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  • Jodi Picoult, left, and Paula McLain will be at the City Opera House on Monday, March 12. Special to the Record-Eagle

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March 9, 2012

Bestselling authors square off in NWS

Paula McLain, Jodi Picoult at March 12 event

BY JODEE TAYLOR jtaylor@record-eagle.com

TRAVERSE CITY — Best-selling author Paula McLain has never interviewed another author but she's not nervous about her first subject, mega-best-selling author Jodi Picoult.

"She's a sensation, a brand," said McLain, of Picoult, whose 19th book, "Lone Wolf," was published last month. "All her books are the best."

In a first-of-its-kind event, the authors go mano a mano Monday, March 12, at the sold-out National Writers Series event at the City Opera House.

McLain, 46, author of "The Paris Wife," still on the bestseller list a year after publication, plans to ask Picoult about "her process, her research, her career." Picoult, 44, has published nearly a book a year since her debut in 1992.

"It feels like a book a week to me, who takes, like, five years (to write one)," McLain said.

Both women have exhaustive research in common. "The Paris Wife" is a fictional account of Ernest Hemingway and his first wife, Hadley.

Picoult's books often deal wtih social issues, ranging from organ donation to gay rights. Her latest is about a man who spent time living with wild wolves and details not only pack behavior, but family crises.

"She uses her research not to further her own agenda, but presents every possible angle," McLain said. "She doesn't take sides."

McLain said she loves talking to other writers, mainly to find out about their lives.

"I want to know how other people do it and stay relatively sane — their routines, relationships with editors, tours. How do they keep it in balance?"

This will be McLain's second appearance at the National Writers Series. She was here in September 2011, touting her own book.

"This writers series was so fun, so well run," she said. "It's a night of culture."

When asked what she's working on now, McLain laughed, "Right now I'm cleaning the bathtub." She's also working on a novel about Marie Curie, a Polish scientist who discovered radium.

"I get to go back to Paris," she said.

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