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GIVEAWAY & Guest Post: Where a Novel Comes From by Beth Gutcheon @BethGutcheon @WmMorrowBks

April 2, 2012 By Mary



Where a Novel Comes From
By Beth Gutcheon,
Author of Gossip
In my experience, a novel accrues, over time and from many sources, with ideas and aspects seeming to light up until enough of them form a cluster that can become a story. I read a lot of biographies and I love volumes of letters because they give you authentic voices, the diction and vocabulary of a period. A major plot line in my novel Leeway Cottage came from one sentence in a book of letters by Sylvia Townsend Warner. Her fiction doesn’t speak to me at all, but her letters are brilliant and wonderfully frank and full of the daily details of a life. At one point the love of Sylvia’s life left her for a younger woman who was more beautiful and far richer than Sylvia. She bore it quietly, in spite of being devastated, because she wanted her lover’s happiness even more than she wanted her own. Eventually, Valentine came back, and Sylvia wrote to a friend this incredibly simple explanation: her rival had all the advantages, except that “I was better at loving, and being loved.”
What a thing to say, what a thing to understand.
I think Gossip started with a biography of Emily Post. I’m a longtime fan of Mrs. Post, a very witty writer and brave, self-reliant and deeply considerate woman. Etiquette books in general paint a vivid picture of changing manners and mores, but Post’s are the most fun. From her 1928 edition one learns that is shocking to allow your butler or footmen to sport facial hair of any kind. Who knows, in this Downton Abby world, when that might come in handy? (As you can infer, I find a lot of research material in second hand bookstores.) Mrs. Post is brisk and confident, but a crusader against snobbery and fussiness, and I thought I might do a character based on her, but instead turned out to use Tuxedo Park, the very grand, very early gated community where she spent much of her childhood and where she is buried. It was the perfect symbol for one of the questions the book raises: what does it mean to be an insider in society? What does it mean to choose to be an outsider? A maverick, if you will? By society, I mean any group that sets the tone for a community, be it the local grange in a farming village, or Mrs. Astor’s Four Hundred.
This is real life, but it is also Edith Wharton territory, of course; so many of her New York plots are turned by the terrible power of social judgments and gossip. But in Wharton’s world, and in Mrs. Post’s, there is a recognized social standard and body of opinion. Our world is very different. The true purpose of manners, according to Emily — I think of her as Emily, since she feels to me like a friend — is to treat others with consideration and kindness and avoid making people uncomfortable. In my mother’s youth, good manners required addressing people formally unless you were truly familiars. When she insisted, though, on calling my friends “Mrs. Todd” or “Mr. West” although she was 35 years older than we and we were wearing blue jeans with our hair down to here, it didn’t seem polite, it just seemed weird, really a protest or rebuke, if not actually to us, then to the world for changing and shifting the ground beneath her feet.
So the deal with manners is not propriety, but kindness. Which reminded me of the “Iago question,” which you hear a lot about if you’re an English major. What is his motive, why is he evil? Does he even know? He does seem to be one of the few characters in literature or life who actually knows that he’s mean. So I re-read Othello, and Othello led me again to the subject of gossip, or rather to the fact that knowledge is power, and words are weapons. I began to think of a modern character who winds up doing something like what Iago does, but in such a way that we understand what she thinks she’s doing when she does it. You almost never meet with pure malice outside of a mental ward, but you certainly all the time meet with people who do casual harm to others while feeling swell about themselves, and that seemed like a proper subject for a novel.
But is that really where this particular novel came from? I think we all wonder why some things lodge in memory when we forget so much else; someone once told me we remember moments when we learned things. Here’s a moment from when I was about seven. The subject of rumor had come up, maybe in life, maybe in a book. My mother told us about the girl who went to confession because she’d said something untrue about somebody else. The priest said that as a penance, she was to go outside, cut open a feather pillow, and empty it on the breeze. Then she was to retrieve all the feathers. I remember my childhood bedroom, blue wallpaper, my sister’s horseshow ribbons on a string above the mantel, the clock on the wall in the shape of a black and white cat with eyes and tail that went back and forth as it ticked, and that story.
© 2012 Beth Gutcheon, author of Gossip
Author Bio
Beth Gutcheon,
 author of Gossip, is the critically acclaimed author of eight previous novels: The New Girls, Still Missing, Domestic Pleasures, Saying Grace, Five Fortunes, More Than You Know, Leeway Cottage and Good-bye and Amen. She is the writer of several film scripts, including the Academy Award nominee The Children of Theatre Street. She lives in New York City.
For more information please visit http://www.bethgutcheon.com and follow the author on Facebook

