Elizabeth Strout

Very nice to be here.

Thank you so much.

I love Ireland.

I've always loved Ireland.

I came here when I was 18 years old for the first time and I just thought it was amazing.

It's so beautiful.

Well, first of all, the beauty of it and also the people are just great.

I just have a real fondness for Ireland.

Well, I don't know if I can—I guess I'm not going to give away any spoilers, right?

No, don't.

That's why I'm letting you do the summarizing.

Okay, well, it's a little hard to talk without giving out, so I'm not going to.

But it's about a 57-year-old high school teacher of history, and he's been a wonderful teacher.

He loves his students, and it's really about his time in history because his time in history is changing.

And therefore his life is going to change and his personal life is changing and his professional life is changing.

Well, you know, when the book first starts and he's feeling quite desolate, as I was writing that, I thought, what am I going to do with this?

How am I going to get myself out of this?

And then all of a sudden, well, not all of a sudden, but very slowly, actually, I began to understand, oh, I actually knew what I was doing unconsciously.

I was setting it up for him to feel lonely because his wife has...

withdrawn from him intermittently during that time period.