An interview with Jennifer Cohen conducted by Andy Miles, December 2, 2004, in the Washington, D.C. home of the author.

AM  Now that Lying Together is out and you've had some time, presumably, to evaluate the book in the context of reviews that have been published, the feedback and reactions you've had from friends, family, readers unknown to you, what would you say works best about the book? And what, if anything, doesn't work as well as it might have, that given the chance you might do it differently?

JC  I don't know that there is a "what works best," because honestly, different people have responded about very different things. I mean, some people love the depictions of Russia, and the sort of seedy, moody atmosphere that I present. But I think also a lot of people just really respond to the sort of raw, honest love story — well, it's not exactly a love story —

AM  Would-be love story.

JC  Would-be love story, wannabe love story.

So I'm not really sure. And that's actually one of the things that's been really interesting to me is what people do pick up when I talk to them. And it's actually been really — one of the most satisfying things for me is talking to people I don't know who have read the book, and then what happens inevitably is that they then start telling me their story, be it their story of their time traveling in Eastern Europe or, usually more likely, their story of some disastrous romance. (Laughs.) So clearly it sort of works on these different levels. But it's been pretty outstanding to me just that people respond to it in different ways. So I can't say that one part of the book worked better than another.

AM  Does that go for what might not work as well? Nothing's eating away at you?

JC  There aren't any like, "Uck, why didn't I put that in there, why did I take that out?" No. In a lot of ways it feels very complete to me and in a very satisfying way, especially because it is a part of my life, and so to have it sort of like a clean cut — it's like, here's my life; it's in this package; it's a nice, neat package now, and I can sort of hand it off to be read, but I don't have to live it anymore.

AM  Have people by and large gotten what you've tried to convey in the pages of your book?

JC  Mostly, yes. And some people have gotten it more than I even realized for myself what was there. And that's an interesting sort of experience, too, is somebody says something to you about your book — I can't think of anything specific, but it's definitely happened a few times where, you know, "When this was happening, this scene resonated to me" in such a way. And suddenly I'll have this weird insight into me, or I'm not sure if it's me but me who's the character in the book. And it sort of adds a whole new depth to my own memory of the experience, which is very trippy.

AM   You expressed modest expectations for the book in September. "I hope it does well; I hope I get some nice praise," you said. Now that the book has indeed exceeded those expectations, do you have a new set of expectations going from here?

JC  My expectations aren't so much for Lying Together.

There are hopes. I would love to see it go into paperback. I would, of course, love to see it be made into a movie. That would be a hoot, and it would be nice to get some money. But honestly, I'm very happy with where it is. So they're hopes; they're not expectations. And there's a difference.

My expectations are more about where it will take me as a writer in terms of my career as a writer rather than the book itself and its life. You know, it is funny; the shelf life of a book is so short. You know, we're three or four months out now and it's almost over.

AM  How comfortable are you in your book being categorized as "chick lit," and how useful do you find those sorts of shorthand PR designations?

JC  You know, it's kind of like hey, if it makes someone pick it up and sells the book, fine. The problem with those titles, though — the same reason a big press didn't pick [Lying Together] up or isn't picking up the paperback so readily is [that] it's not exactly chick lit.

So they see it; they say, "Oh, chick lit." And then they open it up and they say, "Ooh, deeper, darker, a little bit more involved than that — bleh!" You know, if they hadn't been trying to see it through the lens of chick lit maybe they could be more open-minded to it. But again, it sort of goes both ways.

AM  You write in the book, "If I don't tell, it never happened, there is no script." At some point you did decide to tell, and it did happen. What was that process?

JC  That's actually a really amazing process. I really firmly believe that by telling your story, especially a painful story, it helps you heal from whatever harm that story did to you, and it helps you grow from it — and in a way, now even more so.

Like I said, people, when they respond to me and tell me what they got out of the book, it gives me a new perspective on my own past, and it's been pretty amazing.

AM  WNYC Radio host Leonard Lopate characterized your book as "a depressing tale of love and professional ethics." Do you think your book is depressing?

JC   I think there are depressing parts. Depressing's not a good word. I think there are some sad and difficult parts in the book. But at the end I don't think it's depressing. I think actually at the end what you have is somebody who's gone through some really hard stuff and comes out the other end, and to me that's actually very happy. I think if you picked up the book and just opened to any old page — yeah, there's a chance you're going to fall on a really dark page, but that's not how it ends. That's part of the story.

AM  Your story, you said in one radio interview, is like a fairy tale. "I think a happy ending exists," you said, "but it's not the one you expect." Could you expand on that?

