New Novel About Punk Rock, Poetry and Suicide

Tom Fudge: Lady Lararus is the name of a new novel by another writer with San Diego connections. Andrew Foster Altschul used to be the editor of Slam , a rock and roll magazine in San Diego. His novel borrows from that, in that its main character is a woman who is the daughter of a punk rocker who committed suicide when the girl was a toddler. She grows up in the shadow of her father's fame and his continuing fan base. After a troubled childhood with her troubling mother, the girl grows up to a be a confessional poet. In fact, the story is inspired by the work of a confessional poet named Sylvia Plath, who wrote a poem also called Lady Lazarus .

Guest

• Andrew Foster Altschul teaches creative writing at Stanford.  He used to be the editor of a San Diego music magazine called Slam .  His first novel, Lady Lazarus, has just been published.