By the Book (38 page)

If you could meet any writer, dead or alive, who would it be?

I already met my hero: Kurt Vonnegut. I wanted to know if he liked Louis Armstrong better than Richard Wagner. I can't remember the answer. He poured me a drink, and we sat up listening to music. I left his house walking on air, soused, having drunk his liquor and smoked his filterless cigarettes. I asked him why he smoked filterless cigarettes, which are stronger and worse for you. He said, “More value.”

If you could be any character from literature who would you be?

Spider-Man. If that doesn't count, George Smiley, from John le Carré's early work. Smiley understands. Smiley takes it across the face. Smiley's got a job to do. Smiley's got a broken heart. Smiley can take it.

What book have you always meant to read and haven't gotten around to yet?

Harriet Beecher Stowe's
Uncle Tom's Cabin
.

Anything you feel embarrassed never to have read?

I've never read the great Russian writers. Fact is, I just don't have any great interest in Russia or Russian culture or Russian history. None at all. Who knows why. I suppose we're all allowed to be dumb here once or twice.

What do you plan to read next?

John le Carré's
A Delicate Truth
.

James McBride
is the author of
The Good Lord Bird
,
The Color of Water
,
Song Yet Sung
, and
Miracle at St. Anna
.

James Patterson

What's the best book you've read so far this year?

I spent several eventful and exhilarating summers at a mental hospital outside Cambridge, Massachusetts. I was working my way through school there—honest. But I do love crazy people. Crazy authors especially: William Burroughs, Jean Genet, Ken Kesey, Sylvia Plath, Cormac McCarthy. Maybe that's why
Where'd You Go, Bernadette
is my favorite novel so far this year. It's funnier than a season's worth of
Modern Family
,
Curb Your Enthusiasm
, and
Justified
episodes; it's also the most original and imaginative fiction I've read since
The Invention of Hugo Cabret
.

If you had to name a favorite novelist, who would it be?

I'm much more comfortable writing about “favorite” books than I am proclaiming “the best” of anything. I'm afraid I have to talk “favorites”—plural—though. Gabriel García Márquez, James Joyce, and Günter Grass are important to me because their writing made it crystal clear that I wasn't capable of the write stuff. Those three dream-killers are still among my favorites. So is George Pelecanos in the thriller-mystery game. Also Richard Price, who seems to remember every good line and phrase he ever heard. This was even true in his first novel,
The Wanderers
, which made me sick with envy way back when I was young, carefree, and more susceptible to jealousy.

Who do you consider the best thriller writers of all time?

There's that gnatty “best” word again. Soldiering on, I love Pelecanos. Also Nelson DeMille, Michael Connelly, James Lee Burke, Dennis Lehane, Walter Mosley, Don Winslow, and Richard Price, of course. As one-offs,
Night Dogs
,
The Ice Harvest
,
Marathon Man
,
Different Seasons
, and
Cutter and Bone
are among my “besties.” I believe that thrillers should thrill—and most don't, at least not for me. I also don't think that thriller writers need to play by the constricting rules of realism. Sometimes I come across reviews carping that a certain thriller isn't very “realistic” or that such and such a scene “would never happen in real life.” Makes me think of an art critic accusing Klee or Chagall of not being very realistic.

Who is your favorite overlooked or underappreciated writer?

Let's assume that I've overlooked most of the good ones myself, but I'm a fan of
Mrs. Bridge
and
Mr. Bridge
, by the late Evan S. Connell. It was Connell, and also Jerzy Kosinski (
Steps
,
The Painted Bird
) who first made me aware of the power of short, very concise and witty chapters. (At least I got the short part right.) Frederick Exley's
A Fan's Notes
is another overlooked beaut. Also Edward St. Aubyn's
Patrick Melrose Novels
. And George Saunders's
CivilWarLand in Bad Decline
. A troubling sidebar is that for every George Saunders found, there are a dozen others, not just overlooked, but undiscovered.

What kinds of stories are you drawn to? Any you steer clear of?

I avoid the same kinds of books that I do people—long-winded, sanctimonious, goody-two-shoes, self-important, mean-spirited. Well, maybe not mean-spirited when it comes to books.

What books might we be surprised to find on your shelves?

I'm not entirely sure who “we” is. Some people would be surprised, I guess, to find
Train Dreams
;
Caravaggio
;
Swerve
;
What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank
;
Poems: 1962–2012
, by Louise Glück, on my bookshelves. Others might be surprised that I enjoy so-called chick lit. And kids' books by the baker's dozen. I was surprised to find
11/22/63
in my stacks. Aren't I supposed to be mad at Stephen King?

Do you ever read self-help? Anything you recommend?

I'm a believer in literal self-help rather than help by others. I try to avoid self-appointed experts for hire.

Of the books you've written, which is your favorite?

