Authors at Home: Emily Giffin, "The Lies That Bind"
This week's spotlight Q&A is with Emily Giffin, whose tenth book The Lies That Bind , came out in paperback earlier this summer to the delight of her readers and fans. We got to chat with Emily about writing, life, the Royals and more. Get to know Emily Giffin in today's Authors at Home feature!
What are you currently reading, watching, listening to? Anything you wholly recommend as being inspiring, uplifting or just really fun?
I've recently read Amanda Kloots's heartwarming new memoir Live Your LIfe: My Story of Loving and Losing Nick Cordero , and chose it as my Instagram book club's August pick (more below)!
Currently watching Manifest on Netflix. My daughter Harriet and I are obsessed — and so thrilled they are bringing the show back for another season! As a fun side note, I've gotten to know (the lead actress) Melissa Roxburgh over Instagram as she was reading The Lies That Bind as I was watching her show, and we have both said how much we would love to work together on one of my adaptations.
Currently listening to Zibby Owens's podcast Moms Don't Have Time To Read Books and another great literary podcast Pop Fiction Women. And lots of Taylor Swift. Always lots of Taylor!
Can you take us through the day in the life of Emily Giffin? What's your day-to-day routine? What's it like for you when you're in the middle of a writing deadline, and when you're not writing (are you even ever NOT writing?)
I start out every day with a cup of coffee at my laptop going over the writing from the day before. I like to get up before the rest of the family and just hang out quietly with my dogs, Hank and Dolly. Hank is a better helper when it comes to writing. He sits in his cozy bed next to my desk and gives me moral support.
No doubt that 2020 was a difficult year for everyone. What exciting upcoming things do you have going on, personally and professionally? What will readers be excited to know about?
We are working on the TV adaptation for The Lies That Bind , which will be produced by the same team that did the Something Borrowed movie (Black Label Media). We have a wonderful actress attached to the project and will make an announcement about the status of that project soon! And the same team is also committed to bringing Something Blue to the big screen. I promise it will happen. I'm also working on a film adaptation of Baby Proof , as well as a TV adaptation of All We Ever Wanted .
On the book front, I recently launched a new Instagram-based book club that I am SO excited about! The first selection in June was Colleen Oakley's fantastic new novel, The Invisible Husband of Frick Island , and the July selection was Saumya Dave's wonderful What A Happy Family . August's book is Live Your Life: My Story of Loving and Losing Nick Cordero by Amanda Kloots.
I announce a new book selection every month, and then do an Instagram Live interview with the author as well as offer giveaways for the book and other fun promotions. Please come join me on the book club's Instagram page @egbookclub and spread the word to your book-loving friends as well!
Have you gained any new perspectives from the past year? What are some new discoveries? Did you learn a new hobby or add anything new to your life?
Be in the moment. Make the best of every day. Look for the silver linings. In 2021, I also made the decision to walk three miles a day. I've only missed one day so far — the day my boys won their high school state track meet. I was so excited that I forgot!
Do we get to ask what you're working on next? Can we get a sneak peek into the next Emily Giffin novel?
I am hard at work on my eleventh novel right now, but it's still a bit too early in the process to talk about it in detail. I will say that it's loosely based on a real-life relationship that has always fascinated me and I've loved digging deep into these characters and trying to get into their heads. The book will be released in summer 2022, so keep an eye out on my social media pages (@emilygiffinauthor on Instagram and @emilygiffinfans on Facebook) for news and updates!
We know you were previously a lawyer. If you weren't writing books do you think you'd still be in the courtroom trying cases? Or would you be doing something else?
I'd love to be a therapist or psychiatrist. I think my friends agree that I'm a pretty good (amateur) one, despite often being an anxious mess in my own life!
What is one message you want readers to take away when they finish reading The Lies that Bind?
There's never any specific or heavy-handed message that I want to convey to readers in my books, as I really believe reading is a wholly personal, organic experience and I always want to preserve that as much as possible. That said, there are two very general themes to The Lies That Bind that I hope will resonate with readers as they follow Cecily throughout the book.
First is this idea of living an authentic life and, in particular, what that looks like for Cecily as she navigates her personal and professional relationships in The Lies That Bind . The process of identifying and then finding the courage to pursue who and what we truly want for ourselves is something we all deal with at one point or another, and I love exploring that (sometimes painful) process of self-discovery and having my characters find truly meaningful paths for themselves.
