Transcript from The Girlfriend Book Club Author Talk: Wally Lamb, October 2025 - 'The River Is Waiting'
Shelley Emling: Welcome, everyone, to tonight's October monthly discussion for the Girlfriend Book Club. I'm Shelley Emling, the editor of The Girlfriend Newsletter. I'm also the moderator of this fabulous Girlfriend Book Club, and the more than 113,000 members of the book club chose. As our October pick, 'The River is Waiting' and as always, you picked a great one and especially this one.
I have to just say on a personal note that I finished this on a recent Saturday afternoon and I was sobbing and my husband was like, are you okay? What is going on with you? Are you, what's going happening? And I said, this is just. Such a beautiful read. I haven't read anything like this in years, and I said I just could not stop crying about it.
And I thought about it for the weeks afterwards. So we're so pleased to welcome New York Times bestselling author of The River Is Waiting, and so many other books Wally Lamb. So welcome to a to the Girlfriend Book Club.
Wally Lamb: Thank you Shelly, and thanks for that wonderful introduction.
Shelley Emling: I have to say that I don't ever lie when I do these things and I have, I really was sobbing when I finished this book, and my husband really did say, are you okay?
It was really like that,
Wally Lamb: idea. Shed a few tears writing the thing too, particularly toward the end.
Shelley Emling: So I was gonna ask you how you came up with the idea for the book, but then I saw some interviews that you've done, and I've heard that you always start with a character that you are worried about.
I think you said in your interview with Oprah Winfrey that you don't start with an outline, which is unusual for authors, I think. But you get an idea you get your ideas elsewhere. I think in this case you got an idea by this idea by reading a newspaper article about something similar happening, and then you come up with the character first before you do the outline.
So can you just tell us about how that process works?
Wally Lamb: Yeah. It's different for each of the books that I've written. The article that I had read was about the prevalence of something called back over accidents where where there is no there is no backup camera in a car.
And very often, sadly enough the victim is is a toddler. And somebody, and even with backup cameras, sometimes the kid is very short and it doesn't, and doesn't doesn't get captured. And so that's where it started. What if it, what if there was, one of these horrible.
Things that happened to a character of mine and and and his family. And and also there's another complication with the story in that this character is has become addicted to anti-anxiety medication and has begun to drink as well during the day when he's taking care of his 2-year-old twins.
So that's, that was where I started. And as you said, I don't, I never know where I'm going with it. I have to research along the way and and I do worry about these characters. I become them. I always write first person. I stretch beyond the limitations of my own.
My own pretty happy life and and and I become somebody else for my working day. And so that's that's how I get the, that's how I get the feel of the character by becoming that person
Shelley Emling: I. So in this case, the character is not your age. He's a younger man probably the age of one of your sons.
Who you came up with this idea of the character. So you started writing, but you really didn't know how it was gonna play out. Is that right?
Wally Lamb: Yeah. And I knew right from the start that I wanted to ask readers a question and involve them, not just, write a story, but try to involve the readers too by asking is this.
Thing that has happened, forgivable can he forgive himself? Can his wife forgive what has happened? Because she she would, she didn't know that he was drinking alcohol during the day while he was being Mr. Mom and so forth. So I wanted the readers to answer that question for themselves.
And I, I'm not stacking the deck. I think readers. Have a perfect right to decide for themselves whether his act is forgivable or not. I'm always championing redemption of of characters who are less than perfect. And so I was rooting for him to figure something out.
But I didn't know because I had to keep writing to figure out, what the next part of the story was gonna be.
Shelley Emling: So I always ask authors this question, and you've probably been asked this many times before, but was there a particular character or scene or chapter that was more challenging for you to write, that you had to work harder on than the others?
Wally Lamb: Yeah, I'd say probably right off the bat in the first the first couple of chapters, the accident itself how do you go on from there? And and at the time we have five grandchildren now, but at the time we had we had a two, a three-year-old son, a grandson rather, our grandson, Ethan and his little baby sister, who was a.
She was an infant and I began to imagine, what if something terrible like this had happened to him? And and so I was scared. I was scared for him. In fact, I called up my son who lived down, down in new Orleans with his family and I said, Hey, my, my car has a backup camera and I had just gotten the car, so it was new.
And I said, if you fly up I'll give you the car. I'll give you the keys. You can drive back and I'll just get something else. And that's what happened. And that made me relax a little bit.
Shelley Emling: Yeah. So you gave him your car. Good idea. Yeah. So in this book, Corby, the main character is a good dad for the most part.
