The Guy Not Taken (34 page)

Q: In “Buyer’s Market,” you play with the idea of a Hollywood ending: “If life were a movie, Jess would have looked into Steven Ostrowsky’s eyes and fallen deeply and immediately in love” (165). Do you think readers expect Hollywood-type happy endings in your writing? How do you work with these expectations?

A:
I think there are a few things at play here. One is that I do think that readers expect happy endings from me. Which is perfectly understandable. If you’re setting out to tell an entertaining story with a protagonist who feels relatable, funny, and real, and if you’ve done your job well, then of course readers are going to want good things to happen to her.

As her creator, I will too. I sometimes think that my job as an author is to take flawed, damaged characters and bring them to a happier place—not a perfect place, but a place that at least offers them some decent possibilities. (This is especially true if I’m going to make them suffer!) And while I don’t believe that marriage is the only happy ending possible—the bright bow that has to be tied around every young woman’s life in order for her to say “There! Done! Happy!”—I do believe that there is a very primal yearning for connection. It could be romantic, could be familial, could be a friendship (readers have pointed out that the most engaged and passionate relationships my heroines have aren’t always with the men in their lives, but with their best friends).

To make a long answer short, I generally believe in trying to bring my characters to a good place, but I don’t believe that happy endings all look the same, or are necessarily what the reader, or the heroine, expects.

Q: DreamWorks Pictures snapped up the film rights to “The Guy Not Taken.” Ideally, who would you envision starring as Marlie, Bob, and Drew? What did you think of the film version of
In Her Shoes
?

A:
I was thrilled with the film adaptation of
In Her Shoes,
and I always enjoy the time I spend in Hollywood, where my brothers, my sister, my sister-in-law, and my niece all live, but I can’t say that I’ve given the movie version of “The Guy Not Taken” much thought. My job is to tell the stories, as best I can, and once I’m done, and the book is published, my work is done. Any possible movies are then the filmmakers’ story to tell, and my job is to stand on the sidelines, cheer them on, hope for the best, and work on my next book. That was how I felt with
In Her Shoes,
and it’s how I feel about “The Guy Not Taken,” and it’s how I hope I’ll feel about any future projects that come down the pike.

With all of that as a gigantic disclaimer, I will say that I hope that Marlie actually looks like a regular person, instead of some Los Angeles glamazon in the standard-issue chunky-frame glasses that they give starlets when they’re trying to make them look like regular people.

Q: “The Mother’s Hour” was such an accurate portrayal of the first few months (and years) of parenting, and the unlikely friendships that follow. Did you join any mother’s groups when you first had your daughter? And further, did you meet any interesting mothers along the way?

A:
I joined every mother’s group that would have me when my daughter was first born, because if I was home alone with her, I’d end up feeling isolated, lonely, overwhelmed, and inadequate—and usually all four by lunchtime. This was not because my daughter was such a difficult child. She wasn’t. But, after a lifetime of being a good student, and relatively professionally competent as a journalist and novelist, motherhood was hard in a different way.

So Lucy and I were out and about a lot. We did playgroups, took classes, went on play dates and outings with our friends. As I’m writing this, she’s getting ready to start nursery school, and I feel as though I know every woman in Philadelphia who had a baby the same year I did. All of them were interesting, and some of them became my good friends, but none of them were much like the mothers in “The Mother’s Hour.” I hope I’m not, either.

Q: Your blog, Snarkspot, at
www.jenniferweiner.blogspot.com
, is immensely popular. What purpose does the blog serve in your career and in your personal life? Do you think blogging is a good first step for aspiring writers?

A:
It goes back to the journalism thing. I got spoiled by being able to write a lot, and being able to respond to things that happened immediately—one of the few luxuries that fiction doesn’t give you, unless you’re publishing it online.

My blog is a way for me to feed the part of myself that journalism fed—the part that got to write quickly and informally, about anything that struck my fancy, whether it was reality television or a three-year-old’s birthday party. It’s also a way to keep in touch with my readers, and to let them keep up with me (to the extent that anyone would want to).