Second, I really wanted to capture the mood of summer 2001 in New York City which, in many ways, felt like the last season of innocence before 9/11 changed everything. More to the point, I wanted to illustrate that sensation of "before and after," which is what Cecily (and the entire country) experiences after the shocking attacks in NYC, and how those watershed moments force us to take stock of where we are in our lives and whether we are truly happy with the choices we've made. The fact that this book came out in 2020, with the pandemic and BLM protests raging throughout the world and providing that same sort of "before and after" moment, only makes that feeling seem more immediate and real.
And a bonus question since we know you are a huge Royals fan: If you could meet any one living Royal and ask him or her any ONE question — who would it be, and what would you ask?
The Queen! I have to say Her Majesty! Second would be Princess Anne as she seems like so much fun, and I *know* I could get her to confide in me! I can't share my question, though — that's between Anne and me. I'm very good at keeping secrets.
About The Lies That Bind:
It's 2 A.M. on a Saturday night in the spring of 2001, and twenty-eight-year-old Cecily Gardner sits alone in a dive bar in New York's East Village, questioning her life. Feeling lonesome and homesick for the Midwest, she wonders if she'll ever make it as a reporter in the big city — and whether she made a terrible mistake in breaking up with her longtime boyfriend, Matthew.
As Cecily reaches for the phone to call him, she hears a guy on the barstool next to her say, "Don't do it — you'll regret it." Something tells her to listen, and over the next several hours — and shots of tequila — the two forge an unlikely connection. That should be it, they both decide the next morning, as Cecily reminds herself of the perils of a rebound relationship. Moreover, their timing couldn't be worse — Grant is preparing to quit his job and move overseas. Yet despite all their obstacles, they can't seem to say goodbye, and for the first time in her carefully constructed life, Cecily follows her heart instead of her head.
Then Grant disappears in the chaos of 9/11. Fearing the worst, Cecily spots his face on a missing-person poster, and realizes she is not the only one searching for him. Her investigative reporting instincts kick into action as she vows to discover the truth. But the questions pile up fast: How well did she really know Grant? Did he ever really love her? And is it possible to love a man who wasn't who he seemed to be?
The Lies That Bind is a mesmerizing and emotionally resonant exploration of the never-ending search for love and truth — in our relationships, our careers, and deep within our own hearts.
About Emily:
Emily Giffin, a Chicago native, graduated summa cum laude from Wake Forest University and the University of Virginia School of Law. After law school, she moved to Manhattan and practiced litigation at a large firm for several years while she paid back her school loans, wrote a novel in her very limited spare time, and dreamed of becoming a writer.
Despite the rejection of her first manuscript, Giffin persisted, retiring from the legal profession and moving to London to pursue her dreams full time. It was there that she began writing Something Borrowed (2004), a story of a young woman who, upon turning thirty, finally learned to take a risk and follow her heart. One year later, Giffin's own gamble paid off, as she completed her manuscript, landed an agent and signed a two-book deal on both sides of the Atlantic. The following summer, Something Borrowed, hailed as a "heartbreakingly honest debut" with "dead-on dialogue, real-life complexity and genuine warmth," became a surprise sensation, and Giffin vowed never to practice law again.
Dubbed a "modern day Jane Austen" (Vanity Fair) and a "dependably down-to-earth storyteller" (New York Times), Giffin has since penned eight more New York Times bestsellers, Something Blue (2005), Baby Proof (2006), Love the One You're With (2008), Heart of the Matter (2010), Where We Belong (2012), The One & Only (2014), First Comes Love (2016), and All We Ever Wanted (2018). All of her novels, filled with endearingly flawed characters and emotional complexity, have resonated deeply with both critics and readers around the world, achieving bestseller status in a number of countries, including the United States (#1), Canada (#1), United Kingdom, France, Brazil and Poland (#1). The books have been translated into thirty-one languages, with over eleven million copies sold worldwide. In addition, five of her novels have been optioned for the big screen and are in various stages of development. The first, Something Borrowed, hit theaters in May 2011, starring Kate Hudson, Ginnifer Goodwin and John Krasinski.
Giffin now resides with her husband and three children in Atlanta. Her tenth novel, The Lies That Bind, was released on June 2, 2020.
Source: https://medium.com/the-reading-lists/authors-at-home-emily-giffin-the-lies-that-bind-53c29c22a68f
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