He's married, he had a job. He did lose his job. And then things spiral downward for him. So what made you take Corby this pretty good guy at the beginning, like down this path.
Wally Lamb: Addiction is something that I have wrestled with myself in terms of al abuse of alcohol.
I was a late bloomer. This started happening to me, or I started making it happen when I was in my fifties. It was a tough time in my life. My parents were aging and and they, and became pretty needy. My mother had a. A bad stroke. My father had Parkinson's disease. We have three sons and our youngest is started out as our nephew who we adopted.
And and he was having a very. Tough adjustment. He was four years old, had just turned four. And and then I had a big book contract that was looming and I found myself really struggling to write it and with everything else that was going on. I began to take nightly vacations via.
Single malt scotch, which was maybe a little bit of comfort at the beginning. And then it turned into a pretty big problem. So I drank a alcoholically for about 10 years. And the, some of the some of the church basements that Corby is in. I've had experience in those.
I'm in a, I've been in a 12 step program now for about 15 years and it it helped me crawl out of the black hole that that I had fallen into.
Shelley Emling: So you knew exactly what
Wally Lamb: Corby would be going through. Yeah. Yeah. And also the prison stuff, I didn't, I've never had to go to prison, for a felony or anything.
But but I worked with female inmates at a Connecticut maximum security prison. And I did I did that volunteer work for about 20 years and and when the women felt that they could trust me and trust one another they began, writing autobiographically and and they were writing, a lot of them were writing about.
Why, what the conditions were that led them to go to prison. And also a lot of them were writing about what it's like once you're in prison. And so I had a 20 year education. Now granted, a men's prison and a women's prison are different, but but there's a lot of things that are the same.
And so they educated me, I think. Probably more than than I taught them.
Shelley Emling: So I was gonna ask you about that. What was your biggest takeaway from volunteering for 20 years in a women's prison? And would you ever go back and volunteer again?
Wally Lamb: I would and if, if I was welcomed back and, but also my big takeaway I think probably more than anything else it taught me, taught me the value of humility. And there, but for the grace of God, go, I, and and there were I worked with a lot of women who. Had done one terrible thing in their life, and and then they had 20 year sentence, 50 year sentence and so forth. So yeah, I think gratitude, was a big takeaway.
But also I felt that, to, to a certain extent we're all vulnerable and and anything could happen to any of us. And they were they were they were so honest, they were so forthcoming. A lot of them had been incested by a father or a grandfather or a big brother, a cousin or something like that.
And so it was wonderful when they began to trust the group and the dynamic of the group. Because it allowed them to get that big bag of rocks, in terms I'm talking about these terrible secrets that they were warned they had to keep. And when they began to release those secrets, I could see the therapy that was going on.
I'm not a therapist, but I know that writing group is therapeutic.
Shelley Emling: So what did you learn about yourself when you were writing? The river is Waiting. I saw, as I said earlier, your interview with Oprah Winfrey, and I believe you said you became angrier about social injustice while you were writing this book.
Is that right? Is there anything else you learned about yourself when, while you were writing? The River Is Waiting.
Wally Lamb: Let me explain the social justice thing. Almost all of my writing the stories that I've written have concern, power and powerlessness of a, of various sorts.
Yeah. And how sometimes power is abused. And I depicted some of that with the prison guards. And and also and not only, there are a lot of prison guards who are not bad guys for sure, but there are some who are there for the wrong reasons. And so that was the power struggle that I was dealing with then.
And also the, the racial injustice. The first time I walked onto that, into that prison I noticed, there were, far and wide there were black and brown inmates and and much fewer white inmates. And so I think there's, and remains an imbalance between the way the justice system treats you depending on the amount of melanin in your skin.
And so I, that made me angry. And and then of course I don't wanna get too political, but I, I'm not really pleased with what's going on in our country these days. And and I believe that, I believe there is there is injustice and a terrible misuse of power. I I deal with these things in my stories, but also I'm out there with my placard, in a big street crowd as well.
Shelley Emling: So a couple of the book club members wanted me, to ask you about the title of the book, the River Is Waiting. Is the River A Metaphor For Something? How did you come up with that title?
Wally Lamb: I always, and this is back from my first book, she's come undone the, to the present one. I have a big, I have a big love of music and so I always I always get a title from either a lyric or a title of a song or whatever. And and I found when I was writing this I, I think I Googled or, I don't know.
