Meg Wolitzer’s newest novel, The Uncoupling, just came out this week. Wolitzer, whose other novels include The Ten-Year Nap and The Position, will read on Monday, April 11, at 7 p.m. at the Central Library.
We are thrilled that she’s our guest blogger for today, telling us about her nightstand reading stack:
I tend to be a nearly exclusive fiction reader, but these days I am finding myself drawn to some memoirs as well. When I read, I want the book to be a very concentrated experience: a kind of literary bouillon cube, somehow. In this current cluster of books, none is very long, and each of them is intense in different ways.
Just finished: Sempre Susan: A Memoir of Susan Sontag by Sigrid Nunez. This is a fascinating little book, a close study of a complicated woman who was revered and feared, known for her style as well as her eclecticism and brilliance. Nunez was Sontag’s son’s girlfriend long ago, and she lived with mother and son for a while, learning everything at the knee of this apparently surprisingly needy genius. I really felt that every word here was true.
Recently Finished: Old Filth by Jane Gardam. This British novel has become something of a cult hit among the people I know. It’s a character study of a very old barrister who spent his work life in Asia and now has returned to England, and it’s written in the drollest language imaginable. I haven’t enjoyed a novel this much in ages.
About to begin: The Long Goodbye by Meghan O’Rourke. I know this memoir of her mother’s death and the grief that followed will be really sad, but (actually, maybe I don’t mean but, just and…) the section I read in “The New Yorker” was great. From the quick glances I’ve taken thus far, this looks like an accomplished and riveting study of the slippery, elusive, demanding nature of loss and sorrow.
Our thanks to Meg for talking books with us! We’re looking forward to having this author in town next Monday!
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