How Helen Phillips Wrote Hum

On a semi-regular basis, I interview authors about their writing processes and craft practices. You can find previous entries here. For this entry I talked to Helen Phillips, whose excellent new novel Hum came out last week. Similar to Phillips’s previous books, such as The Need and The Beautiful Bureaucrat, Hum strikes a skillful balance between wild speculative ideas and a realistic portrayal of family life. Hum imagines a near-future where climate change rages, the gig economy is even more exploitative, and A.I. robots called “hums” are omnipresent. Within that world, she tells an intimate and realistic portrayal of a family struggling to get by.

I talked with Phillips in-person for her book launch at Greenlight Bookstore. This conversation has been cleaned up and condensed from the transcript of the recording.