Best-Selling Author Jennifer Weiner Discusses Importance of Author Photo and More

Best-selling author Jennifer Weiner you can judge a book by its cover in an interview with the Hairpin this week. On the importance of an autor's photo, she states:

If you're smiling in your (color) author photo, it's chick lit. If you're smirking, or giving a stern, thin-lipped stare in your black-and-white picture, and if you go out of your way in every interview to talk about how "unserious books do not deserve serious attention," then it's literature.

When asked if she's subconsciously frustrated by being seen as lady first and a writer second, she responds:

Last week, the Bailey Prize for Women's Fiction was announced. With it came the predictable tide of critics saying, "Why a women's prize? Women want to be equal, let them compete for the Booker and the Pulitzer with the boys!"

In an ideal world, that is exactly what would happen. But we all know how far the world is from ideal. Women get published less frequently, reviewed less frequently-taken, in general, less seriously than men-and they have to work that much harder to prove that they're deserving. Until that glorious day comes when we are all judged by the content of our pages, not the pink pastel purse on our cover, I have no problem with ladies-only prizes, or ladies-only spaces.

Read the original interview here.

Jennifer Weiner is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of eleven books, including Good in Bed, In Her Shoes, which was made into a major motion picture, and The Next Best Thing. A graduate of Princeton University, she lives with her family in Philadelphia. Visit her online at JenniferWeiner.com.