I went on online and I said. Songs that have river in them. And and this one popped up and it was a, it's a song that was written by John Fogarty of Credence, Clearwater Revival. And then I found a wonderful version of it, a cover by the New Orleans Queen Irma Thomas. And and that's a, that's just a beautiful, powerful version of it.
And so the river, yeah, I, the, when I when I'm writing, I don't know really what the story means. I have to figure that out when I'm get, when I get to the end of the story the first draft I'm talking about. And so there is a river that, that is just beyond the prison.
The prison compound and Corby hears. The sound of the river moving water. And then and then finally he gets to see it when he's on a. A a detail working the grounds crew and and I, and whereas if you're stuck in prison, you're stuck and just beyond you, there's a river that can keep going, keep moving.
And so for me, it was a, it was a metaphor for life keeps going. Corby don't, you're not gonna you have to be. Hopeful that you will be, you will go and you will travel by the river when your time is up. And then a version of that actually happens with Corby.
Not necessarily where readers expected, but and I don't wanna, do any spoilers. But yeah. So there is a it happens toward the end.
Shelley Emling: So did you base that prison on any particular prison location? Just curious.
Wally Lamb: Yeah, it's I learned things, as I said, from going to York prison.
I, I love the way they, these prisons call themselves correctional institutions, they're prisons and if you wanna correct yourself, you pretty much. Have to do it, you have to be motivated self-motivated. And so yeah, I there's a lot, structural things.
I picked up from that prison. But no, it's not a and I didn't research any pri any other prisons except online. And there I learned things like colloquial, slang expressions and yeah, I read, male inmates who get out and then, write about the experience.
You know that the nonfiction stuff that I read helped me to write the fiction.
Shelley Emling: So in your opinion, I know you've volunteered in a prison for 20 years. Is there a lot of rehabilitation that goes on in prison?
Wally Lamb: There is some. Yeah. But I think again, it has to be something that a prisoner wants to work hard at.
And part of that, part of the way that you do that is you self-reflect. Nobody set out to go to prison. It happened in their lives for one reason or another. And when you go back and you reflect on your history you can, let's put it this way.
Prison is like a maze, and a prisoner is like stuck in a maze. And if you begin to reflect on how you got there. Then you can rise above the maze. If I'm in a maze, I'm stuck as far as how to get out of it. But if I'm rising above it, I see the logic and I also see the exit signs.
So I'm pleased that a lot of the women who worked in our group and then eventually got out, they're doing really well. Because they've learned about things they've learned about themselves and and so there has been rehabilitation in that way.
Shelley Emling: How long did it take you to write the river as Waiting?
Wally Lamb: My my second grandchild, my granddaughter, Olivia as I said, was an infant when I started, and she is now she's in first grade. So it was about six years.
Shelley Emling: My daughter's name is Olivia too. I love that name. Oh really?
Wally Lamb: Yeah.
Shelley Emling: Yeah. There are a lot of Olivia's that
Wally Lamb: more than there are now.
No more Nancy or Mary or or yeah. Kathy.
Shelley Emling: So since the girlfriend book club is from AARP, I just have to ask you, how has growing older impacted how you write or what you wanna write about?
Wally Lamb: Really great question. I was bound and determine, I'm not very good at math.
So in past books I have usually assigned the character my birthday so I can keep track of the, the years and so forth. But I was determined as you picked up the to write a book about a character who was about my son's ages. I have one son who just turned 40, and another one who is I think 44, and then one who is in his thirties.
That, when you're writing, when you're becoming a younger person you're gonna have different experiences than say somebody my age. I'm I'm 74, and my my coming of age was different than their coming of age. And in all kinds of ways.
And it was cool to explore that. And also I think the older you get the more perspective you have your lens becomes wider and you can see like a bigger picture. You can see patterns that repeat themselves and so forth. Yeah, I was I, first of all, I love that question.
I've done a lot of interviews and that's, this is the first time I've gotten that question. And so cheers to you, Shelly.
Shelley Emling: A follow up to that also talking about age does success mean something different to you now at your age? You said you're 74 than when it, when you started writing, years ago.
Does success look different now?
Wally Lamb: Yes, I think so. I I never, when I started writing, I didn't have any fantasies that I was gonna get published or become a bestselling author or anything like that. I didn't, money has never been my motivator. And, but however, when when the books began to sell well with Oprah's endorsement and so forth, I began to I began to be very, first of all the the book sale, the, the book contract got bigger and I was intimidated by that. And and I was so worried that I was gonna disappoint my readers who now were, in the millions, not, not just my wife and a couple of friends that I passed it on to and that kind of.