JC  It's something that I definitely bring up in the book. There are fairy tales in the book — like literally a Russian fairy tale and this sort of Hollywood image that we all grow up with about how we're going to have these fairy-tale endings to our romantic pursuits. And in real life the fairy-tale ending is never quite as fairy-tale-ish as it is in a movie. But it is a happy ending. I mean, it's a happy ending in the book. It ends hopeful.

And then in real life, I went on and I actually met somebody who I love deeply who's a much better partner for me. And we've established a life together now that is a lot saner and a lot healthier — for all involved — and I'm very happy. And so that's a happy ending in all sorts of ways. So, yeah.

AM  As your relationship is unraveling [in the book], you more than once express the concern that to leave Moscow and return to New York would only invite a chorus of "I told you so"s from friends and family. Even with the "very happy place" you're in today, do you still dread that sort of reaction, that judgment from readers, interviewers and critics?

JC   I did initially when it first came out, but I think that I've been so bolstered by the positive reaction that now when there is a negative reaction, it's just like well, that's your opinion but I can present quite a number of people who don't think that.

You know, obviously we all like external gratification and support. And so, yeah, I don't worry about it so much anymore, but I definitely — when it first came out, yeah, I was really worried about that.

AM  At the same time that you've criticized the [television] networks for failing to convey nuance in their newscasts, you've conceded that you missed some of the nuances of the relationship you were in that time. But how realistic is either suggestion — discerning nuance in a heady relationship or conveying nuance in a network newscast?

JC   (Laughs.) Not very. It is kind of like a fairy tale. It's never going to be as good as you can imagine it could be, but I think we can do a better job, both professionally and in relationships.

I mean, you can go into things with eyes open, and maybe it helps to be a little older and have had a little experience, professionally and personally, because then you kind of know what you're getting. You know, you're not going to be bowled over by an interview subject or by a — (laughs) — relationship. It all gets a little bit — not that it gets easier, but things get easier to navigate, I guess.

And also in terms of television news, we do have the luxury of hindsight and we can look and say, "Okay, our coverage missed on this point and maybe we can make a correction here," and occasionally we do. And occasionally there are some really fabulous stories on. It's hard. There are so many different factors at play that are beyond me, way beyond me.

AM  Would you characterize the choices you made as poor choices or as risky choices that didn't play out as you hoped?

JC  The smart answer would be poor choices. But actually the truth is risky choices that didn't play out. I think that given the circumstances, given where I was at in my life, the chance to jump at that relationship was really an exit strategy for me to try a whole new thing. And it wasn't just about the relationship — and it's pretty clear in the book, it was also about pursuing a different direction for my career. So I don't regret it.

It's also another thing that people have responded about. So many people say — they're so impressed with how fearless I was, and that even though it didn't totally work out, it was still really an amazing thing that I did it, and gutsy. And it's sort of funny because it kind of blew up in my face, you know. But because of it — because of it, so many things. Because of it, I wrote a book. Because of it, you can argue I'm in a relationship that's a lot better.

AM  Not to mention your job.

JC  And it looks really good on my résumé to have worked in Russia, yeah.

AM  And there was certainly no guarantee that you would have that kind of success professionally.

JC  No, there was no guarantee. I did actually line up some freelance work before I actually got on the plane, but the ball was already in motion by the time that had happened. I was going come hell or high water.

AM  Is the story as simple as you were young and naοve, made mistakes, learned from those mistakes, and you're a wiser woman today?

JC  (Laughs.) No. Of course not. I mean, yeah, you can distill it to that if you want to, but I think there's so much more going on there. I hope there is.

I think a number of readers find a lot more going on there, because it's a multi-layered story. It's not just my coming of age story. It's also this story of a time and a place. It's a story — I mean, to some degree — of a culture, literature, different influences that I had in my life and how they affected me.

So yeah, you could distill it down to that, but I think there's a lot more going on.

AM  You've said that the "funny thing about writing a memoir is as true as it might be it really becomes a story and it stops feeling like it was my life." How so?

JC   Completely so. Except that every now and then my life creeps back into it. You know, somebody from my past will show up or call, and suddenly it's real again. In good ways and bad.

You know, part of the reason it doesn't feel quite so real is because my memory of it is, of course, now so much more vivid than most of my life, because it's sort of like when you've seen lots of photographs of a part of your childhood and so that's what you remember. So because of that, because I spent so much time thinking and pondering and talking about this part of my life, it's sort of overly vivid, which makes it feel not real because real memories don't feel that vivid.

