Writers Read: Laurie Frankel

Friday, August 17, 2012

Laurie Frankel

Laurie Frankel was recently named one of ten women to watch in 2012. She is a proud core member of the Seattle7Writers. Her first novel, The Atlas of Love, came out in August 2010.

Frankel's new novel is Goodbye for Now.

A few weeks ago I asked her what she was reading. Her reply:

Right now, I’m just finishing Maria Semple’s new novel, Where’d You Go, Bernadette. It’s awesome -- funny and smart with really great characters (which is always my favorite part of books), and really, really weird (which I mean as the absolute highest of compliments). I’m doing a couple readings with her later in the month, and I can’t wait.

I’m also reading Rob Lowe’s memoir, Stories I Only Tell My Friends. (Great title!) This is for work because I’m participating in a celebrity memoirs event later this month, and we’re looking for ridiculous passages. Alas, Rob Lowe isn’t quite ridiculous enough. His memoir’s a little too cool to lend itself to drinking games. On the other hand, I have a soft spot for the man because his character on Parks and Recreation represents the best casting I have ever seen. I love that show, and I love him on it, so he could write almost anything and I’d give him a pass.

A couple weeks ago, I had the flu. I always think it’s no fair being sick in the summer. I felt so awful I couldn’t even watch TV, but I couldn’t sleep either because every time I lay down, I started to drown in snot. All I could do was sit propped up on pillows and blow my nose and read for hours and hours on end, so I needed something compelling, not too hard on the brain, and looooooong. I chose Justin Cronin’s The Passage which is just shy of 800 pages. Ordinarily, I don’t read books that long unless they’re Russian, but this was the perfect flu book. The Passage is a vampire book that’s not really a vampire book. It’s well written. It’s compelling as hell. It’s thoroughly, exhaustively, epically imagined. But centrally, it’s about a virus. Which turns you into a vampire. Which is a really scary thing to read while you’re stuck in bed with a virus.

Next up: David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas, which I’ve read before and adored, in order to be ready for the movie in October.