Vida Vendela Reading
Vendela Vida reads from her novel And Now You Can Go. She follows by explaining that the idea for the story comes from a ten page excerpt from a novel that she spent years writing (which she decided not to publish). Vida says she wrote And Now You Can Go very quickly; she observes that the story is "fast and plotty and angry."
Vida recounts her experience of going undercover at a UCLA sorority to research female initiation rituals, Girls on the Verge. Vida describes her involvement in Operation Ohio, an initiative to boost voter registration among Ohio undergraduates for the 2004 election, as well as her work as the editor of the magazine,The Believer, as a founder of 826 Valencia, a nonprofit writing lab for kids.
In: Fiction
Authors: Vida Vendela
Date Recorded: September 24, 2004
Works Read: Works by Vendela Vida: And Now You Can Go; Girls on the Verge: Debutante Dips, Drive-Bys, and Other Initiations.
Program: Live From Prairie Lights
Format: reading
Contributors: Introductions by host Julie Englander.
Topics: editing; fiction writing; creative writing M.F.A. programs