Q. As one of the Book Review regulars, what's your background and how did you end up working for the Book Review?
A: My father is a Russian literature professor and my mother taught journalism, graphic design, global Marxism (etc). I grew up in mid-western university towns in a busy, somewhat raucous (two brothers) household where food, books, conversation and entertaining were very important. Because of my dad's job, I was allowed to study French and German at the university, and spent summers in France, from the age of twelve, which kicked off a fascination with all things trans-Atlantic. I was a paper girl, edited the school newspapers, and was a high school debater. At Yale I majored in comparative literature, and learned Russian and Italian. When I graduated, in pre-internet days, I was hired as a fact checker at The New Yorker at a time when phone calls to collapsing, post-Soviet Eastern Europe were integral to the job. That job was more than marvelous. It gave me a firm foothold in a matchless literary community, and gave me the time to write extensively on the side. I soon started writing for The New Yorker, and when Chip McGrath left the New Yorker for the Times Book Review, he assigned me my first review in 1995. I continued writing book reviews and other pieces while working at The New Yorker. When Sam Tanenhaus came to the Review in 2004, he asked me to write more frequently. In 2004 and 2005, I wrote so much for the Times that I at last left The New Yorker to devote all my time to writing. I am thrilled to have a forum where my impressions are welcome to be part of the ongoing cultural discussion.
Q. How do you write a review, and how long does it take you?
A: I read the book as long as possible before the review is due, to give me time to ponder the other books, movies, or other influences it might suggest. When I feel it's important to the review, I read (or watch) those other books/poems/movies. (Sometimes the book itself is enough.) I sit with these thoughts for a day or two, then write. I write in one sitting, then I give myself a little pause, and come back to the piece, and see if was on the right track. When necessary, I then tweak, or rewrite. (I often have two separate leads, and decide at the last minute which one is the better starting point.) And then I hit send.
Q: What constitutes original fiction these days?
A: It's funny, I think that a lot of fiction can be both derivative and original. Some, sadly, is neither. Writers, nearly always, are also readers. It is inescapable that their literary preferences and influences will emerge in their work. David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas, for instance, is an overwhelmingly beautiful and intricate book, written in styles that intentionally evoke Thomas Mann, Ray Bradbury and any number of other masters of different genres. In general, I am more interested in original subjects and assured voice than in self-consciously original style. That said, I think Dave Eggers and Tom McCarthy's fiction deserves to be called purely original. The question you ask yourself while reading is: Have I read something like this before? When the answer is no, the author has really pulled something off. Some other voices that have captivated me in the last few years are Will Clarke, Ben Fountain, Zadie Smith, Marisha Pessl and Adam Davies. (The list goes on.)
Q. Who are your favorite authors?
A: Graham Greene, Anthony Trollope, Jane Austen, Yeats, Charlotte Bronte, V.S. Naipaul, Kurt Vonnegut, P.G. Wodehouse, and most of the Russian greats.
Q: What's the last good book you read for fun and how does a book reviewer read for fun?
A: I write a column for Styles of the Times on books that are often purely fun. I adored Kristina Grish's Joy of Text, and Simon Winder's reflection on the importance of James Bond ... The Man Who Saved Britain. I'm reading Dostoevsky's The Idiot for my book club (I started a book club seven years ago, when I realized I wasn't doing enough reading for pleasure, and wanted to be reminded of why I like reading so much in the first place), and Trollope's Barchester Towers is on my nightstand.
I take guilty delight in reading books that aren't assigned on the fly. It feels like a stolen pleasure. For instance, yesterday I read Alex Kapranos's Sound Bites, a food memoir of (mostly) the meals he had on tour with Franz Ferdinand. On one page, he mocks New York gourmet tastes for marrow: "Do dogs know something I don't?" On another, he describes a Glasgow roadway as a "mile of dirty concrete cast across the city like a slice of gristle through the Glaswegian heart." Then, here and there, an apostrophe to food joy breaks forth: "chickens that were thick-boned from healthy life;" the "regal crudity " of a mutton chop. It's an irreverent, knowing and savory read-and Irresistible when you're supposed to be reading six other books.
Q: Finish this story: Once there was a valley filled with peaceful unicorns:
A:But then, one day, a pack of vegetarian lions wandered into the valley, looking for a serene new home where they could enjoy their non-meat diet without facing mockery from the lions they'd left behind in the valley one over. Soon, the neighboring carnivorous lions began to sneak into the unicorn valley, slinging excess kills amid the buttercups, hoping to woo their friends back to their old ways, and lure them back home. The vegetarian lions resisted temptation and ignored the carcasses - wildebeest, ibex, rabbits, dik-diks. But the peaceful unicorns, curious and unaware, began to nibble the fresh meat that dotted their pasture. They soon developed an unshakable hunger for flesh. Over time, they grew strong and violent, and slew and ate the mild lion invaders, who had been weakened by their diet of chives and berries. The unicorns' craving for meat grew and grew, but alas, no more deliveries of wildebeest and ibex came, as the lions the next valley over were now afraid to drop by (and besides, since their friends had been eaten, their motive was much reduced). The unicorns were very relieved when Fresh Direct began to deliver to their zip code, though these days, they eat mostly fish.
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