Anne Burt
Author Interview - Anne Burt
Author of PLEASE DON'T LIE
Please Don’t Lie is a twisty psychological thriller set in the wild beauty of the Adirondacks. It follows Hayley Stone, a young woman trying to put her life back together after some devastating losses. Newly married, she moves with her new husband to a remote mountain town, hoping for a fresh start. But it’s not that simple. As cracks begin to show - both in her relationship and in the seemingly idyllic town - Hayley uncovers secrets that make her question everything. Please Don't Lie is a story about betrayal, survival, and what we’re willing to believe or ignore when we’re desperate to feel safe.
Author Interview - Anne Burt
Author I draw inspiration from:
Every book or story that I've read by Lauren Groff feels completely inhabited by its characters, drawn to perfection by her sentences: their rhythm, the meat of her language creates worlds rich with atmosphere and intrigue to me. Her novel Matrix is a particular favorite of mine. I crack it open to random pages for inspiration when I'm writing and always find something that wakes me up to words anew.
Author Interview - Anne Burt | Author I Draw Inspiration From
Favorite place to read a book:
In a library. Any library with a comfortable chair by a window, a reading lamp angled just so. I love the feeling of silent companionship, glancing up from my book to see strangers absorbed in worlds I can't even imagine, so different from the world I'm immersed in, yet experiencing the same double life that being a reader offers.
The moment I knew I wanted to become an author:
When my great aunt gave me a marbled cover composition notebook as a birthday gift when I turned six. I immediately knew I would write stories in this notebook. I called my first epic "The Good King and The Bad King," which might just be a harbinger of the thriller writer yet to emerge. Palace intrigue, kidnapping, a jail break, and a love story thwarted by political agendas - it was all in there.
Hardback, paperback, ebook or audiobook:
Only hardback books have the ability to make my heart beat faster. Nothing else compares: the jacket design, the weight, the feel of the crisp new pages, the anticipation of cracking it open and reading the first page. Magic. My shoulders don't like them as much as my heart though - I've had too many sore spots to count from schlepping hardback books around New York with me on subways and buses. Paperbacks are much easier to slip into a purse or backpack but I always end up with crushed pages and torn edges. Ebooks are perfect for airplane travel or for reading in bed at night on low light so I don't disturb my partner's sleep. However, I like to riffle back through books that I've read in the past to find passages that inspired me and this is deeply unsatisfying in digital form. Audiobooks are terrific for passing the time on a long car ride, but I retain much less when I'm listening as opposed to seeing words on a page.
The last book I read:
The Postcard by Anne Berest. It will never leave me.
Author Interview - Anne Burt | The Last Book I Read
Pen & paper or computer:
I toggle back and forth when I'm writing alone. Usually my first drafts are pen and paper - I love the sense of play and freedom that a blank page and a pen provides. It probably takes me back to that first composition notebook that set me on my writing path! Then I type in my handwritten draft to the computer, making edits as I go, and often adding more scenes, more character-building, writing notes to myself inside this second draft. When that's done, I usually print out what I have and edit with my pen on the page. Then it's back to the computer to input my changes. I'll do this as many times as I have to till it feels as right as I can make it. Collaborative writing with Christina requires a different process - it's much easier to compose on the computer, probably because we need to send chapters back and forth between us so frequently. And tech advances like shared digital notes and google docs where we can both write in real time together no matter where we are have become essential to our work.
Book character I think I’d be best friends with:
The adult version of Elena (Lenu) Greco, from The Neapolitan Quartet by Elena Ferrente. By the time Lena is in her 50s, she's on the other side of a complicated but rich childhood, filled with poverty and violence but also big ideas about politics and community and the lives and roles of women. She's lived through marriages, romances, motherhood, sisterhood, losses, and the complex and formative friendship she's had with Lila. She's been jealous and resentful as well as loving and generous. And she's written books that matter to her. I feel like I could talk to Lenu for hours, about honest, unvarnished emotions and experiences. Maybe she'd be willing to teach me both Italian and her Neapolitan dialect. I'd like to talk about Lila. There's a lot to discuss.
