Favorite Websites & Favorite Books

Favorite Websites:

I’m not a huge Internet person. I’ve discovered that it’s better for a writer to stay off the web and keep her nose buried in her new book! Nevertheless:

For Entertainment: www.joshilynjackson.com. Her blog is hilarious and her books are even better.

For News in the World of Publishing: www.publisherslunch.com, www.mediabistro.com/galleycat, www.publishersweekly.com

To Feed the Body and Mind: www.chocolateandzucchini.com

For Commentary: www.huffingpost.com

Favorite Books:

My hands-down, favorite book since I was nine years old is Jane Eyre. “Reader, I married him,” is still one of my favorite lines, ever. But for a grown-up love story, please get Anna Karenina. I didn’t read this until I was an adult, the summer I met my husband, actually, and I think everyone should read it before he or she gets married!

I can’t remember when I first read Lolita, but it creeps me out, every, single time I pull it off the shelf. Especially now that I’m a mother. What’s so genius about it is that you can’t help but be simultaneously attracted to and totally repelled by the narrator. I think when people call this a “dirty” book, that’s what they’re really talking about.

I can never choose between A Prayer for Owen Meany and The Cider House Rules. Irving is our contemporary Dickens, and I love the scope and sly irony of his voice, not to mention his mastery with setting.

I read The Secret History by Donna Tartt when I was in graduate school and totally overloaded on linguistic theory and academic jargon. It was the perfect escape, and to this day I remain a dedicated fan of anything Gothic.

Nigel Slater’s The Kitchen Diaries is the perfect succor for when the writing’s not going well. I put down my pen and head to the kitchen, and I never go wrong with this book.

Finally, my shelves are crammed to bursting with everything ever written by: Alice Hoffman, Amy Tan, Barbara Kingsolver, Alice Sebold, Margaret Atwood, Zadie Smith, Toni Morrison, Michael Chabon, and Isabel Allende.