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Boots!

Where would we be without booms?

Where would we be without good news in bird?

It's a rhetorical question, sir, but where would we need without books?

From KCRW and KCRW.com, I'm Michael Silverblatt, and welcome to Bookworm.

My guest is a writer that I've admired for many years. I've read all of her books, and now she's put out a book

called What About the Baby, Some Thoughts on the Art of Fiction. Alice McDermott is a magnificent

writer. She's published with Farah Strauss and Giroux, I think, from the beginning of her career.

I knew that she had been a client of the great Agent Harriet Wasserman, who was a woman that I went to

visit when I started doing my show. I had never met a literary agent before,

and I'll never meet one again like Harriet Wasserman. Not only had she been Saul Bellow's agent and once

upon a time lover, she was magnificent. Alice, how did you meet her? You were very fortunate to have such a

special person as your first agent. Oh, you're so right, Michael. And thank you so much for

starting with Dear Harriet. I was in graduate school at the University of New Hampshire and was

studying with a novelist, a wonderful

guy named Mark Smith, who was with Russell and Vulcaning, which was the literary agent that

Harriet started working with. And when I started publishing short stories here and there, Mark said,

you know, you really should get an agent. And if I didn't already have an agent, I would want Harriet Wasserman.

So Mark said, I'm going to send a letter to Harriet saying that you are going to send her some of your

work. And he knew I was shy and reluctant. And he said, so as soon as I send that letter, you have to do it.

I mean, this was Saul Bellow's agent.

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