Elizabeth Strout

People are getting, you know, the school boards are saying, we don't like this curriculum anymore.

You've got to change it.

And

And that's a signal to any reader that things are now going to be different for Artie.

Yeah.

You know, I don't know, but...

I don't know.

But as I was writing him and I was so inside him, I thought, okay, so, you know, he's 57.

He's not really ever actually thought about free will that much.

And yet he's going through certain things and he's about to think about that.

And I mean, it was a number of years ago that I was having a drink with a friend of mine and she said, you know, I just don't think there's any free will.

And I was amazed.

And ever since that moment, I've thought about it often.

I thought, well, how could she be so sure?

But anyway, so I've thought about it myself.

And I thought, I already was going to think about this.

And that's at the beginning of the book.

And then it's sort of like a little like, heads up, everybody, this is the point of the book.

Nobody would enjoy the cocktail party, right?

Yeah.