32 ;e Costco Connection DECEMBER 2014
By Lisa Alcalay Klug
IN THE LATEST novel by author Andrew Sean
Greer, Greta Wells undergoes electroshock therapy,
then finds herself transported from 1985 to 1918
and subsequently 1941. With each treatment, in
The Impossible Lives of Greta Wells, she cycles
through these three versions of her existence, each
one a contrasting manifestation of happiness and
sadness. Ultimately, Wells
must choose one to make
her own.
The project dates back
10 years, while Greer was
crafting his first large-scale
success, The Confessions of
Max Tivoli (Farrar, Straus
and Giroux, 2004; not available at Costco). The historical novel, which spanned a
number of decades, landed
on the New York Times best-seller list and earned a
California Book Award and the New York Public
Library Young Lions Fiction Award for an author
under 35. After much research, Greer found himself
wondering what era he might like to inhabit.
That got him thinking about the concept of
transposing a life into another epoch. Each attempt
felt “wooden,” so he dropped the idea. Then one day,
while walking on a country road during the writing
of The Story of a Marriage (Farrar, Straus and
Giroux, 2008; not available at Costco), he realized,
“She could wake up in a different world!”
Initially, the protagonist was a man, but Greer
discovered a woman’s life changed more drastically
in the 20th century. Many other elements remained
unclear. “At first, I didn’t even know what time peri-
ods, or how my character traveled, or anything,”
Greer says. “It was a long walk in the dark for me,”
he says of the novel’s creation.
The same could be said for Greer’s life and career.
After graduating from Brown University, he moved
to New York City, then Montana, then Seattle, then
San Francisco. A series of failures ensued.
“I sometimes think the only reason I’m a successful writer [is that] I was never good at anything
else,” says Greer, who describes himself as a lazy
copy editor, slapdash cleaner, nervous waiter, skittish driver, forgetful paralegal and sleepy retail
worker. As a chauffeur, secretary and bookstore
employee, he was fired repeatedly. Minimizing his
material needs became an easy choice. “A writing
life was more important to me than a glamorous
one,” he explains.
Indeed. His first four novels, which he wrote in
high school, college, grad school and post-school,
respectively, remain unpublished. The latter two
finally landed him an agent for his first published
work, a collection of short stories, with “very little
money and no real reviews.” His debut novel was
published mere days after 9/11. “No one, including
me, was interested,” he says. “But writing, it turns
out, is not about ‘debuts.’ ”
A lover of books since childhood, Greer let go
of what might sell or earn critical acclaim. Instead,
he wrote Max Tivoli as a florid, semi-magical
Victorian novel that, he says, “had the great luck to
fall into John Updike’s hands.” It became an interna-
tional best-seller.
“That made it easier to call myself a writer, but
no easier to write,” Greer tells The Connection.
Although Greer plans each novel before the last
is published, the process nevertheless involves an
income-free year of “baking bread and taking up
some sport and cleaning the house before I really,
really begin the next book,” he says.
His current routine consists of rising at 6: 30
a.m., picking up a fellow writer, swimming in the
frigid San Francisco Bay and returning home to
write 1, 100 words a day no matter what.
“Having already done one impossible thing
before breakfast,” he says, “helps to do the second
impossible thing: write a novel.”
Like Greta, whose twin brother looms large in
the novel, Greer has a twin, which has allowed him
to never feel “truly alone.” They share opinions,
Truly. The identical twins live next
door to one another, in adjoining houses.
Greer shares his with his husband, his
oldest friend and her spouse. It’s not a
bad life to choose after all. C
Lisa Alcalay Klug ( lisaklug.com) is an author
and freelance journalist.
Life choices
Signed book gıveaway
COSTCO HAS 50 copies of Andrew Sean
Greer’s The Impossible Lives of Greta Wells
with signed book plates to give away. To enter,
go to:
costcoconnectionbookgiveaway.com.
NO PURCHASE, PAYMENT OR OPT-IN OF AN Y KIND IS
NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN THIS SWEEPSTAKES.
Purchase will not improve odds of winning. Sweepstakes is sponsored
by HarperCollins, 10 East 53rd St., New York, NY 10022. Open to legal
residents of the U.S. (except Puerto Rico) who are age 18 or older at
the time of entry. One entry per household. Entries must be received
before the January issue is available online, which will happen around
December 25. Winners will be randomly selected and noti;ed by mail
on or before February 1, 2015. The value of the prize is $15.95. Void
where prohibited. Winners are responsible for all applicable federal,
state and local taxes. Odds of winning depend on the number of
eligible entries received. Employees of Costco or HarperCollins and
their families are not eligible.
FR
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tastes and emotional states of mind. “We thor-
ro n
finally know what it is like to be alone. Until
Pennie Clark Ianniciello,
Costco book buyer
WHILE I TRY not to
spend too much time
imagining how different
my life might be had I
made different choices,
I do think it’s fun to
imagine what my life
would be like had I been
born into a different
generation.
If you, too, like to
imagine such things,
I can’t rave enough
about this month’s
book buyer’s pick, The
Impossible Lives of
Greta Wells, by Andrew
Sean Greer.
When Greta Wells’
twin brother dies and
her lover leaves, she’s
prescribed electroshock
therapy to help her deal
with the grief. The
treatment sends her to
1918 and 1941, where
she ;nds her brother, her
lover and an alternate
version of herself.
It’s a beautiful story
about the many faces of
love and what a woman
learns about herself from
being able to visit those
different times. (Item
#953731; available 12/1)
Pennie’s pick
Exploring the possibilities of alternate lives
Andrew Sean Greer
K
ALIEL
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