Author Interview - Anne Burt | Book Character I’d be Best Friends With
If I weren’t an author, I’d be a:
I often think that I became a professional writer because I'm not musically gifted enough to be a professional singer. I hear language, sentences, rhythms when I write and it is the most satisfying part of composing fiction for me. I'd rather sing all day long than do almost anything else, but nobody's going to pay me for it! They might pay me to stop though....
Favorite decade in fashion history:
The flapper era. After the constraints of corsets and floor-length gowns and buttons and elaborate hairdos and all the clothes designed to make it impossible for women to breathe, let alone do anything independently in the world, dresses were loose, skirts were short, hair was shorter, and freedom from this suffocation was the name of the game. I love the lines of Art Deco in clothing, building, and art, the music and literature of the Harlem Renaissance - all of it influenced the clothing. The freedom of this moment in fashion for women to embrace masculine as well as feminine elements is freeing and intoxicating. And so glam!
Place I’d most like to travel:
So many places. I'm interested in any city in the world with distinctive culture that hasn't been homogenized by the same chain stores, restaurants, TikTok influencers, or Marvel superheroes. I would love to take a food tour of the world. But I also fantasize about a month in a villa on a Greek Island, with a desk in front of windows that open out onto the Mediterranean. I write there all morning, then walk to the local town for the most delicious fresh meal along the coast, read novels all afternoon in a shaded garden, and dine, sing, and dance all night under a full moon. I do realize that this vision is one hundred percent created by watching too many movies and it is a romantic idealization of an impossible dream. I am okay with that!
My signature drink:
Vodka martini, very cold and very dry, in a chilled glass with a twist. It's the date night drink of choice for both me and my partner/boyfriend/long-term cohabitation human/whatever you call it when you are in your 50s.
Favorite artist:
Painting: The Dutch Masters and their lush, dark portraits. Rembrandt, Vermeer, Hals. Everyone they painted looks like they are holding a thousand secrets. Any one of them could be the protagonist or the villain in a psychological thriller. Also Nina Katchadourian, whose series "Lavatory Self-Portraits in the Flemish Style" brilliantly recreates all the angsty side-eye of Rembrandt's subjects using found objects in airplane bathrooms and an iPhone. Music: Almost any Stephen Sondheim musical soundtrack, but in particular Sunday in the Park with George, Sweeney Todd, and A Little Night Music. Most evenings you'll find me cooking dinner and singing along to Sondheim with all the drama and intensity I can muster. Wielding a knife over a pile of vegetables lends itself naturally to pretending I'm the Demon Barber of Fleet Street.
Number one on my bucket list:
Please Don't Lie is the first novel in a series of novels that Christina and I have written that will be set in the fictional town of Crystal River in the very real Adirondack region of New York State. We're currently working on the second. We've talked about more, and I can't wait to come up with those as well! I'm looking forward to bringing this world to life with Christina, whose imagination inspires my own to greater heights.
Find more from the author:
Website: www.anneburtwriter.com
Instagram: @anne_burt_writer
Facebook: @anne.burt.5
About Anne Burt:
Author Interview with Anne Burt
Anne Burt is the coauthor, with Christina Baker Kline, of the thriller Please Don't Lie. Anne’s debut novel, The Dig, was a March 2023 American Booksellers' Association Indie Next pick and the Strand Bookstore's mystery selection of the month. Anne is also the editor of My Father Married Your Mother: Dispatches from the Blended Family and coeditor of About Face: Women Write About What They See When They Look in the Mirror. Her essays and fiction have appeared in numerous publications and venues, including Salon, NPR, and The Christian Science Monitor; she is a past winner of Meridian’s Editors’ Prize in Fiction. Anne graduated from Yale in 1989 with a BA in history, and from NYU in 1997 with an MFA in creative writing. She lives in Weston, Connecticut and New York City.
