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Author Biography | Interview | Books by this Author | Read-Alikes
Anne Tyler was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1941 and grew up in Raleigh, North Carolina. She is the author of more than twenty novels. Her twentieth novel, A Spool of Blue Thread, was short-listed for the Man Booker Prize in 2015. Her eleventh novel, Breathing Lessons, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1989. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She lives in Baltimore, Maryland.
This bio was last updated on 02/21/2025. In a perfect world, we would like to keep all of BookBrowse's biographies up to date, but with many thousands of lives to keep track of it's simply impossible to do. So, if the date of this bio is not recent, you may wish to do an internet search for a more current source, such as the author's website or social media presence. If you are the author or publisher and would like us to update this biography, send the complete text and we will replace the old with the new.
Your
protagonist in this novel, Barnaby Gaitlin, has been described as an average,
ordinary man. Is this how you would describe him?
I think Barnaby is
average and ordinary only to the extent that most people are average and
ordinary--that is, not very, if you look carefully enough.
Barnaby is, among other
things, a man struggling to cast off the weight of his past. How successful is
he, and indeed any of us, in doing so?
I do believe that
Barnaby is at least largely successful in getting out from under the weight of
his past--that's where the plot derives its movement.
At the close of this
novel, we are left wondering just exactly who is Barnaby's angel. How would you
answer this question?
Barnaby has not just
one but many angels--the network of people he lives among who see him for the
good man he is and wish him well and do what they can to ease his life.
You delightfully skewer
class pretensions in this novel, most notably in the form of Barnaby's mother,
Margot, and explore the cost and meaning of class mobility in America. Why is
this such a central theme in your work?
I've always enjoyed
studying the small clues that indicate a particular class level. And I am
...
Camilla Barnes was born and brought up in England but moved to France in her twenties. She lives in Paris and works in theatre, doing every job possible there except act. She writes for the stage in both English and French. ... (more)
If you enjoyed:
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Elizabeth Berg is the author of many bestselling novels, including Open House (an Oprah's Book Club selection), Talk Before Sleep, and The Year of Pleasures, as well as the short story collection The Day I Ate Whatever I... (more)
If you enjoyed:
Clock Dance
Try:
The Story of Arthur Truluv
by Elizabeth Berg
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