Mythmakers

A New York Times Editors Choice Named a Best New Book of the Year by Harpers Bazaar Named a Best Book of the Summer by Shondaland, SheReads, The Boston Globe, Harpers Bazaar, and Readers Digest From an acclaimed senior editor at Vanity Fair comes a laudable (The New York Times) debut novel about a young journalist who discovers a short story thats inexplicably about her lifeleading to an entanglement with the authors widow, daughter, and former best friend.Sal Cannons life is in shambles. Her relationship is crumbling, and her career in journalism hits a low point after its revealed that her profile of a playwright is full of inaccuracies. Shes close to rock-bottom when she reads a short story by Martin Keller: a much older author she met at a literary event years ago. Much to her shock, the story is about her and the moment they met. When Sal learns the story is excerpted from his unpublished novel, she reaches out to the storys editoronly to learn that Martin is deceased. Desperate to leave her crumbling life behind and to read the manuscript from which the story was excerpted, Sal decides to find Martins widow, Moira. Moira has made it clear that she doesnt want to be contacted. But soon Sal is on a bus to upstate New York, where she slowly but surely inserts herself into Moiras life. Or is it the other way around? As Sal sifts through Martins papers and learns more about Moira, the question of muse and artist arisesagain and again. Even more so when Martins daughters story emerges. Who owns a story? And who is the one left to tell it? The Mythmakers is a nesting doll of a book that grapples with perspective and memory, as well as the batteries between creative ambition and love. Its a page-turner (theSkimm) about the trials and tribulations of finding out who you are, at any stage in your life, and how inspiration might find you in the strangest of places.