“I was reading about narrative theory and reading a lot of 19th-century novels for my work,” she tells Show Daily. One of the inspirations for her first novel is Fridlund’s academic interest in early narrative.

The History of Wolves is featured at the “Adult Editors Buzz” panel today, at 4:15 p.m., where Elizabeth Schmitz, Grove Atlantic vice president and editorial director, will be talking it up, and the author will take part in the “Adult Author Buzz” panel tomorrow, at 10 a.m.įridlund’s debut is a coming-of-age story that weaves together three different narratives: Linda’s isolation living with her parents in an abandoned commune in the wilderness of northern Minnesota the story of her history teacher, who is accused of sex crimes and being a child pornographer and Linda’s experience as a babysitter for a family that’s just moved across the lake.

It’s a voice I thought I could live in for a while for a longer piece.”Īn impressive voice it is, as that story won the 2013 McGinnis-Ritchie Award for fiction. The author notes, “I ended up feeling that I could linger in Linda’s voice because it has a kind of canniness and also an innocence that a lot of teenagers have, and it’s particularly amplified by her unique background and isolation, and her longing, her need for connection. 2017), told from the point of view of a 14-year-old named Linda. at the University of Southern California was easily transformed into the opening chapter of her first novel, The History of Wolves (Atlantic Monthly Press, Jan. What began as a short story and an academic endeavor when Emily Fridlund was getting her Ph.D.

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