That was the, that's the double-edged sword of success, can I do it again? Can I make a better book? And so forth. And yeah I really hit the wall for a while there after the second book came out and did well. My third book took me nine years to write, and that was the period when I was drinking.
Not exactly a productive time for me. Wow. But it was about fear. It was about being afraid that I was gonna fail. And as far as success I don't worry about that kinda stuff anymore. I wa success for me is, it's about friendships and the, the people that you love.
And I know that sounds corny, but but it's true for me. Yeah. And probably for you too, I imagine.
Shelley Emling: Yeah. So has, so growing older, has it changed what you wanna write about, I guess I should say?
Wally Lamb: Yeah, I think so, because right now I'm starting a novel about a woman who is she has a phenomenal memory, but she was born in 1897.
So I'm going way back and then I'm gonna tell her story in, in chunks and and writing in her voice. And I don't think I would've taken on that assignment when I was a younger writer.
Shelley Emling: So can I. She's a
Wally Lamb: she's 103. And when the story begins,
Shelley Emling: wow. So can I just ask you, what's the best thing about being the age that you are now, which I believe is 74?
Yeah. What's the best thing about being that age
Wally Lamb: perspective? I, I'm not any. I'm not any smarter but I think, I hope anyway that I'm wiser than I had and I'm really glad that if if, material success came to me when it, I was, I'm grateful that it came to me when it did.
I think if I had a bestseller when I was in my twenties or even my early thirties. I think I could have been a real jerk about it. But, and kids keep you humble too. If I'll tell, I'm gonna tell you a very quick story about when the first time that I hit number one on the New York Times list.
And I was just having a, this moment. Looking at the New York Times book review. I wasn't, I just was like, I can't believe this. But right at that time, my son, Justin, who was I think about 10, maybe younger, and he come, he comes walking by me. He's not looking at me, but he's carrying one of those magic eight balls.
One of those things that tell the future. And so he says. He says, without looking at me, and he is crossing my path and he says, is my dad a dork? And and then he shakes it and then he look, he reads it, and then he looks up at me and he says. My sources say yes. If you're in danger of being puffed up by your good luck, your good fortune.
If you have kids around, they will. Yeah, they will humble you quickly.
Shelley Emling: I know I have three kids just like you, so I know what you're talking about. I just wanted to mention that last month we had Frederick Bachman on with us. He his book my Friends was our pick four. September and he mentioned at the end of the interview when I brought up that the river is Waiting was our October pick, that he just read this.
He loved it. It was one of his favorite books which surprised me 'cause I didn't expect him to say anything at all. So is there an author or book that you would recommend to the rest of us, somebody you've discovered in the last couple years, a book or an author that you really love?
Wally Lamb: I, she's been around for a while, but I just recently read some of Adriana Tani's work.
And I'm half Italian and she's Italian, so I kinda like that that entry into it. And yeah, there I was out in in Colorado before this book came out, and there are se I was doing promotional things with several. Of the younger writers and and I really enjoyed, listening to them and hearing about their stories and so forth.
Yeah. Yeah, I those are just a couple of people I'm thinking of.
Shelley Emling: So I just just a couple more questions really quick. What is your process like for writing? Do you get up at a certain time and you make sure you write from nine to five what, how do you do, how does your process work?
Wally Lamb: I get up usually I'm out the door and on the way to the gym by six 30 in the morning. I like to get the blood going, creative, creatively it's a good thing to do. And then I come home at about, I don't know, eight 30. I'm having breakfast and, nine o'clock in the morning, I'm turning on the laptop and I usually will write until about one or two o'clock in the afternoon with lots of with lots of breaks so that I can come upstairs and get snacks and have, way too much coffee.
But yeah, my creative brain for some reason just automatically. Shuts off somewhere in the early afternoon, and then I can do I do, I have a part-time assistant and she helps me with, correspondence and that kind of thing. So I can do that. It's not like my workday is over, but I'm doing now, the business end of writing.
But I love the creative end
Shelley Emling: much more. As you mentioned, you're 74, you've got this book out. What would you tell over. Keep not older people. What should I say? People maybe over 60 if they're, they wanna do something for the first time maybe write a book for the first time.
I know Delia Owens who wrote where the Crawdads Sing, wrote our first book in her seventies, I think. What would you tell people that are older, have faith in yourself? You can do anything at any age. What would you say?
Wally Lamb: I would say that, but I would also say, you humble yourself to the process.
