By the Book by Pamela Paul

heroic characters in my new novel, In One Person , are transgender women—not the first time I’ve written about transgender characters. I love sexual outsiders; the world is harder for them.
    What’s your favorite movie adaptation of one of your books?
    Lasse Hallstrom’s The Cider House Rules . I loved working with Lasse. I wrote the screenplay, but it is Lasse’s film; he is why it works. I also think Tod Williams’s The Door in the Floor is an excellent adaptation of A Widow for One Year ; he smartly adapted just the first third of that novel, when the character of Ruth (the eponymous widow) is still a little girl. He did a great job; he was the writer and director, but I enjoyed working with him—just giving him notes on his script, and then notes on the rough cut.
    If somebody walked into the space where you do your writing, what would they see?
    There are two big tables joined in an L-shaped fashion, so that I can move from one to the other in a chair on casters. There is a large dictionary stand with an unabridged dictionary. There are windows on two sides of my office—lots of books and papers around. My laptop is at a small desk in a far-off corner of the room, removed from the work tables—strictly for correspondence. There’s a couch, and—usually—my dog, a chocolate Lab, is somewhere in my office.
    What do you plan to read next?
    I plan what I write, not what I read.
    John Irving is the author of The World According to Garp , The Cider House Rules , In One Person , and A Prayer for Owen Meany , among other books.

Elizabeth Gilbert

    What book is on your night stand now?
    Rome , by Robert Hughes. Though I’m finding it challenging to read about Rome without immediately wanting to run away to Rome.
    When and where do you like to read?
    When I am awake, and wherever I happen to be. If I could read while I was driving, showering, socializing, or sleeping, I would do it.
    What was the last truly great book you read?
    Nothing in the last few years has dazzled me more than Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall , which blew the top of my head straight off. I’ve read it three times, and I’m still trying to figure out how she put that magnificent thing together. Now I’m on to its sequel, Bring Up the Bodies , which is nicely satisfying my need for more Thomas Cromwell.
    Are you a fiction or a nonfiction person? What’s your favorite literary genre? Any guilty pleasures?
    I enjoy both, although I unfairly hold fiction to a far higher standard. With nonfiction, I figure I can glean something educational or interesting out of the book even if the writing is weak. But if the first chapter of a novel doesn’t feel perfect and accurate to me, I simply can’t read on; it’s too painful. Meanwhile, my (very) guilty pleasure is tabloid journalism. I hate to say it, but I know the names of all the celebrities’ babies.
    What was the best book you read as a student? What books over the years have most influenced your thinking?
    It was a big deal for me in high school to be introduced to Hemingway. I already knew that I wanted to be a writer, but the deceptive simplicity of his voice made writing seem realistically attainable to me—as though all you had to do was get out of the way and let the story tell itself. Of course, Hemingway isn’t simple, and writing isn’t simple, and I certainly didn’t end up thinking like him in any way. But he did open up for me a marvelous expanse of possibility and permission, and just at the right moment.
    If you could require the president to read one book, what would it be?
    My Life , by Bill Clinton—purely as a study guide for how to win a second term.
    What is your ideal reading experience? Do you prefer a book that makes you laugh or makes you cry? One that teaches you something or one that distracts you?
    Oh, I just want what we all want: a comfortable couch, a nice beverage, a weekend of no