THE INTERESTINGS by Meg Wolitzer (is my Girlfriend) (A Preview)

WHAT THE BOOK IS ABOUT:

I wrote about Meg Wolitzer’s THE WIFE a few weeks back (quick recap: I ate it up WITH A SPOON AND A FORK). So of course I’m now on the backlist prowl (I got THE POSITION and THE TEN YEAR NAP from the library). And then wonder of wonders, miracles of miracles, Lydia Hirt over at Riverhead scored me a copy of Wolitzer’s upcoming book THE INTERESTINGS (out this April).

If I was a good and patient little book blogger I would  write my review now and wait ’til April to post it.

But I’m NOT a good and patient little book blogger. I am a wicked thing. And I CAN’T wait to tell you how much I liked reading THE INTERESTINGS. I ate it up with a spoon and a fork and a knife and spork and CHOPSTICKS and I don’t even know what else.

The novel tells the story of a group of friends who meet as teenagers at a sleepaway arts summer camp in the 1970’s, and follows the friends up through basically today. It’s a novel about young people who dream of being creative forces in the world and what happens to their group dynamic over the years as dreams are achieved (and also not). It’s well-observed and hilarious and just so tragic and one of my new favorite fictional stories about envy in the artistic world (I am a GONER for AMADEUS and ALL ABOUT EVE). Also I teach at a performing arts camp every summer and so all the stuff about summer camp just. got. me. 

The book is a little chubby (what do we call books with excess flesh? Rubenesque? Botero paintings turned into books?) It’s not five hundred pages… but it gets pretty close to being five hundred pages. It needs to be big, it spans decades and lives, bigness is key and core to the story. But it was a liiiiittle too big, events and emotions felt just this side of repetitive toward the middle. It’s a book that could’ve dropped a few pounds but I love it even with its extra junk in the trunk. Wolitzer covers so much ground!  It’s a big, smart, human, American book.

I hate hyping this thing hard and then making you all wait ’til April to read. But what can I say, I told you I was a wicked thing. You didn’t think I meant it? Oh, but I did.

You can preorder at Powell’s. You can also preorder with the Dark Lord Amazon, but I’m not linking to that. Or you can wait patiently for the amazingness to drop April 9th. This is going to be such a great spring book. The weather getting warmer, wearing skirts all the time, and this book are what’s going to make April great.

WHAT KIND OF GIRLFRIEND IS SHE: Really nice and smart and funny and adorable and completely envious of all her friends’ success.

MY DATE WITH “THE INTERESTINGS”:

We are very jealous of people who are more successful than us.

Just the jealous-est.

We can’t sit up straight we are so jealous.

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