AM  Your friend and former writing group moderator Victoria Rowan said that as a reader she is "wanting to scream at the screen as if it was a movie — 'don't, don't!'" If the first-person protagonist in your story has indeed become a separate character, do you share that sense of powerless frustration in reading or thinking about the narrative?

JC  Oh, totally. And sometimes I'll read it — you know, I'll read parts of it when I'm doing a reading or something, and I think, what the hell was I doing? (Laughs.) Like, oh, my God, I can't believe I really experienced that. And it's sort of a very out-of-body thing. Like, did I really experience that?

And you know, there are some parts of the book that are fictionalized, and I have actually gotten to the point where I'm sometimes not sure. You know, was this one of the parts that I fictionalized or was this real? And you know, it's weird. It's really weird. Your memory does weird things to you. But I can definitely step back and go — (laughs) — "Whoa," you know, "what a crazy ride," totally.

AM  You talk in the book about the women involved in the trafficking trade and observe that on some level you "admired their enthusiastic responses to the opportunities the ads promised. My heart breaks a bit at the tragic sense of trust that they had when they got on the plane," you write.

Throughout the book you compare your own circumstances to that of the women in the sex trade, reaching varying conclusions. Looking back did you share with them that "tragic sense of trust"?

JC  Well, not nearly as tragic as theirs. Their story is so horrific. And I think to some degree what's going on there in the book and in my head at the time was depression, actually.

I think when you're looking at things through a lens of depression you start to see things in these very extreme ways. And you know, is my lot like that of a woman who's been trafficked? No way in hell. But I did see some vague parallels that still resonated with me.

And you know, it kind of makes me wonder, if I had been born in some small town in Ukraine and had no money and saw this ad, because of my nature to jump on a plane and go fly into the arms of a man I hadn't seen, would I have been the kind of girl who would have answered one of these ads? You know, "waitress wanted in Paris." Maybe I would have been.

AM  Did you see larger themes and symbolism like that at the time or did they become clear only in the writing?

JC  They didn't become clear in the writing but in the reading. I would read things that I wrote and suddenly — it's this wonderful feeling of oh, my goodness, that comes in a way I wasn't even thinking about. It's like your subconscious somehow puts a puzzle together and you're not aware of it, and you need to step back. And then you read it and it's kind of cool. And that happened a lot for me. It's very satisfying. But I'm not sitting down going okay, let me plant this symbol here; it's not that conscious.

AM  And wasn't at the time.

JC  Oh God, no. (Laughs.)

AM   You write late in the book: "I can't say I love him anymore, because I am not sure I know what love is. Whatever I thought it was, I was clearly off-base." Now, you've said in interviews that you weren't in love with Kevin, you were in love with a fantasy. How do you sort that out and distinguish the two things?

JC  Being in love with a person and being in love with a fantasy? I didn't know him, and I think to really be in love with somebody you need to know them. And maybe that's some wisdom I've gained by being a little older, too, and actually knowing what it's like to love somebody and really knowing him. But I was very good at projecting ideas of the perfect man, the perfect relationship, and I projected it onto this person.

AM  Poor Kevin.

JC  Yeah, poor Kevin. And, like, bad choice; he wasn't ready to handle that projection. I mean, nobody could. Who could handle it? Nobody could. Nobody wants to be put on a pedestal.

AM  I'm guessing your engagement ring from Michael did not come in a Ziploc bag, having slipped off a whore's finger in St. Petersburg [as had the ring Kevin gave her]. You found that ring "fabulous and intoxicating." How did receiving a more conventional engagement ring compare?

JC  Ah, this is even better. (Laughs.) This one has a story too. This was his grandmother's ring. His parents had met on the boat coming over from Poland, and they had no money, and his grandfather became a jeweler. And so this is their 25th wedding anniversary ring. They're like the opposite rings. And it's funny because, in a way, this ring is so pure and so clean in the way it's this crisp diamond, very large — (laughs). And you know, it speaks to me. It's like a very honest, open ring, whereas the other one had these tiny little diamonds that are sort of dark and deeply embedded. So, in a way, they're sort of perfect metaphors for both of the relationships.

AM  In the book you say you found the chaos of Russia liberating. Kevin's life, of course, was increasingly chaotic while you lived there with him. To what degree was Kevin's personal chaos also liberating, and when did it become — well, the opposite of liberating?

JC   I think when life is difficult, you don't have time to be real neurotic. It's like you just have to get things done. And in a way, that's liberating. So if you're trying to somehow support and nurture somebody who's falling apart, you can't really think about yourself.

