New Books In Literature

Today I talked to Clare Pooley about her novel The Authenticity Project (Penguin, 2020). In this chatty, very British story, a few personal lines written in a “pale-green exercise book like the one Monica had carried around with her at school,” inadvertently trigger enormous personal change in a group of strangers. Monica owns the café where Julian, an aging, lonely artist, has left a few words about himself in the exercise book. Julian hopes that whoever finds it might want to share their own truth and pass it along, and surprisingly, some do. Monica writes in it and leaves it for the next person, Hazard, a coke-snorting, financially high-flying jackass. Hazard takes it to Thailand and gives it to Riley, a cute young Australian gardener. And so on, but everyone ends up back Monica’s café, grappling with the challenges of finding love, or raising a baby, or getting sober. The Authenticity Project will bring you up to date on popular culture back in 2018, when slapdash gatherings, art classes in cafes, raising