In Katie Kitamura’s new novel, “Audition,” a middle-aged actress in New York City is struggling to interpret a scene in a play when a much younger man walks into the theatre and breaks open the plot of her life. Before writing the book, Kitamura had become interested in the role performance plays in our day-to-day lives.

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 In Katie Kitamura’s new novel, “Audition,” a middle-aged actress in New York City is struggling to interpret a scene in a play when a much younger man walks into the theatre and breaks open the plot of her life. Before writing the book, Kitamura had become interested in the role performance plays in our day-to-day lives. “There are all these parts that we play every single day, and they come with quite prescriptive scripts,” Kitamura said. “The thing that struck me when I was thinking about ‘Audition’ is how seamlessly we flip between parts almost without being aware of it.” She designed the book to be read in several ways. “I’ve come to see it almost as a bit of a Rorschach blot: which side of the book readers think is true, or right side up, versus which is upside down says something about their own desires. What do you want to be true? What do you prefer to be a fantasy? That was one of my endeavors in writing the book—so it’s not really an either-or but both. I’m so conscious of the fact that when I read, my own desires as a reader are radically shaping the book.” Read an interview in which Kitamura talks to Jennifer Wilson about interpretation, workplace novels, and why writing is particularly important right now.

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