Welcome to the Book Marks Questionnaire, where we ask authors questions about the books that have shaped them.
This week, we spoke to A Lucky Man author Jamel Brinkley.
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Book Marks: Favorite re-read?
Jamel Brinkley: So Long, See You Tomorrow by William Maxwell.
BM: What book do you think your book is most in conversation with?
JB: Lost in the City by Edward P. Jones.
BM: A book that blew your mind?
JB: Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison.
BM: Last book you read?
JB: A Mercy by Toni Morrison.
BM: A book that made you cry?
JB: Stoner by John Williams.
BM: What book from the past year would you like to give a shout-out to?
JB: The Unpassing by Chia-Chia Lin.
BM: A book that actually made you laugh out loud?
JB: Happiness, As Such, by Natalia Ginzburg.
BM: Classic book on your To Be Read pile?
JB: The Lydia Davis translation of Madame Bovary.
BM: Favorite book you were assigned in high school?
JB: Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison.
BM: Book(s) you’re reading right now?
JB: Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk, Tirra Lirra by the River by Jessica Anderson, and I’m rereading Alice Munro’s Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage.
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Jamel Brinkley, author of A Lucky Man, was raised in the Bronx and Brooklyn, New York. He is a graduate of Columbia University and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. He lives in California.
Jamel Brinkley’s A Lucky Man is out now in paperback from Graywolf Press
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