Excerpts from email to Julie Buxbaum, who came and spoke to our group at Kapp's Pizza last week:
(also fyi - there was this Washington Post review, which was favorable, but Julie pointed out that it didn't go very deep into the emotions of the characters. It's all well and good to be Carrie Bradshaw's smarter sister, but that's not all this book is about.)
I went and bought the book at Books Inc down the street that night and finished it the next day. Unfortunately I wasn't thinking about the impact of crying at the end, and wound up finishing it while sitting at Peet's Coffee and starting to sob.
On top of how the book speaks to me, as a woman and a motherless daughter, I also find it very inspirational to hear of people (especially people close to my age) writing first novels successfully.
I did the National Novel Writing Month last year (NaNoWriMo) and was really happy to finish something that vaguely is a connected storyline, in 50,000 words and 1 month!
Right now I am at WisCon, which is a feminist sci fi and fantasy convention, and hoping to recharge batteries here.
One of the women in my life who is one of my "Ruths" (author Pat Murphy, she was the officiant at my wedding) flies to Madison from San Francisco every Memorial Day for WisCon, for almost 20 years now --- she thinks it's pretty cool, and it looks like it will be.
Anyway - quick list of my favorites in The Opposite of Love:
* Ruth and the book club. Emily's thoughts about how much she wants to be with this group of older women, regardless of what they're reading, really hits home to me.
Especially as I get older (I'm 34, Mom died at 42) I am more and more drawn to women who are in their 50s and 60s at least. They are the only models really for what it's like to live longer than 42.
And Ruth being a career mentor for Emily too, as my friend Pat is (although my writing is just getting going, she's also a good overall career mentor. Just in the 2 years I've known her she's had some of the most interesting jobs ever.)
* picture of Emily's mom on the beach - taken before she was born, connecting to a mom she never knew. I have a similar picture of my mom standing in front of a lake, and I always thought it was weird that I feel closer to this picture than to the later pictures that I remember being there for. nice to see a character having the same feelings.
* writing the letter to her mom and the feeling that she sees her around - this is part of what my NaNo novel was about.
* I really liked the prologue with the ultrasound (or is it sonogram) -- we know that there is a baby coming eventually, and there is a father, but don't know who the father is exactly. I think you did a great job with the character of Andrew also -- As I got to know him better, I really felt so hopeful that it would indeed turn out to be Andrew who is the father.
Very real, but not sappy, descriptions.
* references to other people being "grownups" -- their friends having a "grown-up" apt, and so on. My husband and I still talk like this sometimes!
* the whole theme of being afraid to really commit. Sometimes I just want to push people away because I am afraid of losing them if they get too close. I'm pretty happy that my husband withstood previous attempts to do this and stayed with me, and that we are married!
Anyway - thanks again for coming. I hope that your work on the second book is going well. I'm looking forward to reading it.
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