What is Abbi Waxman reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Abbi Waxman, author of Other People’s Houses.

Her entry begins:

Most of the time I'm reading crime fiction. I don't write crime fiction, but my mother did, and it's what I grew up on. I tend to favor Golden Age writers, ranging from Christie to Wentworth to Marsh, with a generous helping of Rex Stout, who isn't strictly speaking GA, but is probably my favorite. I think Nero and Archie knock Holmes and Watson off their pedestal with ease, and I've read every book in the series at least a dozen times, literally.

If I'm writing a book I can't read contemporary fiction, as either I become deeply depressed because I'll never write anything as good as what I'm reading, or I worry that I will steal the best bits without noticing (that's my story, and I'm sticking to it). I also read a lot of non-fiction, because it feels like quality food for my brain, whereas the fiction is delicious but possibly less nutritious fare. Having said that, I tend to...[read on]

About Other People’s Houses, from the publisher:

The author of The Garden of Small Beginnings returns with a hilarious and poignant new novel about four families, their neighborhood carpool, and the affair that changes everything.

At any given moment in other people's houses, you can find...repressed hopes and dreams...moments of unexpected joy...someone making love on the floor to a man who is most definitely not her husband...

*record scratch*

As the longtime local carpool mom, Frances Bloom is sometimes an unwilling witness to her neighbors' private lives. She knows her cousin is hiding her desire for another baby from her spouse, Bill Horton's wife is mysteriously missing, and now this...

After the shock of seeing Anne Porter in all her extramarital glory, Frances vows to stay in her own lane. But that's a notion easier said than done when Anne's husband throws her out a couple of days later. The repercussions of the affair reverberate through the four carpool families--and Frances finds herself navigating a moral minefield that could make or break a marriage.

Visit Abbi Waxman's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Abbi Waxman & Daisy, Jasper, and Wilbur.

Writers Read: Abbi Waxman.

--Marshal Zeringue