We chat with author Wilton Barnhardt about Western Alliances, which is a vivid portrait of a wealthy family set against the backdrop of the 2008 financial crisis. This laugh-out-loud, darkly funny novel follows the Costa family—whose members are every bit as richly absurd as the characters in HBO’s Succession.
Hi, Wilton! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?
I was born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, went to school at Michigan State, before moving to New York to be literary. Either that meant writing my first novel or working in publishing or magazines. I did work on magazines and my career peak was as a reporter for Sports Illustrated. Grad school at Oxford University (first Brasenose College, then St. John’s College) came next. I got a M. Phil. (a masters degree they since have gotten rid of) and piled up a manuscript that became my first book Emma Who Saved My Life. I followed with Gospel, then Show World, and a lot of visiting writer gigs at various writing programs around the country (UC Irvine, Univ of Alabama, California Institute of Technology, Warren Wilson College’s MFA Program for Writers) before landing back in my home state, North Carolina State University, where I helped found the SPECTACULAR master of fine arts program in creative writing there.Two novels, Lookaway, Lookaway and the current Western Alliances followed. All my books are from St. Martin’s Press and Picador. I am also proud of an anthology I edited, Every True Pleasure: LGBTQ Tales of North Carolina (from University of North Carolina Press).
When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?
I would have told you in junior high I was a writer. Horribly, I think it was part of my brooding adolescent shtick. At a certain point, it occurred to me I had better write something if I was going to act like a Writer…
Quick lightning round! Tell us the first book you ever remember reading, the one that made you want to become an author, and one that you can’t stop thinking about!
Books? All kinds of “boys” literature which I’m not sure exists anymore… The Hardy Boys and my sister’s Nancy Drews. Johnny Quest comics? I had a subscription to Boys Life, and anything that involved survival—volcanoes, mountaineering disasters, underwater peril—I was rereading a hundred times. Ditto any kind of boy detective/girl detective mystery. My grandmother had a moldering, dusty shelf of 19th Century classics, and so I read most of Jules Verne. I attribute my only real natural literary talent—plotting—to this classical foundation!
The first real book of literature I read was Henry James’ The Portrait of A Lady as a teenager on a beach vacation where the novel was passed around to everyone in the beach house. And we talked late into the night about Isabel Archer’s choices and follies and people got animated and so involved… and I thought, hm, I would love to write something people were passionate about and would talk all night about. I did my master’s thesis on Henry James—I never got over the classic Victorian novel, set in parlors, full of intrigues…
Your latest novel, Western Alliances, is out now! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?
Succession filtered through Arrested Development
What can readers expect?
Lots of sibling rivalry, sex all over European capitals, disappearing trust funds, financial scamming, a family behaving badly but usually hilariously.
Where did the inspiration for Western Alliances come from?
I was one of those eternal never-grow-up backpackers in hostels and one-star hotels, who would arrange to sleep in the 2nd class carriage of overnight trains (circa 1985-2000). Anything could be sacrificed to live and eat and carouse in Europe and never go home for a real job. I always envied the rich kids who never really DID have to go home so they inspired my characters. Of course, I set this in 2008 when the fortune the Costa siblings depend upon is evaporating.
Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?
I love writing about Americans having misadventures in foreign countries, roadtrips from hell, amusing clashes of culture, vacations gone bad. Alas, I had much from my own life to draw upon…
What’s next for you?
The title makes it sounds grimmer than it is—The House of Dust—but it’s a mostly comic novel about friends deciding if they should marry for companionship and financial benefit, rather than hold out in their middle-aged years for romantic love.
Lastly, do you have any book recommendations for our readers?
I’m headed to India for a first trip soon, so… Vauhini Vara’s The Immortal King Rao, Smriti Ravindra’s The Girl Who Climbed Trees, and the short story collection of Jai Chakrabarti A Small Sacrifice for Enormous Happiness. All fabulous!
