LISTEN
to today's show
featuring David Wroblewski
to today's show
featuring David Wroblewski
“Already having drawn comparisons to Russo, Irving, Strout, McCarthy, and Gilbert, with García Márquez added here, Wroblewski earns them all, amply rewarding readers who have been waiting impatiently for fifteen years…This colossus of a book will own you, and you will weep to be freed.”—Kirkus Reviews, STARRED review
David Wroblewski, author of Familiaris and The Story of Edgar Sawtelle joins Janeane to talk about his latest book. In addition to being a beautiful writer, David is an interesting and articulate author with impeccable research behind his books. He has now been chosen for the SECOND time as Oprah's Book Club pick--in fact, Familiaris is the read for the entire summer!
Sixteen years ago, David Wroblewski’s debut—The Story of Edgar Sawtelle—was hailed an instant classic by critics and readers alike, reaching #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. Iin addition to receiving incredible praise from authors like Tom Hanks, Richard Russo, and Margot Livesey; starred reviews from Kirkus Reviews and Library Journal; and was recently named one of Esquire's Best Books of Summer 2024.
Blackstone Publishing | On Sale June 11, 2024
Available in Hardcover, E-Book, and Audiobook
Part saga, part love story, part historical —all with a dash of backwoods science fiction—Familiaris takes readers from the halls of the Kissel Motor Car factory to the Sawtelles’ small-town Wisconsin northwoods farm, through an ambitious WWII dog training program, and back into mankind’s ancient past. Through the story of John and Mary Sawtelle, Wroblewski’s triumphant return examines the dynamics of love and friendship, the vexing nature of families, the universal desire to create something lasting and beautiful, and of course, the species-long partnership between homo sapiens and canis familiaris.
“By taking us back to the origins of the Sawtelle family, Wroblewski has set a storytelling bonfire as enthralling in its pages as it is illuminating of our fragile and complicated humanity. Familiaris is as expansive and enlightening a saga as has ever been written.” –Tom Hanks, Academy Award-Winning Actor, bestselling author of The Making of Another Major Motion Picture Masterpiece and Uncommon Type
“[An] impossibly wise, impossibly ambitious, impossibly beautiful book.”—Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize winner, author of the North Bath trilogy
“Like many readers, I adored The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, with its gripping tale of treachery and the magnificent Sawtelle dogs. Now I adore Familiaris. David Wroblewski is a wonderfully inventive writer; he knows so much—how to test a tractor, how to make a table, how to borrow money, how to see the future—but best of all he is a writer of extraordinary characters, human and canine, who will take up residence in your mind and heart. A dazzling and irresistible novel.”—Margot Livesey, New York Times bestselling author of The Road from Belhaven and The Flight of Gemma Hardy
“David Wroblewski is one of the few contemporary authors who can create a world that the reader doesn’t merely visit but fully inhabits. And what a world it is, rich with love and joy and heartbreak. And wonder, especially in the way human and canine form inseparable bonds. It has been a long wait for a new Wroblewski novel. The wait is worth it.”—Ron Rash, New York Times bestselling author of Serena and The Caretaker
“No writer understands the depths of dogs’ natures the way David Wroblewski does, and once again we have a vital, absorbing, and remarkable fiction fueled by this understanding. Familiaris is a rare novel, modest and epic.”—Joan Silber, PEN/Faulkner Award-winning author of Secrets of Happiness and Improvement
“Tender, ambitious, fierce, deeply human, and of course wonderfully canine, David Wroblewski’s second novel is an American tour de force…This is a big brave book that is old-fashioned in the very best sense of the word."—Colum McCann, author of Apeirogon and Let the Great World Spin.
David Wroblewski, author of Familiaris and The Story of Edgar Sawtelle joins Janeane to talk about his latest book. In addition to being a beautiful writer, David is an interesting and articulate author with impeccable research behind his books. He has now been chosen for the SECOND time as Oprah's Book Club pick--in fact, Familiaris is the read for the entire summer!
Sixteen years ago, David Wroblewski’s debut—The Story of Edgar Sawtelle—was hailed an instant classic by critics and readers alike, reaching #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. Iin addition to receiving incredible praise from authors like Tom Hanks, Richard Russo, and Margot Livesey; starred reviews from Kirkus Reviews and Library Journal; and was recently named one of Esquire's Best Books of Summer 2024.
Blackstone Publishing | On Sale June 11, 2024
Available in Hardcover, E-Book, and Audiobook
Part saga, part love story, part historical —all with a dash of backwoods science fiction—Familiaris takes readers from the halls of the Kissel Motor Car factory to the Sawtelles’ small-town Wisconsin northwoods farm, through an ambitious WWII dog training program, and back into mankind’s ancient past. Through the story of John and Mary Sawtelle, Wroblewski’s triumphant return examines the dynamics of love and friendship, the vexing nature of families, the universal desire to create something lasting and beautiful, and of course, the species-long partnership between homo sapiens and canis familiaris.
“By taking us back to the origins of the Sawtelle family, Wroblewski has set a storytelling bonfire as enthralling in its pages as it is illuminating of our fragile and complicated humanity. Familiaris is as expansive and enlightening a saga as has ever been written.” –Tom Hanks, Academy Award-Winning Actor, bestselling author of The Making of Another Major Motion Picture Masterpiece and Uncommon Type
“[An] impossibly wise, impossibly ambitious, impossibly beautiful book.”—Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize winner, author of the North Bath trilogy
“Like many readers, I adored The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, with its gripping tale of treachery and the magnificent Sawtelle dogs. Now I adore Familiaris. David Wroblewski is a wonderfully inventive writer; he knows so much—how to test a tractor, how to make a table, how to borrow money, how to see the future—but best of all he is a writer of extraordinary characters, human and canine, who will take up residence in your mind and heart. A dazzling and irresistible novel.”—Margot Livesey, New York Times bestselling author of The Road from Belhaven and The Flight of Gemma Hardy
“David Wroblewski is one of the few contemporary authors who can create a world that the reader doesn’t merely visit but fully inhabits. And what a world it is, rich with love and joy and heartbreak. And wonder, especially in the way human and canine form inseparable bonds. It has been a long wait for a new Wroblewski novel. The wait is worth it.”—Ron Rash, New York Times bestselling author of Serena and The Caretaker
“No writer understands the depths of dogs’ natures the way David Wroblewski does, and once again we have a vital, absorbing, and remarkable fiction fueled by this understanding. Familiaris is a rare novel, modest and epic.”—Joan Silber, PEN/Faulkner Award-winning author of Secrets of Happiness and Improvement
“Tender, ambitious, fierce, deeply human, and of course wonderfully canine, David Wroblewski’s second novel is an American tour de force…This is a big brave book that is old-fashioned in the very best sense of the word."—Colum McCann, author of Apeirogon and Let the Great World Spin.
David Wroblewski is the author, most recently, of the novel Familiaris, his followup to the internationally bestselling The Story Of Edgar Sawtelle, an Oprah Book Club pick, Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers selection, winner of the Colorado Book Award, Indie Choice Best Author Discovery award, and Midwest Bookseller Association's Choice award, in addition to being selected as one of the best books of the year by numerous magazines and newspapers.
David received an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the Warren Wilson M.F.A. Program for Writers, and a Bachelor’s degree in computer science from the University of Wisconsin. He lives in Colorado with the writer Kimberly McClintock and their dogs, Pie and Luci.
--
