Writing Parts Into a Whole: An Interview with Grace Talusan

By Jessica A. Kent
February 27, 2020

“I think I’ve had about a hundred events since March,” local author Grace Talusan tells me over coffee and tea at a Cambridge Starbucks on a cloudy Monday. Her memoir, The Body Papers – which was awarded the Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing – was released last year, and it’s been a whirlwind ever since.

“Because I had taken so long to write it and it took me so long to publish it, I wanted to do everything in my power to support my book and make sure people knew it existed,” she says. Talusan and her publisher Restless Books worked with booksellers around the country to stage readings and events, sometimes twice a day, to get the word out about her story. A self-proclaimed introvert, Talusan didn’t necessarily want to be the center of attention at book events, but knew it was part of the territory of having a debut release. After all, she had a dream of one day publishing a book and “this thing that I wanted for so long came true.”

Having heard Talusan read bits of The Body Papers at Tell-All Boston and GrubStreet, and with a slew of local events coming up for the paperback release next week, I wanted to chat with her to find out more about how this memoir – or collection of essays, or collage of a life – was put together.

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