Community Corner

Amy Sohn, Novelist

Author Amy Sohn talks about the neighborhood and her upcoming sequel to "Prospect Park West."

It might be accurate to say that Amy Sohn has become infamous in our little Brooklyn neighborhood. But whether you love or loathe Sohn’s popular portrayal of the neighborhood in her novel, “Prospect Park West,” few would argue that she has a keen eye for observation.   

We caught up with the busy author to chat about the neighborhood, and the upcoming sequel to “Prospect Park West.”

First off, when can we expect “Prospect Park West,” the sequel?

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Summer 2012.

Will the bike lane debate to make an appearance in the book?

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You know, I thought a lot about it.  Brian Lehrer told me to do it.  The bike lane is referenced, but not a major plot.

I am definitely interested in old versus young in Park Slope, and there's a bit of that in the book, in a different context.  But I wasn't sure the lane was rich enough for a story of its own.  The one image that stood out to me in the New York Magazine article about the lanes was the woman with the camera on her roof, filming the "low ridership."  That was very evocative and novelistic.  I love the idea of her rage being so strong she's counting riders.  So maybe I'll sneak her in somewhere.  One thing that Suleiman Osman, author of “The Invention of Brownstone Brooklyn,” pointed out was that the dividing lines of debate regarding the lane don't really match up in an easy way.  The lane-haters don't fit into an easy category and the lane-lovers don't either.

What else can we expect from the sequel?

There are two major male characters, both new. We get inside the sexual mind of Park Slope dads. Because I can't actually get inside I had to make it all up.  I am fascinated by the way parenthood changes men.  It's something that's not discussed as much, despite Michael Lewis' book.

The book takes place in three main locations including PS.  There's lots of hot, twisted sex.  There are surprising revelations and passionate betrayals.  The children are background to this, but they are older and more absent from the characters' daylight lives, which is what happens as kids get older and go to school.

What inspired you to write a novel about Park Slope in the first place? 

I am a reluctant novelist.  Initially I wanted to do a non-fiction essay collection, because they are easier and quicker. Novels are exhausting and take forever and are complicated.  My book was going to be about feeling like an outsider in a neighborhood of hovering and insane mothers.  I began writing essays, some in New York Magazine – like “The Bjorn Identity,” “A Glass of Wine and a Pacifier Please,” and “My Husband, My Rival,” but others just for myself.

When I met with publishers to pitch my "momoir" there was a lot of concern that those books don't sell.  I also felt like the book was lighter than the way I really felt about the neighborhood, there was something not completely honest about it.  It was as though I went for the easy jokes instead of digging really deep.  

My agent and I met with my then-publisher David Rosenthal and then-editor Marysue Rucci at Simon & Schuster and both felt that I had a novel in me about Park Slope, specifically the anxiety of modern motherhood, the cult of real estate and success, and the strange moment we're in where celebs choose to live in neighborhoods like Park Slope.  I remember David saying, "Desperate Slope Wives."  Something clicked in my mind.  I saw what he meant, because my daughter was not yet three and I was spending all day with desperate Slope wives.  I also saw that I could have much more fun writing fiction about the neighborhood even if it was harder and would take longer.  And I knew the time was right – I couldn't mull it over and try it in a year or two, because Park Slope was popping and we all knew it.

I came up with the title Prospect Park West on the B train home from that meeting and in three weeks wrote the first 75 pages of what became Prospect Park West.

Where are we most likely to spot you around the Slope?

The Coop, in front of 321, .  Hey why am I doing this?  I need some anonymity to do my work!

What are your favorite Slope restaurants?

, , (eat there a couple times a week), (where long ago I went on a great first date), , .

What do you love/hate most about living in Park Slope?

I love Prospect Park and the way it is a magnet for so many different types of people.  It really feels like the people's park in a way Central Park doesn't.  

I hate the selfishness, myopia, and disregard that so many Park Slopers have for other people.  

What are some of Park Slope’s untrue stereotypes?

1.  That it is granola.  With the exception of a few types I've seen at the Coop, I don't think we are more granola, than say, certain parts of northern California.  There is a huge variety on the hippie spectrum.  This is why we have people paying double to shop at Union Market rather than join the Coop and do the shifts. To each her own.

2.  That none of the mothers work.  There are a lot of working moms around here, but they don't have as much of a presence as the SAHMs (who one character calls SHAMs in my book) because hello, they're not here during the day.

3.  That all the parents are selfish and/or rich (though as you can see from my response above, I think a lot of them are).

Why do you think the neighborhood has become stereotyped the way it is?

It's something I've wondered about a lot.  Any neighborhood in New York City will get more national attention than a comparable neighborhood in Chicago, LA or San Francisco.  New York is the center of the world.  The Times has done a lot to put PS on the map, for better or worse.  There have been several big articles going back into the mid 2000s that got people talking.

And this one was one of the more formative stories I have read.  My daughter was a few months old when it came out and I remember reading it at Connecticut Muffin. I think it was on the first page, but I'm not sure.

I think we are stereotyped in a similar fashion to the way people stereotyped the Upper West Side in the 80s as lefty, Jewish, crunchy, foodie.  It helps that we have a great name.  What's funny is that the stereotypes are so divergent from each other.  Park Slope has such a confluence of stereotypes and so many are contradictory with each other. 

I also think that when Foer and Connelly moved here it put us on the map in a big way, even though Turturro and Buscemi had lived here a long time.

How has the neighborhood changed since you first moved here?

It's getting richer.  More lawyers and bankers, more renovation.  I can't pretend that 2004, when I moved here, was the "old days."  But I see more affluence – the way private school parents are dressed, the beach stickers on the cars, the total absence of people in August, the vacation tans I see in mid-April when the private school people return from wherever they are, the kinds of strollers, the after school activities – places like Kidville.

And the baby boom just keeps going and going.  A friend told me he had to go to Huggs at 5:30 a.m. to sign up his daughter up for day care – and this is not even a day care attached to a prestigious private school!

You’ve lived in a lot of Brooklyn neighborhoods – why did you decide to “settle down” in the Slope?

My husband and I moved to send my child to a quality public school and thereby continue to live in New York City on the salaries of a writer and an artist.  We moved before she was born and are finally getting a return on our real estate investment!  I'm very happy with our decision and I love the school.


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