J. Courtney Sullivan

J. Courtney Sullivan
Occupation	Writer, novelist
Nationality	American
Period	2007–present
Website
www.jcourtneysullivan.com

Julie Courtney Sullivan (born 1982), better known as J. Courtney Sullivan, is an American novelist and former writer for The New York Times.

Biography

Sullivan grew up outside Boston, Massachusetts. She attended Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, where she majored in Victorian literature and received the Ellen M. Hatfield Memorial Prize for best short story, the Norma M. Leas prize for excellence in written English, and the Jeanne MacFarland Prize for excellent work in Women's Studies.

She graduated in 2003, then moved to New York City and began working at Allure. Sullivan later moved to The New York Times, where she worked for over three years. Her writing has since appeared in The New York Times Book Review, The Chicago Tribune, New York magazine, The New York Observer, Men's Vogue, Elle, and Glamour.

In 2007, her first book was published, a dating guide titled Dating Up: Dump the Shlump and Find a Quality Man; she has since stated that she wrote the book for money and that "fiction was always [her] passion".

Sullivan comes from an Irish-Catholic family where many of the women go by their middle rather than first names. Her first piece for Allure was published under the name "Courtney Sullivan," but she added the J back in shortly thereafter.

She self-identifies as a feminist, a stance that has been reflected in both her fiction and nonfiction work. In 2006, she wrote a piece for the New York Times "Modern Love" column about her experiences in the dating world, and in 2010 she co-edited a feminist essay collection titled Click: When We Knew We Were Feminists. Both of her novels deal prominently with relationships between female characters.

Currently, Sullivan serves on the advisory board of Girls Write Now, a nonprofit organization that pairs young and professional female writers in mentoring partnerships. She has also been involved with GEMS, a New York organization dedicated to ending child sex trafficking.

Sullivan lives with her husband, Kevin Johannesen, and their dog, in Park Slope, Brooklyn.

Novels

Commencement

In 2010, Sullivan published her first novel, Commencement, which focuses on the experiences of four friends at Smith College, Sullivan's alma mater. She wrote 15 different drafts of the book before sending it to her editor, after which it underwent two or three more revisions.

Commencement received positive reviews from many major publications and became a New York Times bestseller. After the book's publication, feminist icon Gloria Steinem called Sullivan personally to offer her praise. Steinem described the novel as "generous-hearted, brave...Commencement makes clear that the feminist revolution is just beginning".

In 2011, Oprah's Book Club included Commencement in a list of "5 Feminist Classics to (Re)read as a Mom, Wife and Writer".

Maine

Sullivan's second novel, Maine, deals with four women from three different generations of the same family spending the summer at a beachfront cottage in New England. Though Sullivan did not base the fictional Kellehers directly on her own Irish-Catholic family, she drew on her own childhood experiences while writing the novel.

Maine received reviews that were slightly more mixed than those for Commencement, but that were ultimately positive. It was named one of the top ten fiction books of 2011 by TIME magazine.

The Engagements

Evelyn has been married to her husband for forty years—forty years since he slipped off her first wedding ring and put his own in its place. Delphine has seen both sides of love—the ecstatic, glorious highs of seduction, and the bitter, spiteful fury that descends when it's over. James, a paramedic who works the night shift, knows his wife's family thinks she could have done better; while Kate, partnered with Dan for a decade, has seen every kind of wedding—beach weddings, backyard weddings, castle weddings—and has vowed never, ever, to have one of her own. As these lives and marriages unfold in surprising ways, we meet Frances Gerety, a young advertising copywriter in 1947. Frances is working on the De Beers campaign and she needs a signature line, so, one night before bed, she scribbles a phrase on a scrap of paper: “A Diamond Is Forever.” And that line changes everything.

Books

Fiction

• Commencement (2010)
• Maine (2011)
• The Engagements (2013)

Nonfiction

• Dating Up: Dump the Schlump and Find a Quality Man (2007)
• The Secret Currency of Love (2009) (contributing essayist)
• Click: When We Knew We Were Feminists (2010) (co-editor with Courtney E. Martin)

References

Articles about Sullivan

• Julie Bosman. "Brunch and TV, But Still a Workday." New York Times. May 27, 2011. MB2.
• Heather Schwedel. "Exclusive: An Interview with Commencement's J. Courtney Sullivan." June 16, 2009. Flavorwire.
• Emma Shakarshy. One Young Writer's Commencement: An Interview With J. Courtney Sullivan. August 5, 2009. Girls Write Now.

Reviews of Sullivan's Books

• Lily King. "Permanent Waves." New York Times Book Review. June 10, 2011. BR16. Review of Maine.
• Stephan Lee. "Jennifer Close, J. Courtney Sullivan, Sloane Crosley: Chick authors who avoid the 'chick-lit' stigma." September 19, 2011.
• Maria Russo. "B.F.'s Forever." New York Times. June 12, 2009. BR8. Review of Commencement.
• Elizabeth Taylor. Review of Maine. July 1, 2011.

External links

• Official website
• Girls Write Now
• GEMS: Girls Educational and Mentoring Services