Book Title: ALL THIS CAN BE TRUE
Character Name: Quinn Greaves
How would you describe your family or your childhood?
It was tough growing up in Mount Solon, Virginia—it was just me and my mom. Her job at the cafeteria at James Madison University didn’t pay much, but there were small perks, like access to the athletic facilities and library, a discount at the bookstore and coffee shop. Still, it was pretty much whole poverty wheel for me: SNAP and WIC cards from the government, free lunches at school, clothes from the local Salvation Army, which in a town so small meant you ran the risk of either being seen by an older girl at school in one of her castoffs or wearing a sweater that had been owned by a forty-year-old woman. For my twelfth birthday, my mom bought me a guitar from Montgomery, and it kind of changed my life. I joined a band in college and became a little famous. And when I made a mistake and needed to leave the band and come home, my mom welcomed me back, no questions asked. Same with when I came out.
What was your greatest talent?
It used to be playing the guitar, but it’s been a few minutes since I’ve been doing the whole band thing, so I guess it would have to be my massages. I’ve been working as a massage therapist for the past decade or so. Although I love to swim. I used to swim laps in the pool at James Madison.
Significant other?
Nope, nope, nope. I don’t think I’ll ever fall in love again. At least, I felt that way until I saw her. Lacie.
Biggest challenge in relationships?
Trust. People may not even mean to hurt you, but they do, and there’s nothing they can do to take it back.
Where do you live?
In my camper truck. I’m actually headed to British Columbia, Canada, to live in a co-op of grief survivors who have lost children to devastating diseases. Medical bills buried me almost as deep as my grief after Liv died. At least the creditors won’t come after me in Canada.
Do you have any enemies?
I don’t know if they’re enemies, but a lot of fans of my former band blame me for the breakup. And I guess I can’t argue with them—when you leave the band without notice right before you’re scheduled to go onstage, and no one can get in touch with you for days, your fans aren’t exactly going to feel very warmly toward you, regardless of your personal issues.
How do you feel about the place where you are now? Is there something you are particularly attached to, or particularly repelled by, in this place?
I’m not in any place too long to get attached—a night or two at the most. Until I get to British Columbia. I should be on my way, but I’ve stayed in San Diego a few days too long now. Because of Lacie.
Do you have children, pets, both, or neither?
I had Liv, then she was taken from me nineteen months ago.
What do you do for a living?
Right now, I’m just trying to get from one part of her life to another and casually driving across America while doing so.
Greatest disappointment?
That I couldn’t save my daughter. That there was nothing I could do.
Greatest source of joy?
Liv was that. I’m not sure how to answer that now.
What do you do to entertain yourself or have fun?
I play the guitar or take walks along the trails if I’m staying at a campground.
What is your greatest personal failing, in your view?
Drinking. Although the best and worst things in my life have happened to me while I’ve been drinking, so I guess I can’t completely view it as a failing—all this can be true.
What keeps you awake at night?
Money. Wondering how I’m going to survive in Canada. How long my friend Annie has to live. Lacie.
What is the most pressing problem you have at the moment?
Keeping a big secret from Lacie, because she’ll never forgive me if she finds out.
Is there something that you need or want that you don’t have? For yourself or for someone important to you?
Forgiveness. Peace of mind. Happiness.
Why don’t you have it? What is in the way?
Time is in the way. I can’t turn it back.
For fans of Modern Lovers and The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo comes a tender queer romance about one woman’s rediscovery of choice, hope, and wild love in the wake of her husband’s coma.
When Lacie Johnson’s husband, Derek, suffers a stroke at forty-seven and falls into a coma, her plans come to a screeching halt—asking Derek for a divorce, going back to school to get her master’s, and starting over as a single woman now that their children have grown up. But what begins as a disaster brings an unexpected blessing in the form of Quinn, a kind stranger whom Lacie meets in the halls of the hospital.
This is just a stop-over for Quinn, who is traveling up to the British Columbia coast to live in a co-op of grief survivors on a remote island after the loss of her young daughter. She's also the former singer of a post-riot grrrl band who fled the group and the public eye more than fifteen years ago for reasons unknown. Lacie thinks she's discovered in Quinn the life and the person she’s always wanted. But Quinn harbors a secret that connects her to Derek. And if Derek wakes up, Quinn must come clean and risk destroying her growing relationship with Lacie.
Told in alternating points of view, All This Can Be True follows Lacie and Quinn as they make the journey to each other—and then grapple with the fallout.
Women's Fiction [Keylight Books, On Sale: June 3, 2025, Hardcover / e-Book , ISBN: 9781684426089 / eISBN: 9781684426102]
Jen Michalski is the author of three novels, three short story collections, and a couplet of novellas. Her latest collection of fiction, The Company of Strangers, was an Electric Literature's "Small Press Books You Should Be Reading This Summer" and a 2023 Baltimore Magazine's Best of Baltimore winner. Her last novel, You'll Be Fine, was a 2021 Buzzfeed "Best Small Press Book," a 2022 Next Generation Indie Book Awards Finalist, and was selected as one of the "Best Books We Read This Year" by the Independent Press Review. She's the editor of the weekly online literary weekly jmww and currently lives in Southern California, although she will always be a Baltimore girl at heart.
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