Author Curtis Sittenfeld Talks About Using Laura Bush as Muse

LibertySugar — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 06:00:53 -0700

Author Curtis Sittenfeld's new book American Wife — a novel about a quiet librarian and wife of a bumbling American president — hits the stands this week. Buzz and I put our heads together to come up with a few politically-oriented questions before she chatted with Sittenfeld. Here's what the author had to say:

Do you think readers will forget that the book is based on Laura Bush? Do you hope they will forget?
I do think if a person didn’t know anything about this book she could read three quarters of it and NEVER think of Laura Bush. And then in the fourth section, then it might sort of be like, “Oh!” But . . . I don’t think that it totally hinges on familiarly with the Bushes. I would like to think that it stands on its own just as a story.

Are you at all as intrigued by the Bush twins as you were by Laura?
No. I know that’s kind of strange because I’m much closer in age to them. When Jenna Bush had that book, I read some articles about it and I saw her a little bit on TV . . . I don’t know, for some reason they aren’t super interesting to me! (laughs)

Alice is decidedly pretty, which is different than your other characters who were fretting about what they looked like.
Laura Bush is very attractive. If you look at pictures of her from her adolescence or from her 20s or 30s I mean – and I’m definitely a Democrat – she and George Bush were a good looking couple. . . I think they’re still attractive but you know there was something very cute about them when they were in their 30s and I think Alice Blackwell, like Laura Bush, is pretty . . . If the character is not really guided by her insecurities then it’s sort of there just (as) a distraction.

To find out why Curtis decided to set the book in the Midwest instead of Texas, and what she thinks of readers who may feel sorry for the Bushes,

Bookmobile: Lewd American Wife Based on Laura Bush?

LibertySugar — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 10:00:48 -0700

Best-selling author Curtis Sittenfeld has written American Wife — a novel about a quiet librarian, and wife of a bumbling American president. The main character "Alice" might as well be called "Laura," as the story meshes snippets from Mrs. Bush's life with the stories of Sittenfeld's imagination.

Radar has provided some arousing excerpts from the book. Details of the presidential sex life are chronicled, as well as the realization that "Alice" had an abortion, and that her grandmother is a lesbian. The book graphs details from Laura Bush's pre-White House days, including a fatal car accident she was a part of when she was 16. But, Sittenfeld amplifies the drama by writing that "Alice" proceeded to have sex with the brother of the boyfriend she killed with her car.

Do fascinating public figures make for good literary muses? Would you indulge in a good read even if it bothered you that the author treated the First Lady disrespectfully to sell books?

Source

CitizenSugar -- Breaking News, Together.

Author Curtis Sittenfeld Talks About Using Laura Bush as Muse

Bookmobile: Lewd American Wife Based on Laura Bush?