Book Description

Publication Date: March 20, 2012

The critically acclaimed author of Good-bye and Amen, Leeway Cottage, and More Than You Know returns with a sharply perceptive and emotionally resonant novel about all the ways we talk about one another, the sometimes fine line between showing concern and doing damage, and the difficulty of knowing the true obligations of friendship. 

Loviah “Lovie” French owns a small, high-end dress shop on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. Renowned for her taste, charm, and discretion, Lovie is the one to whom certain women turn when they need “just the thing” for key life events: baptisms and balls, weddings and funerals. Among those who depend on Lovie’s sage advice are her two best friends since boarding school days: Dinah Wainwright and Avis Metcalf. Despite the love they share for their mutual friend, there has always been a chilly gulf between Dinah and Avis, the result of a perceived slight from decades ago that has unimaginably tragic echoes many years later. 

An astute chronicler of all that makes us human, Beth Gutcheon delivers her most powerful and emotionally devastating novel to date. Gossip is a tale of intimacy and betrayal, trust and fidelity, friendship and motherhood that explores the way we use “information” — be it true, false, or imagined — to sustain, and occasionally destroy, one another.

WANT TO WIN A COPY THIS BOOK?

 Contest is open to anyone over 13 years old with a US mailing address and ends 4.18.12
Winner will be chosen by Random.org on 4.19.12.  Only one winner per mailing address.
Winner will have 48 hours to respond to email or a new winner will be chosen
This giveaway is sponsored by William Morrow Books and  for ONE WINNER!
Complete the form below!
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Comments

  1. Author Leanne Dyck says

    April 2, 2012 at 11:16 pm

    And gossip is so much like those feathers. Once released it’s so difficult to stop it from flying or even to determine where it will land.

  2. Patricia says

    April 3, 2012 at 1:21 am

    Sounds terrific. Count me in please.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  3. Patricia says

    April 3, 2012 at 1:25 am

    Today’s tweet:
    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/186987309613326338

  4. holdenj says

    April 3, 2012 at 11:50 am

    Interesting post by Beth. Looks like a great read!

  5. Angela Holland says

    April 3, 2012 at 10:52 pm

    I posted your contest on my blog – http://griperangsbookmarks.blogspot.com/p/giveaways.html

    Thank you

    griperang at embarqmail dot com

  6. Patricia says

    April 4, 2012 at 12:38 am

    In for today.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  7. Patricia says

    April 4, 2012 at 12:44 am

    Today’s tweet:

    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/187339455059865600

  8. pegmcdaniel says

    April 4, 2012 at 7:50 pm

    Thanks for the chance to win this book! It’s very much appreciated.

  9. Patricia says

    April 5, 2012 at 1:15 am

    Today’s fresh tweet:
    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/187709323676356608

  10. Patricia says

    April 5, 2012 at 1:15 am

    Daily entry.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  11. Patricia says

    April 6, 2012 at 12:40 am

    Tweeted:

    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/188063147284889601

  12. Patricia says

    April 6, 2012 at 12:40 am

    Daily entry

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  13. Patricia says

    April 7, 2012 at 1:31 am

    Tweeted:

    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/188438551476699137

  14. Patricia says

    April 7, 2012 at 1:31 am

    Daily entry.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  15. holdenj says

    April 7, 2012 at 2:30 pm

    Daily entry 4/7. Thanks!
    JHolden955(at)gmail(dot)com

  16. Sandra says

    April 8, 2012 at 4:52 pm

    Loved her book “More Than You Know” so would really like to win this new one.

