Welcome to the Book Marks Questionnaire, where we ask authors questions about the books that have shaped them.
This week, we spoke to Cat Person and Other Stories author Kristen Roupenian.
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Book Marks: First book you remember loving?
Kristen Roupenian: Before I could read, I loved the pictures of the little glowing eggs in Lorna Balian’s Humbug Rabbit.
BM: What book do you think your book is most in conversation with?
KR: The stories in the anthology The Weird, edited by Jeff and Ann VanderMeer—specifically stories by Shirley Jackson, Joyce Carol Oates, and Octavia Butler.
BM: A book that blew your mind?
KR: The Quincunx by Charles Palliser.
BM: Last book you read?
KR: Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber.
BM: A book that made you cry?
KR: My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell.
BM: What book from the past year would you like to give a shout-out to?
KR: The Other’s Gold by my friend Elizabeth Ames and Bunny by Mona Awad—two killer campus novels that are equal parts funny and dark.
BM: A book that actually made you laugh out loud?
KR: Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood.
BM: Favorite book to give as a gift?
KR: In the Woods by Tana French.
BM: Classic book on your To Be Read pile?
KR: Somewhat unexpectedly, I’m in a ‘classics’ book club, and we’re starting The Brothers Karamazov next week.
BM: Favorite book no one has heard of?
KR: Well, certainly some people have heard of it, but Doreen Baingana’s Tropical Fish is an underrated masterpiece.
BM: Favorite book you were assigned in high school?
KR: All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren.
BM: Book(s) you’re reading right now?
KR: Tender is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica, Why I am Not a Buddhist by Evan Thompson, and Midnight in Chernobyl by Adam Higginbotham.
BM: Favorite children’s book?
KR: The Dark is Rising series by Susan Cooper and the collected works of John Bellairs.
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Kristen Roupenian is the author of the viral short story, “Cat Person,” which appeared in The New Yorker. Her debut collection was published by Scout Press in 2019. She is currently at work on a novel.
Kristen Roupenian’s Cat Person and Other Stories is out in paperback on April 14 from Gallery/Scout Press
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