The Story of O: American Wife Author Sittenfeld Writes Serialized Inauguration Novella for Slate

Curtis Sittenfeld, author of last year's Laura Bush-inspired novel American Wife is wading into fictional Presidential doings yet again. Last night, Slate started running All Along, This Was Supposed To Happen, a serialized novella about Barack Obama's Inauguration.

Reached by email, Ms. Sittenfeld (who used to write for The Observer from time-to-time and is also the author of 2005's Prep), said that despite back-to-back novels with Presidential themes, she is "definitely not becoming a political novelist."

She described the assignment from Slate as "a fun one-time experiment," adding, "my next novel will have nothing to do with Washington, Republicans, Democrats, or any other real people."

While the whole novella is already written, Ms. Sittenfeld said she conceived it "in a more segmented way" with serialization in mind. She saidt that she'll be watching the news leading up to the January 20th event and will update her story with any new details.

"I'm not going to the Inauguration," she continued. "My husband and I are going to watch it in our living room and we're probably going to clap (him) and cry tears of joy (me)."

If you're in St. Louis, their "unprepossessing, book-filled brick house" (per The New York Times' Jan Hoffman last summer) shouldn't be hard to find: According to Ms. Sittenfeld, her husband "wants to bring our Obama yard sign back out of retirement for the day."