Australian author Lexi Freiman’s second novel, The Book of Ayn, is the funniest book of the year. In it, a writer named Anna struggles to find meaning after being canceled for her “classist” book. To cope, she retreats from the New York literary establishment and throws herself into the work of Ayn Rand. Inspired by Rand’s theory of radical selfishness, Anna moves to Hollywood to write an animated TV show starring “Ayn Ram,” an animal avatar embodying Rand’s ideals.
Anna finds hope in Los Angeles, a city where “magic happened to people who absolutely didn’t deserve it.” It’s all palm trees and sunshine until money troubles and a family tragedy bring Anna back to New York. There, she’s offered the opportunity to kill her ego at a strange commune on the Greek island of Lesbos. The second half of the novel finds Anna abandoning selfishness for community, ultimately reshaping her perspective and offering a new way to live.
Over text, Lexi and I discussed borderline personality disorder, being adored by a famous hater, and how Australians are happier.
Anna:
Hi Lexi, is this still a good time to talk The Book of Ayn? (It’s Anna btw- not your protagonist lol, the person interviewing you :)
Lexi:
Yes! It would be fun if you did the interview as Anna
Anna:
Lolol it would hardly be acting
To play a selfish contrarian named Anna
Anyway I loved this book - can you tell me how it came to be?
Lexi:
Thank you. I guess it came to be partly as a product of my own anxieties and interests. I think I worry about my own selfishness and contrarianism and wanted to explore/excuse those things through someone like Anna
I also just found Ayn Rand very amusing
And sort of cute. She's like a mean cocker spaniel
Anna:
LMAO
In LA, Anna has many conversations about “the borderline personality.” Her friend says the whole culture is borderline—“victimy, punitive, and suicidal. Borderlines are always threatening to leave or die because they love to hear their own eulogies.” (Obsessed with that line)
Is Ayn Rand a way for Anna to escape this borderline culture? Moving from BPD to NPD? Self-pitying hysteric to mean cocker spaniel?
Lexi:
Yes I think she's trying not to be a victim, trying to maintain some agency and control over her life. I think a lot of contrarianism is about that fear of helplessness in the face of trends/ideologies, and I think it is more empowering for certain personalities to feel narcissistically superior and separate from others, rather than tethered to the big whingey group
*whingey is an Australian word btw
It means to complain
Anna:
Love it, like whiny remix
Lexi:
Haha yes. It's a good word. Phonetically twists the knife
Anna:
Author Mikkel Rosengaard wrote on Goodreads that your Anna is an example of the “shameless, nihilistic, post-ironic woman” who has emerged “post-pandemic” as an “edgy foil to a dominant Millennial culture that is consensus-seeking and often vengeful of anyone who breaks the moral code.”
Do you see this as an accurate read of Anna?
Lexi:
Yes I think that's a pretty accurate read
It's interesting to me to explore a character who feels sort of ironically sealed, and then find the cracks and prize them apart a bit
Anna:
Does this archetype exist in Australia?
Lexi:
Yes I think it does but it's less prevalent than in the US because Australians are happier
There's less for them to push back against intellectually
It's a much softer culture
People care less
Anna:
Haha I've never been to Australia because I'm afraid of airplanes but I've always fantasized about it ... it seems like California without the gun violence
Lexi:
Yes I think that's a good description. But also they're very risk averse - there's a culture of safetyism that makes it inhospitable to an intellectual provocateur
Look at Germaine Greer
Anna:
It seems like Austrialians are funnier because there is less moral superiority? I'm thinking of the line in your book about making "comedy out of virtuousness," which feels so American
Lexi:
Yeah I think Australians are generally more irreverent although the internet has spread some of that censoriousness to our shores
Anna:
How dreadful
Lexi:
I talk a lot of shit about Australia but I think it's just unresolved adolescent sexual rejection
Anna:
Lol
Your first book Inappropriation takes place in Australia but Anna is American and a lot of the book takes place in the US. Is this book intended for an American audience?
Lexi:
Yes this time I wanted to get closer to the flame of the culture wars
Some people read the first book almost as an allegory because it's set in a far off land with weird birds and trees
Anna:
Speaking of culture wars, I have to bring up Red Scare
Early in your book, Anna comes across two “vaguely socialist and acutely nihilistic” podcasters who “were famous for cooking spaghetti for war criminals and speaking the word ‘retard’ to power.” This is the second novel I’ve read this year—the first being Jenny Fran Davis’s Dykette—with implicit Red Scare references, which I love seeing. Your Anna reflects: “I knew the numb leap of provocation, the cool sparks of deflection, that cozy dark penumbra. These girls didn’t want a socialist revolution. They just wanted attention. We were the same, or similar[.]”
Do you relate to Red Scare’s Anna the way your Anna does, the way this Anna asking you does?
Lexi:
Yes to be honest I do relate to Anna K in many ways. Though the girls in that part are more of an amalgam of several women circling that scene. I remember listening to Red Scare several years ago and thinking, oh shit, this person thinks a bit like me...do I need to kill her? Then I actually saw her on a train in 2018 and started a brief conversation. I can't remember what was said but it was pleasant and I didn't feel the impulse to pull out a knife
Anna:
Lolol amen
Ok back to Inappropriation—famous hater Andrea Long Chu wrote a GLOWING review of that book, what was that like?
Lexi:
That was surreal for me because I'd been following Andrea's work for a while and some of the book was in a way a response to her writing - especially On Liking Girls. She was a bit of a hero of mine, and so the fact that she responded so well to the book made me feel like I could die happy now
I wasn't really on Twitter so I think she tagged me in the review post and I didn't see it for a week
Anna:
Omg amazing
So Anna spends the second half of the book in Greece in search of ego death—where do you envision Anna after the book ends? Does she redeem her writing career?
Lexi:
After Greece I think she probably returns to the US and writes a novel about having lots of sex with young boys
Anna:
Lol perfect
Lexi:
*young men...I have to be careful with that description
Anna:
Lest she get canceled again
Lexi:
Exactly. Though, of all the ways to get canceled, I'd say that's not a bad one
Lexi:
Uh oh did that comment get me cancelled....or are we finished?
Anna:
You aren’t canceled! Technological difficulties! I was just going to ask if you've read anything inspiring lately
Lexi:
It’s probably my fault - I got a dodgy SIM card at the airport on Tuesday night after spending 2.5 hours in the immigration line and trying really hard not to lose my shit at the immigration officer. I come from a long line of ferocious Hungarian women. Anyway.
I just started The Novelist by Jordan Castro which I’m really enjoying and am also midway through Limonov by Emmanuel Carrere who I love. And just before that I read Crazy for Vincent by Herve Guibert which is full of wild sex and ugly feelings and reminded me that my favorite fiction always produces a kind of shock.
Anna:
Omg 2.5 hours in the immigration line after a flight from Australia sounds like HELL. I would have lost my shit. I liked The Novelist, I'll have to check out the others!
I enjoyed chatting with you, thank you for doing this!
Lexi:
Thanks so much, Anna. I’m really thrilled the book speaks to you!
