Madison author Ann Garvin says she’s more excited about her new book “Tell Two Friends” than she has been about one of her novels in a while.
Part of that is the anticipation of catching her readers off-guard. At first, “Tell Two Friends,” which hits stores Sept. 8, fits in snugly with Garvin’s other books like “Bummer Camp” and “I Thought You Said This Would Work,” funny, poignant novels about messy, lovable women. “Friends” focuses on Jane Baye, who becomes the pariah of her very Stoughton-like small town when it’s revealed that her husband is a polygamist.
That alone seems like it would be enough for a novel. But then Garvin starts interjecting chapters told from the perspective of Truman, an ex-con who has moved in across the street from Jane, and is watching her for reasons that are unclear but certainly troubling.
Garvin will talk about “Tell Two Friends” on Sept. 22 at Mystery To Me bookstore with “Writing Forward” podcast host Jeff Oloizia. She talked to City Cast Madison about her glee in throwing her readers a curveball.
CCM: It’s like this guy Truman has infiltrated an Ann Garvin book.
AG: That’s exactly how I wanted it to feel. My very first book had like a real tension line through it, but then I kind of left that behind because people were like, "We don't know how to market a book that is a little bit scary and a little bit funny.” This is the first time where you read chapters and you think, “Oh, that's new.”
Was it fun to write in Truman’s voice?
It was fun. I was nervous to write it because I wasn't sure if I was going to get the voice right and the tone right. But then I met a post-incarcerated man who was on the docket for a teaching thing that I did in New Hampshire, and I got to know him well. And so he promised that he would read it, and I actually paid him to read to be my sensitivity reader.
Does this mark a turn in the kinds of books you want to write?
I have ideas in the future for some books that are tension-filled, but nothing like this really. I'm not really the kind of person that thinks about murderers often. When I pick a book to write, I just have to really feel excited about it, passionate about it. I actually have to know that there’s a true story in there, not just a premise.
What was the biggest challenge of writing the book?
The hardest thing I think with this book was to make her everyday life tension-filled enough that anybody gave a shit about her chapters while you waited to find out what this other guy was doing. I want people to be turning the pages in her life, and all she’s doing is being a regular mom in a town that’s mad at her.
Speaking of that town, you have a disclaimer at the front of the book that this is not Stoughton. But how do you think Stoughton readers will react?
I think I’ll get a mix of responses. I think I’ll get some people mad. You know, “She made fun of us!” I don’t think I was disdainful. I think I rib them carefully because I don’t feel disdainful.
This is a very common question for a writer, but how much do you draw from your real life?
I know that everybody sort of puts themselves in there, and people very often think I’m the protagonist. Which in some cases, I guess I give the protagonist my voice. But she definitely is not me.
I did write to an incarcerated man. Did I say that already?
What? No!
When I was a nursing student, I saw a little want-ad, “Be a Pen Pal With An Incarcerated Male.” I thought, “Poor guy, prison must be so boring.” I came from a small town. I was 19 or 20, and I never had heard that people write to incarcerated people, like the women who are interested in Ted Bundy. So we wrote back and forth for a while.
And then he asked me for a photograph, and I was not so dumb that I didn’t know what was up. I wrote back and said, “I don’t think we need a photograph to be friends.” And then he wrote back and said, “Don’t write to incarcerated men anymore. You’re too nice.”
