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May 21--You laugh. You cry. Often in the same chapter. Sometimes on the same page.
Irish novelist Marian Keyes is a master at meshing merriment and melancholy, a talent she's employed with great success since her first book, "Watermelon," was published in 1995. It told the story of Claire, whose husband runs out on her just hours after she gives birth. Somehow, Keyes managed to find the humor in that.
In her newest tragi-comedy, "Anybody Out There?" Keyes writes about Anna, a woman who is recuperating from a terrible accident in her parents' Dublin home while trying desperately to get in touch with her husband in New York.
On the strength of "Watermelon" and nine other previous books, the 42-year-old Keyes has been dubbed the queen of the chick-lit genre -- sassy stories that feature hip female protagonists. It's a title she doesn't mind, although she is quick to add her own feminist qualifier.
She says that although her books tell women's stories, with humor, they are nonetheless relevant stories steeped in the truth of modern women's lives.
Keyes will be in Tacoma on Monday. During a phone interview from Boston, she talked about her life as a writer and as a woman.
Does it bother you to be called the queen of chick lit?
The label chick lit is meant to be pejorative. The genre has been trivialized by its title. ... But it's inviting women to look at the fact that they're stuck in the office with a (crummy) job. We are at war with food, with our own bodies, tying ourselves in knots because we can't make ourselves look like an anorexic 16-year-old.
How much of your birthplace, Limerick, comes out in your writing?
I didn't live there long. But a generic Irishness comes out.
One thing about any Irish writer, we write and speak English differently. We construct it differently. We construct it according to the rhythms of an old language, which is Irish.
My approach is very exuberant. I revel in words. ... I don't pare to the bone. I fling words at a situation. I love language. My sentences are colorful.
My books are full of Irish slang. But that doesn't impede people's enjoyment of the story. It seems like a cross-cultural exchange.
I write very much about human beings. Although my books are in one way very Irish, in another, they transcend nationhood. I'm writing about the concerns of the post-feminist woman.
What led you to start writing at age 30?
I have been in recovery 12 years from alcoholism. I was given a lot of help. Before that, life was very grim. I was in the throes of denial.
Before I started writing, I had a checkered and messy career. I left school and studied law and got my degree. But I went to London and became a waitress. ... I was studying to be an accountant when I started writing. ...
Utter despair, incredible depression and suicidal thoughts cracked open the urge to write.
Talk about the qualities your personal background brings to your stories.
For me, humor and melancholic tendencies have always been symbiotic. That's Irish. ... You laugh or you cry at your misfortune. We'd rather laugh, thank you very much. Humor has been a survival mechanism for me.
Tell us about your next book.
My next novel is going to be about the "cheery" subject of domestic violence. ... It will be an angry book rather than a sad book. I'm speechless that we are so accepting of it.
A synopsis OF 'Anybody Out There?'
Anna Walsh is officially a wreck. Physically broken and emotionally shattered, she lies on her parents' Dublin sofa with only one thing on her mind: getting back to New York. New York means her apartment, The Most Fabulous Job In The World and, above all, it means her husband, Aidan.
But nothing in Anna's life is that simple.
Not only is her return to Manhattan complicated by her physical and emotional scars -- but Aidan seems to have vanished.
Is it time for Anna to move on? Is it even possible to?
A motley group of misfits, an earth-shattering revelation, two births and one very weird wedding might help Anna find some answers -- and change her life forever See, Hear Marian Keyes
She'll be at the downtown Tacoma Public Library, 1102 Tacoma Ave. S., at 7 p.m. Monday for a book talk and signing.
Books will be available to buy to be signed at the event. Doors open at 6:30 p.m.
She'll also be at the Bellevue Regional Library, 1111 110th Ave. N.E., at 12:30 p.m. Tuesday and at the Ballard Branch of the Seattle Public Library, 5614 22nd Ave. N.W., at 7 p.m. Tuesday.
And she'll be at Third Place Books, 17171 Bothell Way N.E. in Lake Forest Park, at 7 p.m. Wednesday.
Debbie Cafazzo: 253-597-8635
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