The Gossip Columnist's Daughter by Peter Orner
Living in the Midwest, it is not often that one has an opportunity to meet one of their favorite writers. That’s why I was thrilled at the opportunity to attend a reading with Peter Orner in Iowa City in September this year as he was on tour promoting this book. We made a connection after the reading related to the subject of the book, Irv Kupcinet. Preston Jackson, an artist from Peoria, Illinois created the sculpture of Kupcinet that stands on Wacker Drive in Chicago. I asked Peter to inscribe a book to Preston and delivered it to Preston a couple weeks later at the Peoria Riverfront Museum.
Orner has been a favorite of mine for many years now. I’ve read most of his work and find a similarity in experience. He’s from Chicago so I can frequently relate to the time and places he writes about. I was particularly taken aback reading about his experience in Dubuque while I lived in Dubuque. In, Am I Alone Here, Orner shares his experiences while visiting New Melleray Abbey, a Cistercian monastery on the outskirts of town:
In Dubuque looking for a Starbucks, I drove down Grandview Avenue, where the bright yellow recycling boxes gleamed in the driveways of home after house. I tried to have a spiritual experience over those recycling boxes. It nearly worked. You should have seen them. The people of Dubuque never forget to put out the recycling, and they always sort it very well, too.
While I don’t exactly remember how I found Orner, he probably came on my radar either because of my experience at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop (he is a graduate of the program) or a short story he published in The Paris Review. He is also the reason I’m aware of the Gina Birriault, another master of the short story. — MJD
Review:
More than a novel, Peter Orner’s “The Gossip Columnist’s Daughter” is a vibe.
Sure, there’s a plot, and a pretty engaging one at that. Separated from the mother of his child and frustrated by a sputtering literary career, Jedediah Rosenthal, a professor of writing at Loyola University in Chicago, is much more entertaining company than his job description and track record might suggest. Jed narrates this story of his obsessive inquiry into a decades-old murder case, one tangentially related to a dramatic incident in his own family history.
“This isn’t a detective story or a police procedural. It’s not a mystery,” Jed admits. “The truth is I’ve never been drawn to stories with answers.”
Instead, what he has constructed is a moody and engrossing meditation on the ephemerality of memory, the persistence of family myths and a haunting ode to a bygone Chicago. A memorable novel of the stories and people everybody has already forgotten. - The New York Times
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