Another Side of--Scott Fitzgerald?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Get a cup of tea or your favorite coffee. Pull up a chair, and carve out five minutes.

Do you remember your first F. Scott Fitzgerald? How you realized there was something more to literature, a voice, a time, a glamor? And then you heard about Zelda, and the Jazz Age, and Gatsby, and the beautiful shirts?  And thought about why Nick Carraway was named that, and what Scott’s life was really like, and whether it would have been amazing or tragic?

Sally Koslow explored, absorbed, researched and recreated—and brings us—lucky us—a wonderful narrative biography into one part of Scott Fitzgerald’s life.  The part about--well, let her introduce it. 

In 1937 Hollywood, gossip columnist Sheilah Graham’s star is on the rise, while literary wonder boy F. Scott Fitzgerald’s career is slowly drowning in booze. 

But the once-famous author, desperate to make money penning scripts for the silver screen, is charismatic enough to attract the gorgeous Miss Graham, a woman who exposes the secrets of others while carefully guarding her own. Like Fitzgerald’s hero Jay Gatsby, Graham has meticulously constructed a life far removed from the poverty of her childhood in London’s slums. 

And like Gatsby, the onetime guttersnipe learned early how to use her charms to become a hardworking success; she is feted and feared by both the movie studios and their luminaries.

A notorious drunk famously married to the doomed Zelda, Fitzgerald fell hard for his “Shielah” (he never learned to spell her name), a shrewd yet softhearted woman—both a fool for love and nobody’s fool—who would stay with him and help revive his career until his tragic death three years later. 

Working from Sheilah’s memoirs, interviews, and letters, Sally Koslow revisits their scandalous love affair and Graham’s dramatic transformation in London, bringing Graham and Fitzgerald gloriously to life with the color, glitter, magic, and passion of 1930s Hollywood.

Ready to hear more? Of course you are. And she’s giving away a copy of  ANOTHER SIDE OF PARADISE  to one lucky commenter!

HANK: Is there anyone more famously romantic and literary and doomed than F. Scott Fitzgerald? How did you choose him for your book--and this aspect of his life in particular?  

SALLY KOSLOW: F. Scott Fitzgerald’s certainly tops the short list for lush writing, and in his private life, he was a true romantic, as well. The man had the ability to intensely focus on a woman. I chose to look at the final chapter of his life because it’s far less familiar than the fizzy, pink champagne, riding-on-the-top-of-taxis Jazz Age he shared with his wife, Zelda Fitzgerald. 

I found these later years with Sheilah Graham to be tender and touching, though this in no way suggests that he had stopped loving Zelda. Still, he adored and admired Sheilah.

HANK: Do you think Sheilah Graham has faded from memory? What do you think about that?  Is this his book, or her book, or their book?

SALLY KOSLOW: Another Side of Paradise is more a novel about the woman who reinvented herself as “Sheilah Graham” than another F. Scott Fitzgerald rehash. Her tumultuous romance with Fitzgerald is central to her story, but there’s far more to it. Sheilah overcame poverty and hardship in England to succeed first as a performer, than a Fleet Street writer and later, one of the first Hollywood gossip reporters.

Though she’s not as familiar to today’s readers as her rivals, Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons, that may be because Hopper was a notorious meanie who ruined reputations during the McCarthy period and Louella had the Hearst newspaper empire behind. For better or worse, Sheilah was an independent who stopped short of being cruel in her reporting.

HANK:  Let me quote from an article about you and the book: 

“Like Fitzgerald’s hero Jay Gatsby, Graham has meticulously constructed a life far removed from the poverty of her childhood in London’s slums. And like Gatsby, the onetime guttersnipe learned early how to use her charms to become a hardworking success; she is feted and feared by both the movie studios and their luminaries.”

Wow. Tell us more!

