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Is it possible to be a good writer without being a good reader? I don't know if there's any empirical evidence on this subject. My bet is that it's possible to be a good writer without having grown up with books, but that it is impossible to be a great writer without having books as the deep solace in your life. Have you ever belonged to a reading group? When I moved to a small town in my early twenties, I could not figure out how to meet readers. The librarian was a stern woman who read romances, so she wasn't much help. Could you tell what a person read by looking hard at her face? This gauge, I learned, was not reliable. It was after The Book of Ruth was published that reading groups starting to come to me. There were about five book clubs in my neighborhood, including a men's group. Who knew! It seemed to me that these groups were secret societies, underground rabble-rousers, who showed themselves every now and then to people they thought were safe. I joined one for awhile -- which was lovely -- but then I had children, life got busier, and I had to take a long leave of absence. What advice do you have for reading group members when it comes to selecting books for discussion? This seems like the most difficult part of the book club experience. You know you're not going to please everyone, so I'd pick a book that I'm crazy about, and also I'd try to develop a thick skin, and also try very hard not hold it against any book club member if she hated it.....Or, is it better to pick something you don't love, so you're not devastated when others think it's dumb. All of this, a very sticky wicket. What books are you reading now or do you plan to read? I just read all of Alice McDermott's work. I am in an Alice McDermott swoon. Her books are thrilling. I'm going to read The Heart of Darkness, because I've never been able to get through it, I want to reread The Once and Future King, and I'm dying to read the new Jennifer Egan book, The Keep. If you were stuck on a deserted island and could only bring one book with you to read, what would it be and why? We'd get a Boyscout Manual, right? And a guide to wild nuts and berries? And we'd automatically have the Bible and Shakespeare? So, for another book I might try to learn something that has always been difficult, such as math, or I'd bring one of those detailed How to Draw books. Or a book of the New York Times crossword puzzles, although that would probably be the one thing that would drive a person to kill herself. If you could have dinner with 3 writers (dead or alive) who would they be and why? I'd like to be the maid who gets to stand in the corner, who pours the water for Samuel Johnson, Henry James, and Truman Capote. Can you imagine anything more frightening? Have you ever read anything you're too embarrassed to admit (except in this interview)? Never. Favorite book when you were a child? The first Box Car Children book. There were only three back then, but the first one was pure heaven. This was my favorite book when I was in first grade. I think that was the first book I read myself, which also makes it reason to be a favorite If you have children, is this the same book that you read to them? If not, what's your favorite book for your children? By the time my children came along, there were hundreds of Box Car books. They checked them all out from the library. None of them came near the first. There is nothing better though, for a child, than an orphan story. Favorite heroine in literature and why? Not counting Austen's heroines and usual perennial favorites in the moment, I'd choose Rose, the narrator of Lori Lansen's wonderful novel about conjoined twins, The Girls. Rose has no self-pity, she's funny, she reads good books, she tries to speak the truth, she's aware of her evil streaks, and she can make a great story out of very little material. She's pure joy. Favorite hero in literature and why? The composer in David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas, because he knows almost everything. Favorite first line from a book? "Take my camel, dear," said my aunt Dot, as she climbed down from this animal on her return from High Mass." -The Towers of Trebizond. Favorite last line from a book? "It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both." -Charlotte's Web.
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