Hernan Diaz on Ply

About this episode

Hernan Diaz joins Tom’s Book Club to talk about Ply, his new novel set centuries in the future. Diaz is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Trust, which won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. In Ply, an orphan grows up to become a “pincher”, someone who steals electricity from the grid to sell on the black market. When she finds herself being followed, she is drawn into a mystery involving a groundbreaking experiment that could change the fabric of reality. In this conversation, Diaz discusses the origins of Ply, creating its distinctive future world and why he doesn't consider it simply a dystopian or post-apocalyptic novel. He talks about technology, what it means to be human, as well…