I’d encourage any aspiring writer to blog. I think anything that lets you write regularly for an audience is good practice, and a good foundation for more ambitious writing.

Q: More often than not your stories take place in Philadelphia or on the East Coast. In this collection, “Swim” is vividly set in Los Angeles. How do you portray life—in this case with the aspiring writers and actors, the coffee shops and the apartment complexes—in places you’ve never lived? How do you do this type of research?

A:
Thanks to the aforementioned family, I actually do spend a lot of time in Los Angeles, and I have had the experience of writing in a coffee shop there. I take my laptop to a coffee shop in Philadelphia all the time, without incident, but when I went to a Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf in L.A., it took me about an hour to notice that, basically, every single person at every single table was a writer, with a laptop, and an agent, and a cell phone to call the agent on. It was like an episode of
The Twilight Zone
. Every single table was filled with better-looking versions of me!

Q
UESTIONS AND
T
OPICS FOR
D
ISCUSSION

1. Why do you think this book is called
The Guy Not Taken?
What is the significance of the title for that story, and for the collection as a whole? What are some of the themes in “The Guy Not Taken” that you also find in the other stories?

2. In “Just Desserts” the younger sister, Nicki, dismisses the
Jaws
movies as fake looking, yet she uses a different false name every day at work. Why do you think Nicki is preoccupied with illusion and authenticity?

3. In “Travels with Nicki,” Josie fantasizes about helping her sister through college: “Or maybe I’d just drop out and give her my loan, and start again next year. My roommate would undoubtedly be delighted to have our double to herself” (44). What are the motivations behind Josie’s fantasy? If she is so eager to rescue her sister, why does she leave Nicki to face their angry mother alone at the end of the story?

4. “Just Desserts,” “Travels with Nicki,” and “The Wedding Bed” all feature the Crystal family—following the Crystal siblings from high school angst through to wedding-night jitters. And while Nicki still demands “No unnecessary touch!”, the relationship between the two sisters has undoubtedly grown and changed through the years. What aspects of their relationship remain constant throughout the stories? Which aspects seem to
have developed? And what brings Josie and Nicki together on Josie’s wedding night? What is left unsaid between them?

5. In the story “Swim,” Ruth spends hours in the pool explaining, “The familiar smell of chlorine, the feel of the water buoying me, holding me up, eased my homesickness and shame” (82), while her grandmother cooks as though it were “Christmas in New England and [she was] expecting a hockey team or two to show up for dinner” (85). What do you feel these women are compensating for? How do you see both Ruth and her grandmother moving forward at the end of the story? What role does Caitlyn play?

6. In “Buyer’s Market,” how does Jess’s father compare to Charming Billy? What do these men want from Jess, and how do they attempt to achieve their goals? Why does Billy succeed when Jess’s father failed? Though we only meet him briefly, how does David Stewart, the Hoboken real estate agent, seem to differ from both of them?

7. “Good Men” is a prequel to
Good in Bed,
Jennifer Weiner’s first novel. If you’ve read
Good in Bed,
what was your reaction to Bruce’s point of view in this story? Are you more or less sympathetic to his character after reading “Good Men”? What other characters from Weiner’s novels would you like to see again? Weiner is writing a sequel to
Good in Bed
entitled
Certain Girls
. How do you imagine Bruce will be portrayed?

8. “Good Men” and “Oranges from Florida” are both written from a male point of view. Compare the narrative voice in each—which is a more convincing portrait of a male perspective? Discuss these two stories within the context of the collection as a whole.

9. Alice and Victoria enjoy a short though much needed friendship in “The Mother’s Hour.” What does Alice find in Victoria and her “warm little kitchen” that she feels is lacking in other areas of her life? When Ellie is hospitalized, Alice is confronted by a social worker to vouch for Victoria. “Alice paused.
Victoria is a wonderful mother,
she wanted to say”(217). What kept Alice from
saying these words? What events specifically shaped her opinion of Victoria? Was she wrong?

10. “It is hard to keep secrets from your children. This was what Marion thought as she did laps next to her son . . .” (249). Why does Marion decide to keep Hal’s leaving a secret from Jason? Do you agree with her choices in this story?

