Milan correspondent for W magazine and Women’s Wear Daily, and disappeared for four years in Tuscany. In L.A. she was on the writing staff of Unhappily Ever After; Encore, Encore; The Dead Zone, and Wildfire. She now lives in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. She is the co-author of two novels under the pen name Magnus Flyte. She teaches at College of the Sequoias. The Italian Party is her debut novel.
Lynch's new novel is Sally Brady’s Italian Adventure.
Recently I asked the author about what she was reading. Lynch's reply:
I have a large personal library, and always have an eclectic mix of reading material strewn over the bed and surrounding tabletops toVisit Christina Lynch's website.suit varying moods and energy levels. The other night I stupidly left Mussolini’s Daughter by the indefatigable Caroline Moorehead on a low shelf and then found it partially shredded by my 11-month-old puppy. You can imagine the angry shrieking. Moorehead is a go-to source of research for my historical fiction projects, the latest of which is set in Venice in 1926. Apparently Jack the supermutt also finds her work delectable!
I’m a sucker for those emails from New York Review Books about the new editions of older works they’re publishing, and on impulse I bought A Private Affair by Beppe Fenoglio, about an Italian Resistance fighter in WWII. I’m not that far into it, but I’m loving that the main character is moreconcerned with jealousy over a love affair than the German occupation—it feels so real to me, and reflective of how people really behave in wartime, not the glossy poster version of history. Fenoglio was in the Resistance himself, so the details are wonderful.
The most entertaining slice of the stack on my night table is a pair of comic collections by Norman Thelwell, Pony Panorama and Pony Cavalcade, that feature tiny furry equines wreaking havoc on the humans around them. When I’ve had a long day grading essays and can’t bear to read another word, it’s Thelwell time.
I’m embarrassed to say I’m finally reading Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, about our relationship with the natural world. Better late than never! I’m reading it slowly because it’s the kind of book where you read one page and then lie there thinking about it for a while. Though the ground squirrels strain my patience, I try to live in harmony with the insects, plants and animals here in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. A few years back I even nursed a tarantula back to health over several months—and he never ate any of my books... Puppies!
My Book, The Movie: Sally Brady's Italian Adventure.
--Marshal Zeringue
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