An Evening With Lily Tuck

On Wednesday, March 16th, as the befurred society ladies and other lucky souls were enjoying Billy Collins at DU, your pal and proprietor caught the free show down the road, Lily Tuck gracing Denver's Tattered Cover (Cherry Creek) to read from her National Book Award-winning novel.

The reading was more sparsely attended that I would have assumed—exactly 20 people, a number I can report with confidence, because I counted.  And, uh, the demographics skewed a tad old.  Like baby boomer and up. (And up.) Until a nattily-dressed young fellow carrying a hardcover copy of The News From Paraguay showed up right before 7:30, I was the only able-bodied man in the room under age 50, for what it's worth.  The job of counting heads obviously didn't take very long, so I was left with a little time to think.  First, about the fact that the tony Cherry Creek shopping Mecca is basically built upon what used to be the Denver City Dump—the irony of which is pretty delicious, if more or less unremarked-on or unknown by the Creek denizens of today.  Second, about what, exactly, your reporter was doing there.  I haven't read Paraguay, and the more I hear about it, the less interested I get.  On the other hand, (despite appearances to the contrary) I try like hell to stow the cynicism and prejudice when it comes to books in general, so I decided that I'd give Tuck a chance to win me over.   After all, Kate Walbert pretty much did.  (Also, RP's readings coverage has been overwhelmingly male, and Tuck was by far the most interesting woman writer on the March schedule.  Q: Care for any Picoult?  A: Er, no, thanks.  I had a big lunch.)

Tuck Love didn't quite ensue, but more on that later.  First, on with the show.  (Well, right after this little tidbit: Before the author took to the lectern, our master of ceremonies came around with a tray of Dixie cup-sized "mate lattes," brewed by the TC coffee counter in honor of the book.  We were informed that the drinks were caffeine-free—oh yes, someone inquired—but that they did include "a natural energy enhancer…or something."  A mate latte tastes like chai, by the way, and it allows you to see through walls.)

So Lily Tuck was introduced, briefly, and she made her way to the 'tern.  She's gray-haired and diminutive, and gave off the no-nonsense air of a librarian.  Reserved.  Serious.  After a short introduction interrupted by the typical microphone volume antics—folks, I was in the back and could hear fine, but whatever—Tuck jumped in, reading the opening of the her novel and then jumping to part of chapter four.  She was only adequate as a reader—stumbling a bit here, completely lacking fire and inflection there—and I got the sense that she doesn't exactly hold close and cherish the public reading.  (A stance for which I have complete sympathy, and which is confirmed here.)  Anyway, a whole hanging garden's worth of exotic flora was described.  The prose picked up quite a bit during the second chunk, as Tuck described a grisly, backwoods limb amputation and two fishermen who discover a small, "undigested" monkey in the belly of a fish.  And then it was over.  The whole thing took under ten minutes, and then came the question and answer period.

Your pal here has now come to dread the Q&A period; sure, it can be rather revealing, but that depends almost entirely on how well and how far the author runs with it.  Otherwise, you're only going to get the Same Five Questions®—proving, unbelievably, that some people do in fact come to, say, a Lily Tuck reading wondering, Where does Lily Tuck get her ideas?

Tuck did come to life a little during this period, describing how Paraguay—the country—basically tapped her as a VIP in the hopes of drumming up some tourism. (More here.) In fact, the Minister of Tourism was pretty excited about the success of her book, but apparently there were other factions who found her portrayal of Francisco Solano "disrespectful" and her erotic scenes "pornographic."  Therefore, she had to have armed bodyguards when she traveled the land in the MoT's company.  The whole thing made the front pages of the Paraguayan papers, serially. 

Later, our aforementioned nattily-dressed young man asked about the NBA controversy.  Tuck's response: "Ridiculous" and a confusion of sales vs. quality.  After that, a woman who made no bones about being a Friend of Tuck took the floor, bursting forth with fulsome praise, and, strangely, intimating that no one there had yet experienced the magic of The News From Paraguay.  (In my case, she was right, but still.  Very odd.)  Then it was book signing time, and YPTR slipped out the back as the book-tote toting masses rushed Tuck.  Total time: About 35 minutes.

In all, not a wasted evening, by any means, but not one in which Tuck did much to win me over.  The NBA honors authors solely on the basis of their books' excellence—or should, ideally—so it's probably unfair to expect that all the honorees are going to be charismatic and ambassadorial.  Still, hope springs eternal, as they say.  Tuck is onto her next book—set in Italy—and your pal’s preparing for the big George Saunders Santa Fe blowout next month.

Comments

[Jimmy Beck]

That's all well and good, but I still give her full marks for inventing those hemorrhoid wipes.

[tito]

I, too, have been increasingly reluctant to read The News From Paraguay. Upon hearing that L'il Tuck is even remotely responsible for "mate latte", my reluctance has now been thoroughly ossified. How's that for an unreasonable grudge? Ha Hah!

[Rake]

(There's an Infinite Jest joke just flat teed up here if anyone cares to take a swing.)

[Scott]

Okay, I'll bite. Maybe for her next book, she can write a sequal, but instead of writing about the past she can write about the future. Specifically, she can set it in the Year of the Tucks Medicated Pad.

There should be some great advertising tie-ins, and that way the NBA won't have to worry about nominating an unknown for the award. They can even pass out TMPs at author readings, in case anyone gets a case of the mate lattes.

[The Croz]

Hmmm . . . somehow I slept on this book winning the NBA, but upon reading the description, it sounds like the least interesting novel to ever win the award. (And I've read The Shipping News.) Didn't this award used to go to books that had something to say about the world we live in now?

Rake, in attending this reading, you have once again proven to be a heartier man than I.

[Oriana]

Lily Tuck is a phony product of the overpaid Gordon Lish and his masturbatory workshop. Her books are horrid from the very first to the very last. Lord knows why they are so well covered in the media except that her husband was a lovely and well-connected man who always tried to make her happy.