'The Alternatives' is a novel about grief, sisterhood and working women

NPR's Book of the Day

NPR

Books, Arts

4.2 • 672 Ratings

🗓️ 20 May 2024

⏱️ 8 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Caoilinn Hughes' novel The Alternatives revolves around the four Flattery sisters, each with a more impressive career or degree than the last, all with a profound grief for the parents they lost at a young age. When one of the sisters purposely goes off the grid, the other three are reunited in the Irish countryside in an attempt to find her. In today's episode, NPR's Andrew Limbong asks Hughes about crafting the witty dialogue between the sisters, writing side characters that jump off the page and getting feedback from her own siblings.

To listen to Book of the Day sponsor-free and support NPR's book coverage, sign up for Book of the Day+ at plus.npr.org/bookoftheday

See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.

NPR Privacy Policy

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hey, it's Empire's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbaugh. I burned through Keelan Hughes's book,
0:07.5	The Alternatives, in just a matter of days. And I'm a slow reader, but it's one of those books where
0:12.7	it's about a family of four sisters, and Hughes just puts them in a room together and
0:18.3	lets them cook. They're bickering and joking and arguing and sniping
0:22.4	at such a fast clip that the book actually turns into a script just as a way of keeping up with
0:29.1	it all. But as much as the sisters fight with each other, at the end of the day, in true
0:33.8	sisterly fashion, there's love there. After the break, my interview with Keeling Hughes.
0:39.4	In the U.S., national security news can feel far away from daily life.
0:44.1	Distant wars, murky conflicts, diplomacy behind closed doors.
0:48.6	On our new show, Sources and Methods.
0:50.7	NPR reporters on the ground bring you stories of real people,
0:57.2	helping you understand why distant events matter here at home.
1:02.1	Listen to sources and methods on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.
1:11.8	Sisters have a way of being there for you, holding you down when you're going through it or standing up for you when your backs against the wall.
1:16.7	But also, golly, do they have a way of getting on your nerves.
1:22.8	Just the decisions they make sometimes force you to really wonder, how are we related?
1:30.7	This dynamic is deeply and thoroughly examined in the new novel, The Alternatives, by Irish author Keelan Hughes, who joins us now in studio.
1:32.4	Hey, Keelan, welcome to All Things Considered.
1:34.1	Hi, Andrew. Thank you so much for having me.
1:34.9	Yeah, thanks to being here.
1:37.2	So there are four flattery sisters, right?
1:38.6	There's Nell, the youngest.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from NPR, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of NPR and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.