Amor Towles

"When I finish writing a novel, I find myself wanting to head in a new direction. That’s why after writing Rules of Civility—which describes a year in the life of a young woman about to climb New York’s socioeconomic ladder—I was eager to write A Gentleman in Moscow—which describes three decades in the life of a Russian aristocrat who’s just lost everything. The Lincoln Highway allowed me to veer again in that the novel focuses on three eighteen-year-old boys on a journey in 1950s America that lasts only ten days. The reason I make a shift like this is because it forces me to retool almost every element of my craft. By changing the , the era, and the cast of characters, I also must change the narrative’s perspective, tone, and poetics so that they will be true to these people in this situation at this moment in time. Similarly, by changing the duration of the tale—from a year to thirty years to ten days—the structure, pacing, and scope of thematic discovery all have to change."

"I think that, for the most part, I've have always tried to keep my focus on telling a story without worrying about what it might mean to others. ... Some people really write towards having a message. And, for me it's always been, when someone says, 'What is your book about?' — if I could say to them what my book was about in a few sentences, that book would be a failure — for sure."

"(quote at 6:53 of 58:49)"

"The 1930s . . . What a grueling decade that was. I was sixteen when the began, just old enough to have had all my dreams and expectations duped by the effortless glamour of the twenties. It was as if America launched the Depression just to teach a lesson. After the , you couldn't hear the bodies hitting the pavement, but there was a sort of communal gasp and then a stillness that fell over the city like snow. The bands laid down their instruments and the crowds made quietly for the door. ... Poverty and powerlessness. Hunger and hopelessness. At least until the omen of war began to lighten our step."

"Eve Ross . . . Eve was one of those surprising beauties from the . In New York it becomes so easy to assume that the city's most alluring women have flown in from Paris or . But they're just a minority. A much larger covey hails from the stalwart states that begin with the letter I—like Iowa and Indiana and Illinois. Bred with just the right amount of fresh air, roughhousing, and ignorance, these primitive blondes set out from the cornfields looking like starlight with limbs. Every morning in early spring one of them skips off her porch with a sandwich wrapped in cellophane ready to flag down the first headed to —this city where all things beautiful are welcomed and measured and, if not immediately adopted, then at least tried on for size."

"In three bestselling novels over eight years, Amor Towles has established himself as one of our most beloved contemporary novelists, exhibiting a chameleon-esque ability to inhabit vastly different settings and s in a style uniquely his own, yet never the same from book to book."