Ah, which of my babies? Well, my current passion is the books I write to get more kids reading (that's your kids and grandkids, dear reader)—the Middle School series,
I Funny
, Maximum Ride,
Treasure Hunters
. I'm proud to have created Alex Cross, the Women's Murder Club, Michael Bennett, the Private series. Jeez, enough with the self-serving lists.

Of the films based on your books, which is your favorite? What made it so good?

Sadly, I feel my books have been better than the movies made from them. I'm a total movieholic, so that state of affairs is more depressing to me than it ought to be. My current paranoid theory is that I'm a victim of “caricature assassination” in certain Hollywood quarters—“Oh, that airport author has another best-selling page-turner.” True story: When
Along Came a Spider
was in galleys, I got a large offer from a studio. All I had to do was change Alex Cross into a white man.

Describe the best letter you've ever received from a reader.

I get hundreds of very sweet, heartfelt letters from parents thanking me for getting their kids reading. Each one absolutely makes my day—make that my week. Many, many women thank me for getting their husbands reading, or reading again. Occasionally, a husband thanks me for getting his wife reading, but that's rare.

What book has had the greatest impact on you personally? Professionally?

Tristram Shandy
shivered my timbers as a grad student, and woke me out of my zombie state about the glorious possibilities for breaking the rules whenever I damn well felt like it. Mix first person and third person? Sure, if it helps the story. Sentence fragments? Hell, yes.

If you could require the president to read one book, what would it be?

It seems to me that Barack Obama is sufficiently well read. The president might consider E. M. Forster's
Two Cheers for Democracy
or even Tina Fey's
Bossypants
, which would have helped him surround himself with people who don't think they know everything about everything: being poor, being wealthy, getting sick, getting old, fighting a war. If it matters to anybody, I voted for Mr. Obama.

Did you grow up with a lot of books? What are your memories of being read to as a child?

It's all getting a little dim back at the far end of the tunnel—but I recall that my mother and father read a lot, mostly best sellers. But the better ones—Gore Vidal, Herman Wouk. I don't remember being read to as a kid, or actually being a child at all. Some friends suggest that I never was a child.

Do you have a favorite childhood literary character or hero?

Peter Pan. I loved Peter Pan. Still love Peter Pan. Peter Pan is the only ride that I enjoyed at Disney. And I'm pretty sure that I wrote the Maximum Ride books for kids—starting with my own beloved Jack—because of my affection as a child for Peter Pan.

Disappointing, overrated, just not good: What book did you feel you were supposed to like, and didn't? Do you remember the last book you put down without finishing?

I put down at least a book or two a week. I also walk out on scads of movies, and even Broadway plays. I believe it's the sane thing to do. I'm not a big
Gatsby
fan, and unfortunately I never got into
Don Quixote
, even though I thought I would love the book.

If you could meet any writer, dead or alive, who would it be? What would you want to know?

I'm fascinated by the idea of James Joyce, but I doubt we would have much to talk about. I'd like to have a lunch with Bill Clinton. Maybe a drink with Hunter Thompson. Just one—or two. Dinner with Angelina Jolie would be nice. Does she write?

If you could meet any character from literature, who would it be?

Jesus. Somewhere in his late twenties or very early thirties. Pre-Crucifixion. I would advise against the experience on the cross. I would suggest he talk to his Father about it. Lay out his own well-reasoned point of view. Maybe mention that I was negative about crucifixions as object lessons.

James Patterson
is the author of many books, including the Alex Cross novels, which include
Kiss the Girls
and
Along Came a Spider
; the Women's Murder Club novels; and the Michael Bennett series.

Jonathan Lethem

What are you reading at the moment? Are you a one-book-at-a-time person?

I'm all over the place right now, happily. In my office I tend to be racing through short books—Russell Hoban's
Turtle Diary
and Edward St. Aubyn's Melrose books and Lydia Millet's
Magnificence
just now, while at the bedside table and on trains and airplanes I'm grinding away at monsters over a period of months, if not years: Robert Musil's
Man Without Qualities
and Karl Ove Knausgaard's
My Struggle
. I've been trending to these galactic structures lately—last summer I had my head broken open by Doris Lessing's
Four-Gated City
and so now appear doomed to read the Martha Quest novels—backwards. I also recently noticed how many unfinished novels have been important to me: Musil's, Kafka's, Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy, Christina Stead's
I'm Dying Laughing
. Reading around in Ellison's
Three Days Before the Shooting…;
I bet I'd like that thing in Salinger's safe.

What's the best book you've read so far this year?

I just devoured in succession two spanking-new studies of great artists, both terrific reading experiences, brain-expanding but embracing, too: Claudia Roth Pierpont's
Roth Unbound
and T. J. Clark's
Picasso and Truth
. Both hit their very tricky targets. They'll be with me for a good long time.

If you had to name a favorite novelist, who would it be?

I hate this question. My favorite letter is
D
, which gives me Dostoyevsky, Dickens, Dick, Delany, and DeLillo. Unless it's
S
, which gives me Stead, Spark, Salter, Saramago, and others. I could go to a desert island with
D
or
S
, I think.