SALLY KOSLOW:  Without spoiling the drama of the novel, let me simply say that while born into poverty and isolated in a Dickensian orphanage for ten years, Sheilah found the grit to reinvent herself, travel freely in high society and eventually become a legendary and powerful gossip columnist starting in Hollywood’s Golden Age and sticking with it for decades. She was far more than F. Scott Fitzgerald’s girlfriend.

HANK: What do you think she would have been like today? How do you think their relationship would have been handled today?

SALLY KOSLOW: During her lifetime, Sheilah moved from writing a widely syndicated newspaper column to radio to television, where she starred in her own celebrity talk show, paving the way for Barbara Walters, Oprah and many other television reporters. Today, I could imagine Sheilah doing a similar celebrity-oriented show on television along with embracing the Internet as a reporter or popular blogger. She was a hard-working, resilient professional who knew how to evolve.

With respect to Sheilah and Scott’s relationship, now they would have been able to live openly together as a devoted couple. In the 1930s that wasn’t possible because the powerhouse film studios laid down the law, and forced couples to adhere to ridiculously Puritanical standards.

HANK:  Yes, it seems positively tame now! How and when did you first find her?  You did such meticulous research--what was the letter, document, diary entry that first gave you chills? Do you remember?

SALLY KOSLOW:  As an English major, I’d seen passing references to “Sheilah Graham” in biographies and articles about F. Scott Fitzgerald but never paid attention to her. What got me digging was actually another author’s biographical novel about Fitzgerald’s later Hollywood years that was reviewed in the New Yorker, told from Scott’s point of view. I got curious about Sheilah, began researching and knew there was a book to be written.

HANK: So--this book is a departure for you. Was it intimidating?  

SALLY KOSLOW:  I’ve never believed that a writer is required to stay in her lane. It was fun to switch genres. My debut novel in 2007, Little Pink Slips, was a romp through the magazine industry, where I worked for years, and was inspired by being displaced by Rosie O’Donnell. Three more contemporary novels followed and I loved that their reviews included the adjective “witty.”

I’ve also written a work of non-fiction called Slouching Toward Adulthood, about 20- and 30-somethings who take a while to land.

When I discovered Sheilah’s story, however, I got the bug to write a biographical novel. A biographical novel requires a deep research because you want to build it on a factual skeleton so yes, it was intimidating, but also interesting.

HANK: So. OPRAH!

SALLY KOSLOW: Like the rest of the world, I adore Oprah Winfrey and value her judgment. So when Oprah.com recently recommended Another Side of Paradise as a novel to enjoy over Memorial Day Weekend, who am I to argue. I especially like the opening description of the book: “dishy with a side of wry.” http://www.oprah.com/book/great-mdw-reads-another-side-of-paradise?editors_pick_id=73521

I could happily steal that phrase for my tombstone, and would like to think it applies to every book I’ve written!

HANK:  SO wonderful! And congratulations on your wild success. And Reds and readers, don’t you love this? What comes to mind when you think of Scott Fitzgerald? What was his first book you read?  What did you think?

And remember, a copy of Another Side of Paradise to one lucky commenter!  

********************************

Before writing books, Sally Koslow was the editor-in- chief of several magazines, including McCall's and Lifetime, which she launched, as well as an editor at Mademoiselle and Woman's Day. Sally has also taught creative writing at the Writing Institute of Sarah Lawrence College and various Manhattan venues. Her essays and articles have been published in many publications including The New York Times, the Boston Globe, other newspapers; dozens of magazines including O: The Oprah Magazine and More, and numerous websites and blogs.

Her novels include The Widow Waltz, With Friends Like These, The Late, Lamented Molly Marx, a European bestseller, and Little Pink Slips. She has also written a non-fiction book, Slouching Toward Adulthood. Sally was born in Fargo, North Dakota. She holds a degree in English from the University of Wisconsin in Madison. Please find her at www. Sallykoslow.com,

Instagram: spkoslow,

Twitter: @sallykoslow and

Facebook:__ https://www.facebook.com/SallyKoslowAuthor

And at TALL POPPY BOOK CLUB