Spiotta, Dana 1966–

PERSONAL: Born 1966.

ADDRESSES: Home—New York, NY. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Scribner Publicity Department, Simon & Schuster, Inc., 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

CAREER: Worked in film production and in restaurants.

WRITINGS:

NOVELS

Lightning Field, Scribner (New York, NY), 2001.

Eat the Document, Scribner (New York, NY), 2006.

SIDELIGHTS: Dana Spiotta grew up in California and, influenced by the film industry, began working at the age of sixteen as a film production assistant. Her debut as a novelist, Lightning Field, was described by Entertainment Weekly critic Karen Valby as having "all cool tones and elegant lines." The novel focuses on friendship but covers a range of issues, including adultery, experienced by women in the Los Angeles area. People contributor Christina Cheakalos felt the book to be "pitch-perfect as a character study and parody of ennui in Gucci gulch."

Eat the Document is Spiotta's tale of two 1970s activists who, after an unfortunate incident, go underground separately and create new identities. Mary Whittaker becomes Caroline and moves frequently to avoid being recognized. She is the mother of Jason, whose journals reflect his mother's activist tendencies. Her former partner and lover, Bobby DeSoto, now Nash, manages Prairie Fire, a leftist bookstore in Seattle where he holds protest meetings in the back room. His best friend, Henry, is a haunted veteran of the Vietnam War. A Publishers Weekly reviewer felt that "the many nuances of their deep friendship, beautifully rendered by Spiotta, give the book a compelling core."

Writing in Kirkus Reviews, a critic described Bobby as "the story's brain," and Mary as its "heart—the kind but saddened eternal vagabond." The reviewer commented on the intensity of detail and secondary characters that emphasize the differences in the cultures separated by decades, as well as the elements that both share. The reviewer concluded that Eat the Document is "fiction as documentary, a coruscating, heartrending fable of struggle and loss."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Entertainment Weekly, September 7, 2001, Karen Valby, review of Lightning Field, p. 158.

Hollywood Reporter, October 10, 2005, Chris Barsanti, review of Eat the Document, p. 10.

Kirkus Reviews, October 15, 2005, review of Eat the Document, p. 1106.

People, November 12, 2001, Christina Cheakalos, review of Lightning Field, p. 47.

Publishers Weekly, August 13, 2001, review of Lightning Field, p. 286; October 24, 2005, review of Eat the Document, p. 32.