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McElroy’s debut novel, “The Atmospherians,” told the clever but slightly insiderly and overfreighted tale of a wellness cult designed to cleanse men of their toxicity. “People Collide” is a more agile, universal book, with its title alluding to the randomness of human connection. It’s a variety of rom-com, really, that somewhat lost art. “Circumstances pinball people together,” the narrator declares. “This is called fate because chance is too scary a word.”
Perhaps no situation is more pinballish than that of in-laws, and McElroy’s unexpected digression into the psyche of Elizabeth’s mother, a frustrated writer herself who unknowingly condemns Eli for abandoning her daughter, is one of the novel’s great gifts.
McElroy, who lives in Brooklyn, seems to aspire as much to flight as to eavesdropping. “People Collide” has some bumpy, odd spots — what body doesn’t? — but its naturalness and ease with the most fundamental questions of existence make it a big project knocking around in a small package, portending even bigger projects ahead.
-”Want to spice up a marriage? Switch bodies.” by Alexandra Jacobs, The New York Times, 2023
Isle McElroy is a writer based in Brooklyn. Their debut novel, The Atmospherians, was named a New York Times Editors' Choice. Their second novel, People Collide, was New York Times Critics' Pick. Other writing appears in The New York Times, New York Times Magazine, The Guardian, The Cut, Vulture, GQ, Vogue, The Atlantic, Tin House, and elsewhere.
Isle was named one of The Strand's 30 Writers to Watch. They have received fellowships from The Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, The Tin House Summer Workshop, The Sewanee Writers Conference, The Inprint Foundation, The Elizabeth George Foundation, and The National Parks Service.
Patrick Nolan is Vice President, Publisher of Penguin Books and imprint of Penguin Random House. He joined the company in 2000 as sales director and is now the book-publishing right hand to Viking, overseeing their paperback reprints and a select list of Penguin trade paperback originals as well as the backlist. The list of authors he works with includes Amor Towles, Tana French, Rebecca Makkai, Ruth Ozeki, Bessel van der Kolk, and Robert Greene and the estates of Jack Kerouac, Ken Kesey, and John Steinbeck.
As an editor he is interested in a wide variety of literary and commercial nonfiction and fiction. He has published numerous titles by the #1 New York Times best selling author Matt Haig, including The Midnight Library and Booker Prize winner Roddy Doyle, National Book Award long listed poet Rio Cortez, and nonfiction from Keyu Jin, Benjamin Taylor, Farah Karim-Cooper, and Richard Deming. Before Penguin he worked at Houghton Mifflin Company, The Walt Disney Company, and Waterstone’s Booksellers. He is board chair for the Animal Care Center of New York City and serves on the Programming Committee for the Provincetown Book Festival.
Pat Kearns is a writer living in Provincetown, MA. He is the keeper of the people’s parlor and writes for the Arts & Minds section for The Provincetown Independent.