Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jennifer Egan (Manhattan Beach) joined us for the paperback launch of The Candy House, her follow-up sister novel to A Visit From the Goon Squad. Egan read excerpts from her captivating novel followed by an extended audience Q&A about themes, stylistic choices, and the writing process.
The story opens with Bix Bouton and his successful tech company which allows users to access every memory they have ever had and share those memories in exchange for access to other people’s memories; the result is an intellectually daring tapestry of narratives exploring what it means to long for connection, love, and authenticity.
Featured Book
-
.
The Candy House
By Jennifer Egan
Published by Simon & Schuster
The Candy House opens with the staggeringly brilliant Bix Bouton, whose company, Mandala, is so successful that he is “one of those tech demi-gods with whom we’re all on a first name basis.” Bix is forty, with four kids, restless, and desperate for a new idea, when he stumbles into a conversation group, mostly Columbia professors, one of whom is experimenting with downloading or “externalizing” memory. Within a decade, Bix’s new technology, “Own Your Unconscious”—which allows you access to every memory you’ve ever had, and to share your memories in exchange for access to the memories of others—has seduced multitudes.
In the world of Egan’s spectacular imagination, there are “counters” who track and exploit desires and there are “eluders,” those who understand the price of taking a bite of the Candy House. Egan introduces these characters in an astonishing array of narrative styles—from omniscient to first person plural to a duet of voices, an epistolary chapter, and a chapter of tweets. Intellectually dazzling, The Candy House is also a moving testament to the tenacity and transcendence of human longing for connection, family, privacy, and love.
Featuring
-
Jennifer Egan
Jennifer Egan
Jennifer Egan is the author of several novels and a short story collection. Her 2017 novel, Manhattan Beach, a New York Times bestseller, was awarded the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction, and was chosen as New York City’s One Book One New York read. Her previous novel, A Visit From the Goon Squad, won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the Los Angeles Times book prize, and was named one of the best books of the decade by Time magazine and Entertainment Weekly. Also a journalist, she has written frequently in the New York Times magazine, and she recently completed a term as President of PEN America. Her new novel, The Candy House, a sibling to A Visit From the Goon Squad, was published in April, 2022, and was recently named one of the New York Times’s 10 Best Books of 2022, as well as one of President Obama’s favorite reads of 2022.
Photo Credit: Pieter M. Van Hattem
