Melissa Bank

It seems unfair to brand a writer as talented as Melissa Bank with the increasingly meaningless and disposable “chick lit” label. But there’s no denying that Bank’s Girl’s Guide to Hunting and Fishing, published in 2000, was on the leading edge of an avalanche of thinly veiled romance novels that have since come to dominate (and, some say, destroy) women’s fiction. In their defense, chick-lit titles often reflect the realities of modern dating better than anything with Fabio on the cover ever did. Bank’s new book, The Wonder Spot, is a coming-of-age tale marked by abundant cultural wit and intelligent prose. Who knows why the follow-up novel was such a long time coming, but perhaps the hiatus allowed Bank to cultivate a bit of distance from the genre she inadvertently helped create. 300 Washington Ave. S.E., Minneapolis; 612-625-6000