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"    Photo: Courtesy of Ashley Fodor   You can find Soho-based writer Stephanie LaCava sipping Matcha tea in her NYC neighborhood caf\u00E9 Harney &amp;amp;amp; Sons any day of the week. She&amp;#039;ll be packing her laptop, some research volumes that she borrowed from the public library, and a couple books that top her ever-growing &amp;quot;to read&amp;quot; list (right now she&amp;#039;s pouring over May We Be Forgiven by A.M. Homes). The redhead has a whimsical nature, big heart, and searching soul\u2014all of which fuel her debut book An Extraordinary Theory of Objects: A Memoir of an Outsider in Paris. Packed with historical context and honest anecdotes, the autobiographical narrative documents LaCava&amp;#039;s experiences while navigating her dark and awkward adolescent years as an American transplant in Paris. Through her stories, she finds her way through a very somber and lonely      period while learning to discover her true self and make an empowering connection with the world. ELLE.com spoke with LaCava about the book, her style, and her love of the &amp;#039;90s. ELLE: Your outlook and writing in this book has a whimsical nature to it. Have you always had a fanciful and playful personality? Stephanie LaCava: It&amp;#039;s so important to have a little bit of whimsy. Not in an immature way, because it&amp;#039;s actually a very mature thing to do\u2014to be able to look at the world in a light-hearted way. It really can be such a dark place. ELLE: You speak in the book about how you felt different as a young girl. Did your parents embrace your quirks and creativity? SL: Yes, for example, when I moved back from France to America, I think I was a freshman in high school, I found this picture of a bursting aurora from the Louvre. My dad used to take me there all the time, and I decided that I was going to paint it on my bedroom wall. Since I originally wanted to paint the walls all black, this was a compromise. [Laughs] ELLE: So you were always an artist at heart? SL: I always knew I would write. Though I never thought I&amp;#039;d be a writer, I never thought it would be my job. I thought I&amp;#039;d probably have to do something more practical. The most important thing about writing is to keep practicing. And you&amp;#039;re going to hear &amp;quot;no&amp;quot; so many times. I&amp;#039;m very young, and it&amp;#039;s great that I have this opportunity. I am learning patience and working very hard on my next book. ELLE: You&amp;#039;re often photographed for your fashion sense. What are your staples? SL: I always wear a black velvet ribbon around my neck, and little shorts with knee socks when it gets cold. I can&amp;#039;t live without a striped T-shirt or a Rick Owens shirt with long sleeves that cover my hands. I love Ann Demeulemeester boots or an army green jacket with a pop of neon. I think you always need a bit of grunge\u2014I&amp;#039;m kind of stuck in the &amp;#039;90s. ELLE: Lust for anything else circa 1990? SL: As a young girl, I always wanted to be blonde. I always wanted Kirsty Hume&amp;#039;s hair! I tried going blonde, but it wasn&amp;#039;t meant for me. I&amp;#039;ve gone back to my natural red hair, but because my hair was bleached, the ends are still lighter. It&amp;#039;s warped into an unintentional ombr\u00E9\u2014I hate it! I shouldn&amp;#039;t have gone against nature. ELLE: Any beauty rituals? SL: I pay a lot of attention to my lashes because they&amp;#039;re super long. I use Lanc\u00F4me D\u00E9finicils mascara and Nars Eyeliner Stylo in black to do a cat eye, but that&amp;#039;s it. I&amp;#039;m so pale that foundation takes all of the redness out of my cheeks, and I look like a ghost. ELLE: Who is inspiring you at this very moment? SL: I really love this writer Maeve Brennan. I relate to a lot of different things about her, and she&amp;#039;s so beautiful, so interesting. You should read some of her writing. An Extraordinary Theory of Objects: A Memoir of an Outsider in Paris by Stephanie LaCava will be available on December 4.  Photo: Courtesy of Harper Collins  Photo: Courtesy of Ashley Jahncke   "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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