I think a lot of people have fantasies of sitting down with no writing experience and writing something and bam, suddenly everybody wants to read it. And at least for me and a lot of, I'm, I work in a writer's group, so I, I have friends who are. Who are, long-term writers and a genius first draft just is not something that happens.
So you have to be patient and if you can get feedback from other people share your work. Don't just, sit the Garrett and then come stumbling. 3, 5, 5 years later and say, okay, this is it. So IIII would say humble yourself to the process. Don't chase away any fantasies that this is gonna be a big hit, a bestseller or whatever.
If that's gonna happen, that would be nice, but that should not be your motivation.
Shelley Emling: So two more questions. I just thought of. Another one is the River is Waiting. Is this your favorite book that you've written, and is this anybody talking about making this into a movie?
Wally Lamb: It, I do have a movie agent.
She's shopping it around now. I haven't heard, I haven't gotten a any word yet. But she usually keeps her cards close to the vest and then lets me know when it, when something seems like it might happen. And and what was the other part of your question?
Shelley Emling: Is this your favorite? Is this your favorite book that you Oh,
Wally Lamb: Yeah.
No, I can't. Who's your favorite of, who's your favorite child of those three? Yeah, it's I can't, I, I don't, I can say some of the books were harder to write. Some of the books were were fun to write. But I don't know. I can't say that I have a favorite,
Shelley Emling: and one final question.
So at age 74, I know you love to write. I'm sure you love to read. What else do you love to do for fun at this time in your life?
Wally Lamb: I do enjoy the gym and the reason I enjoy it is because for the rest of the day, I'm gonna be by myself. And and if I want to, if I wanna talk to people, I have to make them up first, but at the gym and I have to confess that I, it's about one-to-one. How much. The exercising I'm doing and how much talking I'm doing they, I've been teased that, oh yeah. I'm the mayor of the gym in the six 30 to seven 30 hour. And I, and so it's nice to have that socialization.
I like doing that. I'm very close to the people. In my writer's group, and sometimes we'll go to the movies or we always have a meal. Whoever's house is is hosting we'll, so we have, that kind of conviviality before we get down to business with the, with everybody's writing.
And I, I love doing that. We have my wife and I. Are fortunate enough to have a little place in New York City. We live out in the country here in Connecticut, but I lo I, I like the rural life that I have, but I also like the city life that we dip into maybe once a month or so.
I love plays. I love I love Netflix a little too much. And and I do love to read as well.
Shelley Emling: So I guess one final question. At what would you say at age 74 is the secret to having, to being vital and be being vibrant and living your best life at this age in your seventies?
Wally Lamb: Stay active.
Engage in, in things that that are, not only enjoyable, but also challenging. I'm challenged by my stories. I'm just, I've just had a breakthrough on the one that I'm working on now, but it was, I had two weeks of spinning my wheels and stuff. But if you, it's again, that perspective thing because I've done it for a while and and I've written now this will be my eighth book.
I know that when you're stuck. You're gonna get unstuck. And I used to be afraid that I was going to stay unstuck. Yeah. That's one of the benefits of being older. And so I like my age, but again, I don't have any terrible disabilities or so far so good.
And and, I live in our place in New York is right across the street from Mount Sinai Hospital and, and I see people coming and going who are really, they're struggling either physically or whatever. And and I count my blessings and I count my blessings for my wife too.
Shelley Emling: So it sounds like staying active, staying socially connected with friends challenge yourself, that's all really important as you grow older.
Wally Lamb: And don't don't, and I'm sometimes guilty of this. I have been, but don't get too addicted by social media and reels from, on Instagram and so forth.
Yeah. Yeah.
Shelley Emling: Thank you so much for joining us tonight. I think everybody watching has probably read this already. The river is waiting, but please recommend it to your family and friends that have may not have read it because it's such a fabulous read And stay on the book club web social page for a while because I'm gonna be posting some conversation starters.
And just a reminder that our book, pick four. Septe November, sorry. November is the correspondent and the author will be joining us the third Tuesday of the month, as always. So thank you so much. And I just, I have to say, like I said before, love this book. So thank you for writing it, it was amazing. And thanks for joining.
Wally Lamb: And can I say one thing? To your, sure. To your book club people? And that is I'm really very grateful that you chose this book. And I wanted to make sure that that you knew that.
Shelley Emling: Thanks everybody. Thanks for choosing this book and good night everybody.
Wally Lamb: Thank you. Bye-bye.
