Q&A w/ Bethany McLean
Bethany McLean, contributing editor at Vanity Fair, joins us for a brief exchange. She authored Saudi America: The Truth About Fracking and How It’s Changing the World (Book of the Month: July 2021).
What do you read?
I read everything, or at least I try…Just recently I loved Patrick Radden Keefe’s Empire of Pain…It’s really important to read a lot of things that challenge you and that push your brain in different directions, and to read good writers—because reading good writers is a way of becoming a better writer yourself.
Do you have a favorite novel?
My favorite novel of late…is probably All the Light We Cannot See [by Anthony Doerr], which I thought was just a remarkable, incredibly well told story that’s centered in World War II and the years after that. It’s just beautifully written and also one of those books that you don’t want to put down. But my favorite work of fiction over time time remains [J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. I’m a Tolkien nerd.
What are you working on today?
I’m writing a book about the pandemic with my coauthor Joe Nocera… Less a blow-by-blow of the pandemic, and really meant to look at how the pandemic exposed problems in our economy and our society that were brewing even before Covid-19.
