When Your Friends
Show Up In Pairs
SUSAN SHAPIRO
Special to The Jewish News
T
he heroine of Was It Some-
thing I Said? is Justine
Schiff, a very funny 31-
year-old dark-haired Jewish
single woman living alone on Manhat-
/- tan's Upper East Side. The book's
author, Valerie Block, is a very funny
34-year-old dark-haired Jewish single
woman living alone on the Upper
West Side.
"But Justine isn't me," Valerie says
of her kooky character. "She's a
Republican; I'm a liberal Democrat.
She's a corporate lawyer; I'm a writer.
OK, Justine has my eating problems,
and we both drink salad dressing from
the bottle ... but she's not me."
Over dinner, Valerie talks about her
comic first novel, love in the urban
jungle and the problems of publishing
fiction that everyone thinks is true.
Set in the New York dating scene, Was
It Something I Said? tells the story of
Justine, a workaholic who laments her
solo status: "Everyone was married,
/--Teveryone. The dim, the bovine, the
nasty. Girls who smelled. The biggest
bitches at Spence had found their
mates and were going about the busi-
ness of their lives, taking vacations,
reproducing themselves ... After a cer-
tain age, people came in pairs ..."
The spunky but cynical Justine
meets Barry Cantor, a cute 34-year-
old Upper West Side product manag-
/- -) er, as their plane is about to crash.
They share a dangerous kiss. They
might stand a chance for long-lasting
romance — if their bosses, room-
mates, co-workers, cooks, dogs,
friends and intrusive families would
leave them alone.
"My father read it and said, 'The
fathers don't come off very well here.'
told him it's not autobiographical.
The book's mother, Carol, is not my
mother. Carol is psychotic. My moth-
er is lovely."
OK, let's get this straight: Barry is
Ms. Shapiro is author of The Male-to-
Female Dictionary and recently corn-
pleted Tangle, a romantic novel.
■
not based on Valerie's old
boyfriend (though she
admits that he's a compos-
ite of several men she's
known). She's never been
in a plane crash (though
once she got stuck in
heavy turbulence in a
plane. "I looked over to
the other seat longingly
and caught sight of ... an
old woman," she says.)
Her parents, unlike the
crazy divorced parents in
the book, are very togeth-
er. Still, the characters and
any possible real-life inspi-
rations all live in Manhat-
tan:
Valerie Block grew up
in New York. Her father is
a businessman, like her
younger brother. Her
mother is a former pianist.
Valerie went to school at
Wktl:'32. A
Dalton, Dartmouth and Barnard and
received her MFA from Columbia.
She published short stories in literary
magazines and spent a year-and-a-half
at ABC News as a desk assistant. "The
desk had a better job," she says.
She then worked at the New
York Observer, "embarrassing myself,
writing fluff about chess, the calendar
and crossword puzzles," and then
wrote grant proposals for the Educa-
tion Alliance.
Valerie's life as a struggling
"Was It
Something
I Said?"
sheds light
on the dating
scene in the
urban jungle.
writer wasn't always
romantic. "I didn't want
to go out of the house for
seven years," she admits.
The first draft of the
book was 921 pages (now
it is 359). Over the course
of six rewrites, she
changed the title four
times. "First it was Magic
Chicken, then Panic,
Indifference and Joy, but
nobody liked that one.
Then See You Later ..."
Finally she settled on Was
It Something I Said?.
After several rejections,
Valerie finally sold the
book to SoHo Press,
which made her an offer
stipulating that "I'd move
the airport scene from
chapter three to page five."
She obliged, and it's been
a whirlwind ever since.
Valerie's given readings
in New York, Washing-
ton, D.C., and Chicago
and everyone's clamoring
for her next book. Still,
all the critical acclaim has
only led to more blind
dates.
"The mommy mafia
keeps trying to fix me
up," she says. "They have
the zest of professional lobbyists. They
keep sending me investment bankers
who've never read a book, like they're
saying, 'Somebody, anybody, marry
this girl!'"
She recently dated a nice Jewish
guy "who was so ready to get married
I could have been a Jewish Toyota —
next one in line was it!" She says she's
now "beyond cynical" and is "on
strike from dating."
Yet what about the book's happy
ending? "It's hopeful, but not in
the Hollywood sense," Valerie says.
"It's happy with slight nausea. Jus-
tine and Barry might be getting mar-
ried, but they'll also be getting on
each other's nerves for the rest of
their lives."
❑
4/17
1998
81