Episode 51 — Lauren Groff

Summary: Lauren Groff is the guest. She's the author of the novel ARCADIA, now available from Hyperion. It has received starred reviews from Library Journal, Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, and Booklist. And Richard Russo raves: "Richly peopled and ambitious and oh, so lovely, Lauren Groff’s Arcadia is one of the most moving and satisfying novels I’ve read in a long time. It’s not possible to write any better without showing off." An excellent conversation with one of our best young novelists. Topics of conversation include: bugs, Gainesville, treadmills, lizards, racoons, heat, cold, sweat lodges, painting, musicians, anxiety, kneading, photography, Modigliani, France, Amherst, David Foster Wallace, Stephen King, Jeffrey Eugenides, Marcel Proust, reading, classics, John Updike, Moby Dick, utopia, Ayn Rand, idealism, empathy, children, sleep disorders, Cooperstown, excruciating ordinariness, sports, gap years, Stanford, Lorrie Moore, Meryl Streep, perfectionism, depression, faith in humanity, and publication anxiety. Monologue topics include: Sarah Groff, Olympics 2012, sports, the ESPYs, being physically inconsequential, genetic freaks, the role of talent, Sylvester Stallone, Rocky II, accidental comedies, and Q Moonblood.