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Tom Rachman Biography, Books, and Similar Authors

Author Biography  | Interview  | Books by this Author  | Read-Alikes

Tom Rachman

Tom Rachman

Tom Rachman Biography

Tom Rachman was born in 1974 in London but grew up in Vancouver. He studied cinema at the University of Toronto and completed a Master's degree in journalism at Columbia University in New York. From 1998, he worked as an editor at the foreign desk of The Associated Press in New York and then did a stint as a reporter in India and Sri Lanka before returning to New York. In 2002, he was sent to Rome as an AP correspondent, with assignments taking him to Japan, South Korea, Turkey and Egypt. Beginning in 2006, he worked part-time as an editor at the International Herald Tribune in Paris to support himself while writing fiction. He now lives in London, where he is working on his second novel.

Tom Rachman's website

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Interview

An interview with Tom Rachman about his first novel, The Imperfectionists, set in the offices of an English-language newspaper in Rome.

Karen Rigby interviews Tom Rachman

BB: How has studying cinema informed your writing?

TR: At college, I majored in film studies, so movies certainly affected how I tell stories. One strength of cinema is its speed: a movie must grip you and tell a story fast; it ought to pull you completely into the onscreen world. Movies have limits, though, struggling to move beyond what can be seen and what can be heard. The written story allows you to venture more deeply inside characters - a novel explores those aspects of people that, in day-to-day life, we cannot easily see or hear. This is what I hoped to do in The Imperfectionists, to bare the thoughts of a range of people who weren't necessarily shrieking but who were worth hearing. If my book also contains something of the pacing and directness of a good film, then I would be very happy.

BB: In many of the stories, relationships decline after pivotal events or quieter, emotional realizations. Rather than romanticizing the expat experience, they explore loneliness, infidelities, and death, among other struggles...

TR: Life overseas (the novel is set in Rome) can be thrilling and disheartening, liberating and constricting. You have the freedom to invent yourself...

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Books by this Author

Books by Tom Rachman at BookBrowse
The Imperfectionists jacket
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Read-Alikes

All the books below are recommended as read-alikes for Tom Rachman but some maybe more relevant to you than others depending on which books by the author you have read and enjoyed. So look for the suggested read-alikes by title linked on the right.
How we choose read-alikes

  • Julia Dahl

    Julia Dahl

    Julia Dahl is a journalist specializing in crime and criminal justice. Her first novel, Invisible City, was named one of the Boston Globe's Best Books of 2014, won the Macavity, Barry, and Shamus Awards, and was a finalist ... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    The Imperfectionists

    Try:
    Invisible City
    by Julia Dahl

  • Joshua Ferris

    Joshua Ferris

    Joshua Ferris is the author of three previous novels, Then We Came to the End, The Unnamed and To Rise Again at a Decent Hour, and a collection of stories, The Dinner Party. He was a finalist for the National Book Award, ... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    The Imperfectionists

    Try:
    Then We Came to the End
    by Joshua Ferris

We recommend 8 similar authors

View all 8 Read-Alikes

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