Today we welcome Emily Wolf to The Writer's Life e-Magazine! Emily is the author of the novel, My Thirty-First Year (and Other Calamities). This interview is part of her My Thirty-First Year (and Other Calamities) Blog Tour by Pump Up Your Book. Enjoy!

Emily Wolf is an ardent feminist, U2 fan, and native Chicagoan. A graduate of Harvard Law School, Emily now lives in Houston with her husband, children, and dogs. She volunteers with Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast and with her synagogue’s Board of Trustees and Social Justice Core Team. Emily has published several essays in the Houston Chronicle and regularly shares new writing at emilyvwolf.medium.com.

Her latest book is My Thirty-First Year (and Other Calamities).

Visit her website at www.emilywolfbooks.com or connect with her on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

TWL: Welcome to The Writer's Life! How did you come up with the idea to write your book?

Emily: I wrote this book to process my own late-twenties/early-thirties. This was a period during which I expected every facet of my life to fall into place…and stay there. Instead, it was messy, hard, confusing, discombobulating, absurd, revelatory, and hilarious. It seemed to me that much of the messy stuff of young womanhood was underrepresented in fiction. I wanted to help fill that gap.

TWL: Can you give us a short excerpt?

Emily:

“Zoe. You need new dating panties.”

I blinked, still foggy from the anesthesia, and tried to focus on the ancient pair of Jockeys my mom was holding at the foot of my gurney. I couldn’t help but smile before giving in to the temptation to close my eyes. Only she could make me laugh maybe ten minutes after I’d had an abortion.

“Sure,” I whispered hoarsely. “I appreciate your optimism.”

I heard her sigh and drop the undies back into the hospital-issue plastic bag. Dating panties. Although I was, at that moment, minutes removed from being pregnant with my husband’s baby, Mom and I both knew that my marriage couldn’t be salvaged. But living any kind of normal life after this moment, much less one that involved dating, seemed impossible.

My nerves began to fire too fast. The moment was surreal and ridiculous. Crazy! Because none of this was supposed to be happening. I tried to arrest the physical manifestations of panic that were already taking hold: I slowed my breath. Released my jaw. I attempted to be present in the tiny, curtained recovery cubicle. To concentrate on the blood pressure cuff on my bicep—its squeeze and release. On the plastic pulse thingy affixed to my pointer finger that lit up blood red. I forced my breath in and out, even though it kept getting stuck in my chest.

“Well,” Mom said with a decisive nod. “I’ll take you shopping when you’re ready. For the panties.”

I studied her. She was working so hard not to lose it. But as usual, her huge green eyes betrayed her. In them swam sympathy, concern about how (if?) I’d manage to put my life back together after this radically un-Zoe-like shitstorm of a disaster, and rage at Rob, all at once.

TWL: What part of the book was the most fun to write?

Emily: The wedding-slash-funeral! Zoe, the book’s protagonist, gets a wedding day surprise when she finds out that her mother-in-law to be, who owns the wedding venue, double-booked a funeral at the same time. That’s what I love most about writing fiction: you can communicate messages, feelings, or character traits in as outrageous/absurd/ hilarious way you want.

TWL: What’s one fact about your book that would surprise people?

Emily: That Zoe has such poor-quality sex. Even after her divorce when she’s young, single, and living in a big, vibrant city—my favorite, my hometown, Chicago—the men she dates, for the most part, are either uninterested in or unable to give her pleasure. Sadly, this is all too common in real life.

TWL: What other books are you working on and when will they be published?

Emily: My second novel is about the power of female friendship from childhood to old age; it is also about the transformative value of summer camp. The working title is Pines and Darkest Woods. I’m hoping to finish it Q1 2023.

TWL: Finally, what message are you trying to get across with your book?

Emily: I want women whose twenties and thirties were messy and hard to feel seen and know that they are not alone. I hope this book empowers women to talk about, laugh at, or release whatever they need to from those dicey years.

TWL: Do you have any final words?

Emily: My favorite fiction combines gravitas with laugh-out-loud humor. I aimed to do this in My Thirty-First Year (And Other Calamities) and, if I do say so myself, think I succeeded.

Title: My Thirty-First Year (and Other Calamities)
Author: Emily Wolf
Publisher: She Writes Press
Pages: 416
Genre: Fiction

Book Blurb

On her 30th birthday, Zoe Greene was supposed to be married to her high-school sweetheart, pregnant with their first baby, and practicing law in Chicago. Instead, she’s planning an abortion and filing for divorce. Zoe wants to understand why her plans failed—to move on, have sex, and date while there’s still time. As she navigates dysfunctional penises, a paucity of grammatical online dating profiles, and her paralyzing fear of aging alone, she grapples with the pressure women feel to put others first. Her family, friends, incomparable therapist, and diary of never-to-be-sent letters to her first loves, the rock band, U2, help Zoe learn to let go—of society’s constructs of female happiness, and of her own.

Book Information

Release Date: August 3, 2022

Publisher: She Writes Press

Soft Cover: ISBN: 978-1647420826; 416 pages; $17.95; E-Book, $9.95; Audio CD $22.9

Amazon: https://amzn.to/3ttf1ip