Colleen Hubbard Biography, Books, and Similar Authors

Interview

A conversation with Colleen Hubbard.

Tell us about Housebreaking.

Housebreaking is contemporary literary fiction centered on a stubborn twenty-four-year-old woman who deals with a long-simmering family feud by dismantling her house and moving it, alone and by hand, across a frozen pond during a harsh New England winter. The novel will appeal to readers who like spare, stylish prose as well as eccentric and compelling characters—think Elizabeth Strout crossed with Ottessa Moshfegh.

What inspired the initial idea for your debut?

I read a Bill Bryson book about Shakespeare's life. In the book, Bryson describes Shakespeare's theatre troupe moving their entire theatre building over the frozen Thames. I thought the image—of moving a building over ice—was fascinating. I kept thinking about how it would work on a domestic scale, that is, moving a house over ice. Gradually the characters came together, starting with Del. I needed someone who was determined and willing to live on the fringes of society.

Also, I have a longtime interest in unlikely and very questionable passion projects. Several years ago, I wrote an article for a magazine about Dennis Severs, a gay American Anglophile who bought a dilapidated eighteenth-century house in Spitalfields in ...