Dana Spiotta's new novel is Innocents and Others. From the author's Q&A with Deborah Kalb:Q: Innocents and Others focuses on female friendship. Why did you decide to write about that topic, and how did you come up with your characters Meadow and Carrie?Visit Dana Spiotta's website.
A: I am interested in writing about nonromantic relationships, which are less addressed in fiction. In my previous book it was a sibling relationship, and in this one a life-long friendship between two women.
I like how a novel can track the ups and downs, the way how, over time, who has the upper hand changes and then changes again.
There is a line that Carrie says at one point:
“Unlike a marriage, which must be fulfilling and a goddamn mutual miracle, a friendship could be twisted and one-sided and make no sense at all, but if it had years and years behind it, the friendship could not be discarded. It was too late to change her devotion to Meadow, even if Carrie hardly ever felt it returned lately.”
I was curious about those kinds of connections. I value them, as there is...[read on]
--Marshal Zeringue