Why Liz Harmer owns two copies of Anna Karenina

Liz Harmer's debut novel features characters who are truly stuck in the past. The Amateurs's wistful take on the post-apocalypse imagines a future where time travel allows people to revisit the memories they yearn for, but few travellers make it back to the present. Their loved ones must then decide whether to wait for them to return, or to move on with their own lives. 

Below, Harmer takes the CBC Books Magic 8 Q&A and answers eight randomly selected questions from her eight fellow authors.

1. Marina Endicott asks, "What's your favourite book with the worst ending?"

I have racked my brain and can think of no book that I love of which I don't also love the ending. The best answer I can come up with are the Brontës — Charlotte and Emily, anyway. I love them, but there are aspects in the ending of Wuthering Heights that are never nearly as compelling as the opening. Saggy bits in the middle, as in Jane Eyre's sojourn away from Rochester, are much more common in novels I nevertheless love, I think. 

2. Alan Bradley asks, "What are the differences between the writing you and the real you?"

The writing me is much more kind to both others and to myself. I think the introspection of writing allows me to be more compassionate and thoughtful. In life I am too quick to burn with anger, too quick to react, too quick to decide. In writing, I dwell and am careful. 

3. Tomson Highway asks, "Do you ever get jealous of other writers? If so, why?" 

Oh, definitely. I want their lives or I want their talent. Wanting their lives is straightforward envy, whereas wanting their talent is also the love of a gift I benefit from. One reason I threw myself into writing is because my cousin was becoming a successful poet, and I couldn't bear the envy I felt for him. It seemed he was living out my destiny. 

4. Cathy Marie Buchanan asks, "Do you know how your story will end when you begin writing?"

Never. I write the way I read, very exploratory and hoping for surprises. 

5. Pasha Malla asks, "Who is one writer, living or dead, who you wish could edit or critique your drafts?" 

Zadie Smith. From her essays and syllabi it's clear that she reads widely in many forms and would be an exceptional reader of drafts. 

6. Karen Solie asks, "Do you remember who you were reading when you first realized, not that you wanted to be a writer, but that you were intrigued by writing and what it can do?" 

I had a very strong epiphanic moment reading Mrs. Dalloway, which recommitted me to a creative path (and away from an academic one). It seemed, when I finished the final pages, that someone had blown on the back of my neck. I've been reaching after that since I was 25 and miserably pursuing a PhD in English literature. That a book could give me a visceral feeling, and evidence that one could apply one's intelligence, the way Woolf did, to creative work. 

7. Camilla Gibb asks, "Do you have an unpublished novel lying about somewhere?" 

Oh, a few. I wrote little baby novels when I was in elementary school; I wrote a semi-autobiographical novel as a coping strategy before I dropped out of my PhD; and then I wrote another semi-autobiographical novel that I haven't yet made work and was still fiddling with when I started to write The Amateurs. 

8. Jonathan Auxier asks, "What book in your home library holds the greatest sentimental value?"

Certainly the book I have the most feelings about is the Bible, but perhaps that is a cheat of an answer. Anna Karenina is one of the first books my husband gave me, because he loved it, and now we have two copies, neither of which I can bear to part with.