It's kind of like a yoga class. You're supposed to clear your mind. So in a way I guess you're kind of clearing your mind of your own debris for that period. Unfortunately, it all comes back to smack you in the face afterwards. I mean, honestly, it didn't really hit me hard until actually after I came home, after the [story related in the] book was over. I mean, it ends on a happy, sort of hopeful note, but it was not an easy thing for me when I came back home. That was a very, very hard year when I came back home.

AM  Your mother told me the night of the launch party that had you "been in a different place today, not been with the man" you love, she might have had a "very different interview" with me. What about you? How differently do you think you might have approached the PR for this book, and how differently do you think the sort of public relations machinery might have approached you, was your life not what it is today, if you didn't have the "happy postscript" that you've spoken of?

JC   I think it would be much harder. I think it would be much harder for me to talk about a painful relationship if I hadn't totally gotten over it. I mean, not necessarily that I had to be married, but it makes it a lot easier.

But also it makes it a lot easier because I do have my husband to be sort of my cheerleader. He's got my back. And it's a really scary thing putting a book out into the world. So even if it was a different book, even if it was this happy-go-lucky whatever, it would have still been terrifying. And so having somebody with me to sort of prop me up is incredible. I feel really, really lucky. I can't even imagine going through this without him. It's just not conceivable to me at this point.

AM  What do you think makes a successful author, and what tips might you offer aspiring first-time writers of either fiction or non-fiction?

JC  You know, it's funny, because you sometimes hear writers talk about how "every morning I get up and write for four hours." It's annoying. Nobody can do that, you know? I was never like that. But I had this story and I had to tell it; it was burning inside of me. And so when I had free time, here and there — not every day, not every week, but I would find time and I would work on it.

You have to be interested in your story, first of all.

For me, one of the things that is really helpful is having a writing group and having a peer group that I can report to and that somehow holds me accountable. It's like, okay, I have to produce something for this coming week or I'm just full of words we can't print or say on the radio, because you can talk and talk and talk — "oh, I want to write a book" — but it doesn't happen unless you actually make it happen. And I think having a group of other people who are sort of in the same predicament really helps.

AM  You said in September that your book is partly the writing group's book. "I couldn't have written this without some of those people," you said. Could you talk about that process and the influence your writing group colleagues had on the book?

JC  The group in New York that Tory Rowan ran, we had some strong writers, but even more importantly, we had some very strong critics.

AM  What do you mean by strong?

JC   They were very candid. They were harsh but they always had constructive comments. We were very good about that — not just tearing somebody's work to shreds but actually giving them incentive to keep working.

So I was able to sort of comb through a lot of stuff, the clunkier parts with these people, and also just engaging their interest. I mean, people would read a chapter and they'd say, "I can't wait till next week, I want to find out what happens." And you know, it eggs you on. Writing is a very lonely thing, they say, but for me, I'm a very social person and I need feedback, I need other people bolstering me up. And I have a writing group now in D.C. and it's very much for the same purpose, to support each other.

AM  Your husband Michael recalled that when you and he first started dating, you had finished writing the book and were trying to get it sold. "Any time I would ask her about the book," he said, "suddenly [you] would just well up with tears and just couldn't even speak." Is that how you remember it?

JC   Totally. (Laughs.)

AM  And what were the emotions involved in finishing the book and trying to sell it?

JC  There were all of these different points. I remember when I actually finished it and wrote "the end" — even though I didn't say it there — and how that was just this amazing feeling. And then suddenly it's like, okay, next! Now we need to get an agent and now we need to get it published, et cetera. And at each of those points there's this really tense moment, and then there's this release and then it's sort of like what's next? This is the rollercoaster you go on.

So by the time Michael came along, I had just been through so much emotionally with this story, with this book that, yeah, it was crazy. I was a mess. (Laughs.) I had so many hopes and dreams wrapped up in it because I wanted so bad to be a published author and to have this work that I'd spent so long on to somehow be validated.

AM  Back in September you told me: "I wonder when I'm going to get to the point where I'm at a cocktail party and someone asks me, "What do you do?" and I'm not going to say, 'I'm a television producer'; I'm going to say instead 'an author.' That's going to be the real sign I finally believe I did this."

Been to any cocktail parties lately?

JC   (Laughs.) I was, and I did it! And not only that, it was a PEN/Faulkner cocktail party. We all introduced ourselves, and it was going through my head — actually that exact thing. "I'm going to do it this time; I'm going to say I'm a writer." And [the host] came around to me, and I said I'm an author. And we talked about my book. It was nice.