When people are making fun of girls that they think are super frivolous or vapid, I’m like, “these are the girls that I’m supposed to keep protected, in a way.” And that’s kind of what I wanted in the novel. It’s just so funny to me that we have been like this forever. When I’m writing, I think a lot about how we have this kind of nastiness toward young women who we think are vain. People don’t take young women seriously, which is the whole point of the book.

MG: Well, the thing is that people were asking me, “Oh are you worried about it not being accepted within this very literary institution?” I think that there was a high probability that it wasn’t going to take off in those circles because of the subject matter. SK: I saw that you posted on Twitter about sending your book to girls on TikTok. I feel like an older sister to these characters, and now I’m giving the novel to some of these young influencers who I’m seeing all the time. That kind of writing can feel a little imprecise in how you process experiences at that age. I feel like people try to do it backwards and write about youth when they’re older, and it feels overwrought. Now I look at it and I am very happy to have felt and written it so close to those ages. The book kind of encapsulated this period of time from when I was 15 to roughly 22, and the dynamics that I had experienced over that time. I was such a city dweller, and I started going out very young. Isa and Gala are very much a testament to how I was. MG: I started writing Happy Hour when I was 22, so very soon after the age of these characters. SK: Who did you write this for? What is your relationship with these characters? They act like they are selling something, but it’s not really clear what it is.

Lola Kirke is like, “Well what are you selling?” And Greta Gerwig says, “Everything!” I felt like that was so similar to how these girls act. After I wrote the novel, I remember watching Mistress America, and one of the lines is so funny.

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