11. There are several sets of unlikely friends in these stories: Jess and Namita in “Buyer’s Market,” Marlie and Jamie in “The Guy Not Taken,” and Alice and Victoria in “The Mother’s Hour.” What is the role of envy in each friendship? Picture each story written from the point of view of Namita, Jamie, and Victoria, respectively. How would the stories change from their perspectives?

12. How does Dora’s history—her disappointment in her son and the secret about her husband’s past—play into her reaction to Dawn and Amber’s presence? At what point does it seem that Dora softens toward the girls? And why, when the girls forget to push chairs in front of Dora’s bedroom door, does she opt not to call the police? Does Dora relate to the girls only because she’s lonely, or is their connection more complex?

P
ERMISSIONS
A
CKNOWLEDGMENTS

“Happiness” copyright © 2005 by the Estate of Jane Kenyon. Reprinted from
Collected Poems
with the permission of Graywolf Press, Saint Paul, MN. “Good Men” copyright © 2004 by Jennifer Weiner. First published by Red Dress Ink in 2004. “The Guy Not Taken” originally published in the October 2005 issue of
Glamour
magazine. “Tour of Duty” originally published in the October 1992 issue of
Seventeen
magazine. “Oranges from Florida” originally published in the October 1993 issue of
Redbook
magazine as “Someone to Trust.” “I Go Back to May 1937” copyright © 1987 by Sharon Olds, from
The Gold Cell
by Sharon Olds. Used by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc. References to
WeddingWishes.com
are granted by permission of WeddingWishes
^™
. All rights reserved.

What if the one you love is the one who got away?

Rachel Blum and Andy Landis are just eight years old when they meet late one night in an ER waiting room. Born with a congenital heart defect, Rachel is a veteran of hospitals, and she's intrigued by the boy who shows up all alone with a broken arm. He tells her his name. She tells him a story. After Andy’s taken back to a doctor and Rachel’s sent back to her bed, they think they’ll never see each other again.

Rachel grows up wanting for nothing in a fancy Florida suburb, the popular and protected daughter of two doting parents. Andy grows up poor in Philadelphia with a single mom and a rare talent that will let him become one of the best runners of his generation.

Over the next three decades, their paths cross in magical and ordinary ways. They make grand plans and dream big dreams as they grow together and apart in starts and stops. Through it all, Andy and Rachel never stop thinking about that night in the hospital waiting room all of those years ago, a chance encounter that changed the course of both of their lives.

In this captivating, often witty tale about the bonds between women and men, love and fate, and the truth about happy endings, Jennifer Weiner delivers two of her most memorable characters and a love story you’ll never forget.

Read on for a sneak peek at Jennifer Weiner’s newest novel,
Who Do You Love

Available August 2015 from Atria Books

Prologue

Rachel

2014

“Rachel?”

I don’t answer. If you build it, they will come. If you ignore them, they will go away.

Knock knock knock, and then my name again. “Rachel, are you in there?”

I twist myself more deeply into the sheets. The sheets are fancy, linen, part of the wedding haul, and they’ve only gotten smoother with every trip through the washing machine. I pull the pillow over my head, noting that the case has acquired a not-so-fresh smell. This is possibly related to my not having showered or washed my face or hair for the last three days. I have left the bed only to use the toilet and scoop a handful of water from the bathroom sink into my mouth. On the table next to my bed there’s a sleeve of Thin Mint cookies that I retrieved from the freezer, and a bag of Milanos for when I finish the Thin Mints. I don’t want to cook. I don’t want to move. It’s spring, and sunny and mild, but I’ve pulled my windows shut, drawing the shades so I can’t see the mom brigade ostentatiously wheeling their oversized strollers down the street, and forty-year-old guys with expensive suede sneakers and beards as carefully tended as bonsais tweeting while they walk, or the tourists snapping pictures of the snout-to-tail restaurants where everything’s organic and locally sourced. The bedroom is dark; the doors are locked; my daughters are elsewhere. Lying on these soft sheets that smell of our commingled scent, hair and skin and the sex we had two weeks ago, it’s almost like not being alive at all.