In the Land of Men: A Memoir

In this intimate account set amid the New York magazine publishing world of the 1990s and 2000s, Miller (The Coast of Akron) focuses on her time as the literary editor of Esquire, from 1997 through 2006, and on her relationship with David Foster Wallace. In 1994, fresh out of college, Miller got an editorial job at GQ and, three years later, at 25, was hired as Esquire’s first female literary editor. She was “a young woman... trying to get herself taken seriously in a world of men,” which included ego-driven agents, editors, and writers. Miller vividly remembers the “days of paper, days of ink,” the time of the Filofax organizer and the large editorial budget. She recalls briefly working with Dave Eggers pre-McSweeney’s; getting barked at by Norman Mailer (“I loathed Mailer”); publishing the greats (George Saunders, Jeanette Winterson); passing on others (an excerpt from J.M. Coetzee’s Disgrace); and, of course, getting to know Wallace, who contacted Miller in 1998 about a short story submission. The pair dated briefly (Wallace, “a genius,” could be “odd, very pushy, maybe even predatory”) and they eventually became friends. This intriguing memoir about the literary life of a female editor working in the “last-hurrah days” of print magazine publishing will appeal to book nerds and fans of David Foster Wallace. (Feb.)