You are a human animal.

You are a very special breed,

for you are the only animal,

who can think, who can reason, who can read.

Hi, welcome to Bookworm.

This is Michael Silverblatt.

My guest today is Erica Zhang, the author of Fear of Flying, Fannie, and Saramissima, all novels, as well as many books of poetry.

Her autobiography, Fear of 50, was recently published by Harper Collins.

Erica, tell me, what were the difficulties of writing in autobiography?

I wasn't sure I could write an autobiography because I wasn't sure I could strike the right tone.

And in autobiography, tone is absolutely everything. Well, maybe you could say tone is everything in writing,

in general, but more so in autobiography, because you have to tell

tales on yourself, and you have to strike the right note of self-forgiveness and self-mockery.

Nobody wants to read an autobiography by somebody who says, I'm so great, I'm so terrific, listen to my next

exploit. I realize that Henry Kissinger and Richard Nixon get on the bestseller list for

writing books like that, but I never read books like that. They don't interest me. And I don't

think that anybody who buys them actually reads them. I just think they get on the bestseller

list, but I don't think anyone reads them. But what interests me and why I love autobiography is I love people honestly looking back on their

own lives and saying, here's where I screwed up and here's what I did right and here's who I think

I am.

And that can be an act of liberation.

I'm curious because I'm reading Doris

...