Amusingly, you’ve pre-empted my second question. KD: That’s a really good answer and I’d definitely like to talk about some of those subjects here. But they speak to each other and intermingle in ways that I hope will give pleasure to people who are familiar with the first book.

It shares a narrator and a setting with my first novel but isn’t a sequel: the books stand alone, and no one needs to read What Belongs To You before reading Cleanness. If I had to sum it up in a single word, I think I’d say that it’s about intimacy: the intimacy of love and of sex, which has been the focus of a lot of the discussion about the book here in the US, but also the intimacy of teaching and friendship, and the strange intimacy that is citizenship, that is belonging to a place and the people who live there. It covers a period of three or four years in his life. GG: It’s actually a hard question! The book is about an American high school teacher living and working in Sofia, Bulgaria. My first question, which is always my first question, is how would you describe the book (briefly) to someone who was hearing about it for the first time? We’re here to talk about Cleanness, which we will publish in the UK in a couple of weeks. I have been reading more, so I’m going to use that as a segue into book talk.

I’m taking an inordinate amount of pleasure from blossom! And am very grateful our families are well, even amidst the awfulness all over the world. But we’re fine, and our loved ones are fine.

My partner and I are in our new house, which has created a state of weirdly conflicting emotions: on the one hand, the anxiety and stress and grief of the pandemic on the other, the pleasures of being together, and of seeing our first spring in our house, all our trees in bloom. I am in Iowa City, which is weirdly calm, with the university students gone. But we are, so far, having a blessedly lucky isolation. GG: I’m so sad too, not to be with you in London! It was going to be the highlight of my spring. Before I ask my first book question, are you OK with all the Covid-19 stuff? Are you writing from home in Iowa? But it’s really nice to have this opportunity to talk to you about it. KD: So, I’m super sad that you’re not here in London for the launch of the book! I was so looking forward to seeing you again.

Cleanness by Garth Greenwell