SJM_Interview_Lippincott_1223_layout 12 / 18 / 23 4 : 12 PM Page 1 Your most recent book Pride and Prejudice and Pittsburgh is a retelling of Pride and Prejudice , where Audrey , a high school art student , IN HER LATEST accidentally gets sent back in time to Jane Austen’s England and meets an NOVEL , Elizabeth Bennet type named Lucy . What made you think about putting ROMANCE together Pittsburgh , time travel , and AUTHOR Regency - era England ? It was a mixture of things . My wife’s com - RACHAEL fort movie is the 2005 Pride & Prejudice [ with Kiera Knightley ] , and when she was LIPPINCOTT pregnant , we watched it , and I got into it PUTS A TIME - again . I really wanted to do something that was set in 1812 , with that historical fiction TRAVELING SPIN element . And I just had this idea that was , ON A JANE “ What if some girl from Pittsburgh shoots back in time ? ” After close to a year of really AUSTEN CLASSIC . struggling to come up with an idea for another book , this one just came so easily . by Melissa D . Sullivan … I felt so comfortable in Audrey’s voice , and also comfortable having it be this girl from Pittsburgh , which is in this contem - porary romance voice that I’ve written in for every single one of my books . But then I had to stretch my writing muscles to write Lucy [ the historical character ] . It was Love of a something I was nervous about . But I showed it to Alyson , [ and ] she said , “ It’s working . You pulled it off . ” What message would you like readers to take away from the book ? Lifetime That’s a good question . I think maybe “ don’t live your life in fear ” and “ don’t be hat’s the one thing bestselling romance writer Rachael Lippincott afraid to love and be loved in return . ” But misses most about living in the southeastern corner of Pennsylva - compared to my other books , like The nia ? Is it the idyllic rural scenery , the charming indie bookstores , W Lucky List or Five Feet Apart , where there or the culture of literary and artistic excellence ? were always messages , with this one I gen - “ I miss Wawa every single day , ” says Lippincott . erally wanted to write something enter - Though she now lives in Pittsburgh , Lippincott grew up in Yardley and started writing taining . Queer people over the past couple in the third grade at Quarry Hill Elementary . She went on to take advanced writing work - of years have really been going through it . shops at the George School in Newtown . Lippincott left Bucks County for college , ulti - I wanted this safe little box where people mately enrolling in the University of Pittsburgh , where she met Alyson Derrick , her wife could just escape to and read a sapphic and occasional coauthor , in a youth literature class . Best known for her adaptation of romance , and just come away from it feel - Five Feet Apart , Lippincott often returns to her hometown with her one - year - old daughter , ing really good and positive . dropping by the Commonplace Reader bookstore and , we suppose , a Wawa or two . We caught up with Lippincott to talk about the benefits of being married to Final question : Keira another writer , her latest work of sapphic romance , and the correct ranking of Pride Knightley or Jennifer and Prejudice adaptations . Ehle ? Oh , God , don’t do this . Well , Keira Knightley is Keira What’s it like having two writers in the family ? Knightley . But the first Pride Honestly , it’s the best . We understand each other’s sched - Q & A and Prejudice version I saw was ules — like , how when you get your revisions back and you the 1995 BBC one , and I really have less than a month to turn out an entire new draft of a book . But when it fell in love with it . Now as an comes to my writing , Alyson is the most useful person . She’s my real litmus adult , I can acknowledge the fact test , and she’s so honest in her feedback . To have somebody like that in your that when Jennifer is playing the corner , living with you , is honestly the best , and it’s also just so great getting to piano and singing the song in that collaborate on ideas together . I feel with other collaborations , you have set working one scene , it was definitely a bit of a gay hours . But with Alyson , I could get out of the shower at 11 p.m . and say , “ I just had the awakening moment for me . So I’m going to best idea , ” or wake up in the morning and say , “ I had this dream that could maybe work ? have to say Jennifer . for a chapter in the book . ” It’s great to work whenever you’re most excited to do it . SOUTH JERSEY MAGAZINE volume20 issue 9 SouthJerseyMagazine.com 54 |
