Not the End of the World

Blogger and freelance writer Diane Vadino captures the premillennial hopes and fears of a single New York City editor in her debut novel, Smart Girls Like Me.

Your protagonist, Betsey, is a worrywart who can’t get her mind to shut off. How much of that is fiction?

Obviously, I understand Betsey very well and may have undergone similar trials, but it is fiction. There’s no getting around the fact that there’s a level of autobiography to it.

Why did you choose to set the novel in 1999 New York?

I remember seeing plenty of intense fear that obviously wasn’t warranted. January first came and absolutely nothing happened, and then there was that feeling of, oh, I’m an idiot. Those times became—I don’t mean to be too nostalgic about it—but they’re special times.

It’s also difficult to talk about the millennium in New York without addressing 9/11. In your novel, Betsey uses the Twin Towers as a geographic reference point.

If you lived in New York City, you would orient yourself downtown by looking for the World Trade Center. It’s the way it was for everyone, I think. It certainly was for me. I started writing this book two and a half weeks before September 11. And of course, on September 12, you’re like, who gives a shit about any of this? It couldn’t have been less important.

It took you five years to write the book?

I wrote 40% of it in second person. Then I had a friend read it, and she said it sucked. I spent quite a bit of time rewriting it from the beginning.

Betsey experiences some unfortunate things at the fashion dot-com she works for. Is that based on your experience?

I worked for a dot-com, but I worked for a great one. But you see it all the time in a lot of workplaces—the devaluing, the short-sightedness.

Dating and romance in general take a few knocks, also.

I feel like single women have it hard in New York, more so than in other places where I’ve lived. I don’t know what accounts for that. I wanted to tell this story about what it was like to desperately want something and the process of realizing that there are so many other options. It’s such a huge world out there, not to be totally cheeseball about it.

You’ve said that your next project might be about the fashion industry?

If I can find an interesting way to do it. There are a lot of good stories to tell.