writing, reading and readers, and most of the conversations are amiable, although Julie Hecht comes off as curmudgeonly and caustic at times. Several of the writers talk about their writing spaces and processes, and several say they write either longhand (Mary Gaitskill) or on a typewriter (Barry Hannah, Joy Williams). Virtually all of them reveal their biases and/or idiosyncrasies. Gary Lutz talks passionately about commas (he likes their precision); Chimomanda Ngoza Adichie points out the power of storytelling; Michael Ondaatje says he never thinks about an audience. Although most of the writers have nothing ill to say of their colleagues, Sarah Schulman zings Rick Moody and Jeffrey Eugenides (among others) but expresses gratitude to Grace Paley, Tillie Olsen and Edmund White for career help. In the whatever-happened-to category, Bruce Jay Friedman, now in his 80s, appears to wax wise and express gentle humility: "I'm really surprised by how little I know," he says. A number of the authors complain about the demands of teaching and about the reluctance of writing students to read, and very few issue canned comments--though Mark Leyner's "Fate is the primordial plot device" could qualify. A motley assortment of writers eloquently demonstrate that there is no single "writing process"; there are myriad.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
