Life Beyond Your Four Walls: The Millions Interviews Jillian Medoff
Jillian Medoff‘s When We Were Bright and Beautiful is a New York novel of a distinct period. At the novel’s center is the uber-rich Quinn family. On the outside, the Quinns seem to have it all—money, good looks, Ivy League education, whiteness—but all is not what it seems, especially when the youngest son is accused of rape. Medoff employs a kind of narrative hall of mirrors combined with a slew of unreliable narrators, leaving the reader eager to unpeel all the layers to get at the pith of this troubled family. I spoke with Medoff about her meticulous plotting, the isolating power of wealth, how the #MeToo movement impacted When We Were Bright and Beautiful, and more.
Marie Myung-Ok Lee: To not give away spoilers, let me talk about WWWBAB via other books. It feels very much in the great tradition of New York books like Claire Messud’s The Emperor’s Children. Did the milieu of this book come first, or did the characters? What kind of research did you do?
Believe it or not, the Valmont, the luxury building at the heart of the novel, came first. Modeled after 740 Park, the Valmont is older, smaller, and more well-appointed, so it’s more exclusive. was conceived as a contemporary or , and, like , kicked off with a crime. The earlier incarnation tracked the interrelationships among the Valmont’s monied residents and the staff who serve them. The current version retains vestiges of these relationships, but it’s leaner, faster, and more focused.
