Author Interview: Elizabeth Wetmore, Author of the Instant Bestseller Valentine

Elizabeth Wetmore is our kind of woman. Brilliant, funny, and adaptable to the point that after many incarnations (bartender, cabdriver, etc) she writes a sensational novel that becomes an instant NY Times bestseller (in the midst of a pandemic even). WOW!!

Her book Valentine explores the lingering effects of a brutal crime on the women of one small West Texas oil town in the 1970s. The kudos are pouring in from all over.

NextTribe is thrilled to host Elizabeth, a native of West Texas who is now based in Chicago, for one of our virtual Thursday book events. We have so many questions about her writing life and the experiences she drew on to create her novel. We’re sure you do too.

Here are some snippets from reviews:

Washington Post: “Valentine is a story about how women — particularly women without much education or money — negotiate a culture of masculine brutality. This is the story of their lives in a backwater oil town in the mid-1970s, which Wetmore seems to know with empathy so deep it aches.”

Chicago Tribune: “In her gripping and complex debut novel, “Valentine,” set in the West Texas city in the 1970s, Elizabeth Wetmore evokes that landscape’s rugged isolation as well as the power that terrain holds over its inhabitants.”

Houston Chronicle: “Exceptional. . . .Wetmore, like Harper Lee before her, has little interest in preserving the illusions of people who believe that justice and love will always prevail. . . . an incredibly moving and emotionally devastating piece of work that heralds great things from Wetmore.”

Ann Patchett: “Fierce and complex, VALENTINE is a novel of moral urgency and breathtaking prose. This is the very definition of a stunning debut.”

Free!