    westwindsoftx@yahoo.com

  17. Patricia says

    April 8, 2012 at 7:58 pm

    Today’s entry.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  18. Patricia says

    April 8, 2012 at 8:00 pm

    Today’s tweet:

    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/189080057401184256

  19. Anita Yancey says

    April 9, 2012 at 7:07 pm

    Sounds like a wonderful book that I would enjoy very much. Thanks for this chance to win it.
    ayancey(at)dishmail(dot)net

  20. Patricia says

    April 10, 2012 at 1:34 am

    Today’s entry.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  21. Patricia says

    April 10, 2012 at 1:38 am

    Tweeted today:
    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/189527310746128384

  22. Theresa N. says

    April 10, 2012 at 12:54 pm

    I’d love to read this book.
    Theresa N
    weceno(at)yahoo(dot)com

  23. Patricia says

    April 11, 2012 at 12:43 am

    Daily entry.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  24. Patricia says

    April 11, 2012 at 12:46 am

    Tweeted today:

    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/189876834547150849

  25. holdenj says

    April 11, 2012 at 11:38 am

    Daily entry 4/11. Thanks!
    JHolden955(at)gmail(dot)com

  26. Patricia says

    April 11, 2012 at 11:54 pm

    Today’s entry

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  27. Patricia says

    April 12, 2012 at 12:00 am

    Today’s tweet:

    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/190227312652988416

  28. holdenj says

    April 12, 2012 at 5:02 pm

    Daily entry 4/12. Thanks!
    JHolden955(at)gmail(dot)com

  29. Patricia says

    April 13, 2012 at 12:50 am

    In for today.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  30. Patricia says

    April 13, 2012 at 12:53 am

    Today’s tweet:
    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/190603296057208833

  31. holdenj says

    April 13, 2012 at 11:43 am

    Daily entry 4/13. Thanks!
    JHolden955(at)gmail(dot)com

  32. Patricia says

    April 14, 2012 at 2:40 am

    Fingers crossed for today!

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  33. Patricia says

    April 14, 2012 at 2:48 am

    Today’s tweet:
    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/190994803633291264

  34. Patricia says

    April 14, 2012 at 10:47 pm

    Today’s entry

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  35. Patricia says

    April 14, 2012 at 10:54 pm

    Today’s tweet:
    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/191298248047202304

  36. Patricia says

    April 15, 2012 at 5:29 pm

    Loved Beth’s guest post.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  37. Patricia says

    April 15, 2012 at 5:32 pm

    Tweeted today:
    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/191579601863065601

  38. Patricia says

    April 17, 2012 at 1:38 am

    In for today.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  39. Patricia says

    April 17, 2012 at 2:48 am

    Tweeted:

    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/192081643350134784

  40. Patricia says

    April 18, 2012 at 12:28 am

    Today’s entry.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  41. Patricia says

    April 18, 2012 at 12:33 am

    Tweeted today:

    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/192409711839158272

  42. Bethie says

    April 18, 2012 at 2:47 am

    Thanks for the giveaway.

    lizzi0915 at aol dot com

  43. holdenj says

    April 19, 2012 at 1:00 am

    Daily entry 4/18. Thanks!
    JHolden955(at)gmail(dot)com

  44. Patricia says

    April 19, 2012 at 2:24 am

    Today’s entry.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  45. Patricia says

    April 19, 2012 at 2:28 am

    Tweeted today:

    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/192801148040773632

  46. Patricia says

    April 20, 2012 at 2:27 am

    In for today.

    patricia dot mariani dot esq at gmail dot com

  47. Patricia says

    April 20, 2012 at 2:31 am

    Today’s tweet:
    https://twitter.com/#!/CapitalismRox/status/193164400125947904

  48. Mary BookHounds Jacobs says

    April 21, 2012 at 8:30 pm

    AND THE WINNER IS:

    JULIA

    An email has been sent to the lucky person named above
    The winner has 48 hours to respond or a new winner will be chosen.
    Thanks to all who entered.
    PLEASE CHECK YOUR SPAM FOR THE EMAIL FROM BOOKHOUNDS @ HOTMAIL REQUESTING YOUR MAILING ADDRESS!

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