Margo Orlando Littell will be visiting her hometown of Connellsville on June 18th in support of Each Vagabond by Name, a piercing tale of isolation, redemption, and belonging set in a remote coal-mining town in Pennsylvania.
Littsburgh has recently been sleeping with the lights on to dissuade copper gutter thieves — so it felt like fate when we read the description of Each Vagabond by Name (“When a band of itinerant thieves arrive in a remote coal-mining town in Pennsylvania, Zaccariah Ramsy, owner of the local bar, finds himself drawn into their world”). We jumped at the chance to read the first chapter and send Littell our Littsburgh Questionnaire!
What comes to mind when you think of Pittsburgh?
As a kid, it was a big deal to drive in from Connellsville to walk through Phipps and visit the Museum of Natural History. When I think of Pittsburgh, I think of the museum’s gemstone displays and tiny dollhouse rooms. We’d drive through Squirrel Hill, and it was a glimpse of an entirely different world that was, somehow, just fifty miles from home. Even though I now live out of state, I feel connected to Pittsburgh every time I’m met with a blank look when trying to order chip-chopped ham at a supermarket deli.
What books are on your nightstand?
Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf, My Name Is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout, and As Good As Gone by Larry Watson. My reading, like my writing, skews toward small towns and family secrets.
Is there a book you’d like to see made into a film?
Jennifer Haigh’s newest book, Heat and Light–there’s so much beauty in southwestern Pennsylvania. I’d also love to see my own novel on the big screen, though I might have trouble looking for too long at my main character, who has a gruesome patched-over hole instead of an eye.
Who would you most want to share a plate of pierogis with?
The long-ago original owners of the incredible turreted mansions in Connellsville, the site of so much of the coal and coke wealth from the early 1900s. Many of these homes are now vacant, stripped bare, and actively disintegrating, and I’d love a chance to go back in time and spy around inside.
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