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Life & Style Books Printers Row Lit Fest

Michael Lenehan

What do you think of when you think of Chicago?

The lake. Lake Shore Drive. The portage between the Chicago and DesPlaines rivers, where the Great Lakes connect (almost) with the Gulf of Mexico--the reason Chicago exists.

Who is an author you'd like to meet, dead or alive?

Jane Austen: I am so curious!

What's your guilty pleasure reading?

Once in a while I'll come across a detective or spy or SF writer who gives me pleasure and I'll keep reading until the charm wears off. I've gone on tears with Ross McDonald, Lee Child, Frank Herbert, Alan Furst, John le Carre....I'm not guilty about John le Carre.

Can you describe a random or unexpected experience you've had while promoting a book?

I won't name the place, but I think the worst-attended reading I ever did yielded the highest percentage of book sales. There were so few people there I think they felt bad. Or maybe they felt conspicuous: they knew if they didn't buy I would know it.

What's your favorite font to write in?

I used to like Courier--it reminded me of typewriters, journalism, newspapers. But I wrote Ramblers in Verdana. It's very clean. It makes my prose look spare and unadorned.

Do you listen to music while you write? What music?

I cannot listen and write at the same time. For me music is distracting.

How do you celebrate after you've finished a book?

I've only published one and I have not really celebrated in a personal way, except for a little launch party. I don't really know what it means to be "finished." I wasn't finished when I turned in the manuscript, or read the page proofs, or completed the index, or started the publicity. Will I be finished when the sales slow to a halt? Maybe, but will that feel like a cause for celebration?

What's your favorite first line of a book? Last line?

When I pick up a book in a store or library, I always judge it on the first sentence. If the first sentence has a clunker or doesn't get me somehow, I put the book down. But I'm afraid my answer to this question is common and boring: I don't think you can do much better than the first sentence of Pride and Prejudice: "It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." It has a couple extra commas, by modern standards, but the whole story is there, along with the author's attitude toward it.

I can't think of a favorite last sentence, but the ending that sticks with me most is the last page of The Grapes of Wrath. That scene just flattens me every time.

What book do you read over and over again?

I'm not much of a rereader. I've read the Grapes of Wrath three times, I think. I've read Pride and Prejudice twice, same with Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy--I'm still trying to get it all straight. Just recently I did something I'd never done before: finished George Saunders's Tenth of December and immediately, without getting up, turned back to the front and started reading it again.

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