Megan Angelo
Author Interview - Megan Angelo
Author I draw inspiration from: Anna Quindlen, Ann Patchett, Zadie Smith, Jhumpa Lahiri, Jennifer Close, Jessica Knoll, Rufi Thorpe. Gillian Flynn. Brit Bennett. Meg Wolitzer. Curtis Sittenfeld. J. Courtney Sullivan. Mary Laura Philpott. Colson Whitehead—I have been fixated on The Nickel Boys for the last few months. I just can't get over what a perfect book it is, how much it accomplishes in just two hundred and some pages.
Author Interview - Megan Angelo
Favorite place to read a book: My parents' sun porch.
Book character I’d like to be stuck in an elevator with: David Hedges from Stephen McCauley's My Ex-Life. David knows how to keep his cool. I find him very calming and resourceful and witty in the face of crisis.
Author Interview - Megan Angelo
The moment I knew I wanted to become an author: Followers made an author out of me. From the time I was little, I knew I wanted to be a writer. But I've been a journalist for years and was writing TV pilots and screenplays on the side. I hadn't attempted to write a book until I sat down to try to fit Followers into a script and it wasn't working. So I took a deep breath and tried to act like an author.
Author Interview - Megan Angelo
Hardback, paperback, ebook or audiobook: Hardback or paperback. Once in a great while I'll do an audiobook—right now I am listening to Courtney Maum's Before and After the Book Deal, which is such a wonderful listen. She's so funny and warm and the book is the answer to all the publishing questions I was and still am too afraid to ask, or didn't know I should be asking—an absolute must for anyone who's in any stage of writing or publishing a book.
Author Interview - Megan Angelo
The last book I read: I'm really enjoying reading the work of people whose pub dates were right around Followers', many of whom I got to know at presale conferences and what not, so I've been on a tear. I loved The Wives by Tarryn Fisher, The Henna Artist by Alka Joshi, Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid, and Everywhere You Don't Belong by Gabriel Bump. Now I'm in the middle of Liz Moore's Long Bright River, which is totally engrossing.
Author Interview - Megan Angelo
Pen & paper or computer: Mostly computer, but pen and paper when I get stuck or when I'm outlining or taking notes.
Book character I think I’d be best friends with: I have a major soft spot for Margaret from The Other's Gold by Elizabeth Ames.
Author Interview - Megan Angelo
If I wasn’t an author, I’d be a: Writer begging for other jobs, and I still will be this, but if I got outside writing altogether? I really have no idea. The only other thing I ever wanted to be was a Disney imagineer, but this was the '90s, and I had trouble nailing down a path to that. The only place to find a good job description for it was that one ride in Epcot. Had to bail on that plan.
Favorite decade in fashion history: I'm working on a project partially set in the time I was in high school—'99 to '02—and I've looked at so many scans of old dELiA*s catalogs lately I've sort of convinced myself that the late '90s and early '00s were the best. But I think that's just the Hang Ten tee Stockholm syndrome talking. By the way, if you think I had to look up the syntax of how dELiA*s was spelled—no way. It's burned in my brain.
Place I’d most like to travel: I haven't traveled extensively, and still have so many basics to get to. My husband and I have a goal to take our kids to all 50 states before they graduate high school. We're not doing well so far because they're very small kids and it's hard to get motivated to travel with them when you know the trip will mostly be about panicking over where and when everyone's going to pee.
My signature drink: I like a vodka martini with basically a whole jar of olive juice in it.
Favorite artist: Plakookee. Check 'em out. Also Martha Rich.
Number one on my bucket list: I don't really have a bucket list but I do have this idea that I want to have a closet and dresser and more clothes I like by the time I'm 40. I live in an old house with a bunch of quirks that add up to me not having a closet or dresser, and usually it doesn't matter too much since I mainly dress to run after kids. But I feel like a real lady, a real 40-year-old lady, needs to have proper clothing storage and proper clothing to put in it. I am working toward this goal mostly by falling asleep pinning results for FRENCH GIRL CAPSULE WARDROBE on Pinterest.
