2003 was a high water mark for speculative literature

This Saturday we’re featuring Andrew Sean Greer at Writers With Drinks, the monthly spoken word night that I organize. (It’s 7:30 at the Make Out Room on 22nd street, and you should all come!) And that started me thinking about how for me, that moment 10 years ago when Andrew published The Confessions of Max Tivoli was so important for the literary-genre crossover thing.

There had been so many great lit-genre stories before then, and I remember Infinite Jest had rocked my world among others. Plus so much stuff by Doris Lessing, Don DeLillo and Kurt Vonnegut. But Confessions of Max Tivoli was released around the same time as The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. (And they were both just a year before Cloud Atlas.) And Kelly Link and Aimee Bender were exploding onto the scene. For a little while, it felt like literary spec fic was finding ways to tell brand new stories about people, using things like time travel and backwards-aging. It wasn’t just clever spins on SF ideas, or postmodern lit that used SF trappings, but really good solid SF storytelling.

Since then, literary genre fiction has exploded—and Greer’s recent books have included The Impossible Life of Greta Wells, which is another great personal story with SF ideas. And David Mitchell continues to be incredible. But a lot of the lit genre stuff is more post-apocalyptic, or out-and-out fantastical. Or pomo, again. I’m just thinking aloud here, but I was really inspired by Time Traveler’s Wife and Max Tivoli, and a few other books around that time. They had a huge influence on All the Birds in the Sky, and my writing in general. I would love to see more personal/intimate takes on speculative stuff again. What do you think?