Emily Temple will discuss her debut novel, The Lightness, in conversation with Chloe Benjamin. Set over the course of one fateful summer that unfolds like a fever dream, The Lightness is a stylish and suspenseful meditation on adolescent desire, friendship, and the female body that shimmers with rage, wit, and fierce longing. Yearning to make sense of her father’s sudden departure, Olivia runs away from home and retraces his path to a place known as the Levitation Center. Once there, she enrolls in their summer program for troubled teens, which Olivia refers to as “Buddhist Boot Camp for Bad Girls”. Soon, she finds herself drawn into the company of a close-knit trio of girls determined to transcend their circumstances, by any means necessary. But as desire and danger intertwine, and Olivia comes ever closer to discovering what a body—and a girl—is capable of, it becomes increasingly clear that this is an advanced and perilous practice, and there’s a chance not all of them will survive.