Welcome to the Book Marks Questionnaire, where we ask authors questions about the books that have shaped them.
This week, we spoke to the author of Luster (out now in paperback), Raven Leilani.
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Book Marks: First book you remember loving?
Raven Leilani: Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli.
BM: Favorite re-read?
RL: Sula by Toni Morrison.
BM: A book that blew your mind?
RL: Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu.
BM: Last book you read?
RL: The Margot Affair by Sanaë Lemoine.
BM: A book that made you cry?
RL: They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us by Hanif Abdurraqib.
BM: What book from the past year would you like to give a shout-out to?
RL: Temporary by Hilary Leichter.
BM: A book that actually made you laugh out loud?
RL: Objects of Desire by Clare Sestanovich.
BM: Favorite book to give as a gift?
RL: Danzy Senna’s New People.
BM: Favorite book you were assigned in high school?
RL: The Awakening by Kate Chopin.
BM: Book(s) you’re reading right now?
RL: Assembly by Natasha Brown, How To Wrestle A Girl by Venita Blackburn, Rainbow Milk by Paul Mendez.
BM: Favorite children’s book?
RL: The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats.
BM: Book you wish would be adapted for a film/tv show?
RL: Milk Blood Heat by Dantiel Moniz.
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Raven Leilani’s work has been published in Granta, The Yale Review, McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, Conjunctions, The Cut, and New England Review, among other publications. Leilani received her MFA from NYU and was an Axinn Foundation Writer-in-Residence. Luster is her first novel.
Raven Leilani’s Luster is out now in paperback from Picador
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