Jenna Ross of Minnesota’s Star Tribune writes about Groff and her new novel Matrix, which explores the lives of nuns—including “the real-life poet/nun/enigma Marie de France”—in a medieval English convent.
The article, based largely on a Zoom interview with the two-time National Book Award finalist from her home in Gainesville, Fla., touches upon the changing reputation of historical fiction within the literary world, Groff’s views on religion and contemporary political issues, and the fiction course she took at Amherst that set her on her vocational path. In addition, it mentions Groff’s previous publications, such as the bestselling novel Fates and Furies and “L. DeBard and Aliette,” “a 2006 short story set amid the flu pandemic of 1918.”
Also quoted in the article is Katie Bugyis, a Notre Dame professor whose lecture about the work of medieval nuns as scribes and illuminators inspired Groff to begin writing Matrix.