In her debut novel, Lapidos delivers a witty update on the ancient parable of the talents, a meditation on creativity and artistic responsibility, and a sparkling academic novel. The narrative follows Anna Brisker, a graduate student whose dissertation on inspiration is languishing due to, what else?—a lack of inspiration. Then a chance meeting with Helen Langley, the niece of Frederick Langley, an author whose career fizzled after a promising start, gets Anna going again. Believed to have suffered terminal writer’s block after his third novel, Frederick in fact had been working on something. Or so Helen says. To find out the truth and to complete her study, Anna has to get access to Langley’s papers—a project in itself.
Lapidos, a senior editor at The Atlantic, will be in conversation with David Litt, author of Thanks, Obama.