This is The Writer's Voice, new fiction from The New Yorker.

I'm Deborah Treesman, fiction editor at The New Yorker.

On this episode of The Writer's Voice, we'll hear Camille Burdaz read her story coloring

Colorado from the July 10th and 17th 2023 issue of the magazine.

Burdaz published two novels in France.

Her first novel in English, How to Behave in a Crowd, came out in 2017.

Now here's Camille Burdaz.

Color in Colorado.

Should they hear this?

The day they came for the interview, I woke up too early, thinking about Bernard Lozo.

This happens when I'm nervous.

Not thinking about Lozo specifically, but thinking in my sleep, waking up mid-thought.

The thought was in fact a memory.

I write fiction now mostly, but back in the 90s, I worked for a magazine in New York,

one that sent me to France to profile Bernard Lozo after he earned his third Michelin star.

I was picked because I was half French and spoke the language, not because I was good.

But I wanted to be good, and writing a profile was a major step for me, so I did a lot of research on Lozo.

I concluded that interviewing him would be easy.

The guy was funny, passionate, generous in his answers.

The piece would write itself.

A piece that wrote itself was dubious to me, though, even as a mostly inexperienced young writer.

I needed to introduce conflict, I thought.

...