This Week in Fiction: Curtis Sittenfeld on the Necessity of Writing Sex Scenes

In “The Prairie Wife,” your story in this week’s issue, a woman named Kirsten is obsessed with the Twitter feed of Lucy Headrick, a social-media celebrity known for her approachable evangelical religiosity, her homeschooling of her children, and her down-home recipes. It’s clear why Kirsten is fascinated by Lucy—they used to know each other—but why are the rest of us so interested in figures such as Lucy? Is it the combination of what often seem to be opposite worlds—those of social media and traditional skills and values? Is it the apparent effortlessness and happiness of their lives?