PAULA WHYMAN

I'm happy to announce some good news. My story, "Bad Side In," is forthcoming in The Southampton Review. When I know which issue, I'll add the info to this post. But right now you can check out the current issue, Spring 2013, a tribute to the late David Rakoff, featuring work by Roger Rosenblatt, Patricia Marx, Konstantin Soukhovetski, Meg Wolitzer, Billy Collins, Daniel Menaker, Jules Feiffer, and more.

I'm pleased and grateful to announce that my story, "You May See a Stranger," which appeared in the Summer 2012 issue of The Gettysburg Review, has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize (2014 edition). This story is part of the collection of linked stories I'm working on, entitled JUMP. It was also selected as a finalist in the WC&C Scholarship Competition, and received a great write-up in NewPages.com.

This weekend at Politics & Prose, DC's premier indie bookstore, there are two don't-miss author events. With this heat (115 degrees??) there's no reason to go outside, especially when all the literary heat is on the inside.

From the P&P website...


SANDRA BEASLEY
Don't Kill The Birthday Girl: Tales from an Allergic Life
Saturday, July 23, 2011 3:00 pm

This memoir from the award-winning poet chronicles Beasley’s life-long allergies to...just about everything. A partial list of what she must avoid includes dairy, soy, beef, shrimp, cucumbers, and mustard. Thriving despite the constant threats, Beasley tells her story with wit and humor, examines the science of allergies, and offers advice to fellow sufferers.
Publisher: Crown, 7/2011




TOM CARSON
Daisy Buchanan's Daughter
Sunday, July 24, 2011 5:00 pm

GQ’s “The Critic” and author of Gilligan’s Wake, Carson in his third novel lets one Pamela Buchanan Murphy Gerson Cadwaller talk about her life, loves, and exploits from the vantage point of her 86th birthday. Just a few of the highlights: her experience as a war reporter on Omaha beach, stepping out with Marlene Dietrich, and comforting LBJ when events went against him.
Publisher: Paycock Press 6/2011


Location:

Politics & Prose
5015 Connecticut Ave NW
Washington,DC 20008
202-364-1919

Susi Wyss debuted The Civilized World, her widely praised linked story collection, at Politics & Prose this weekend. At the reading, she told the audience she's working on her next book, which is a novel. Compared with writing stories, she says, it's a struggle. Why? Wyss gave a clever explanation.

Writing short stories, Wyss said, is "like serial monogamy." It's exciting every time, and then it ends, often with an epiphany, and you embark on another short-term adventure... Whereas the "novel is like marriage"-- intense in the beginning, but that intensity doesn't stay. As in a marriage, the hope is that sticking with it will, in the long run, be more rewarding.

For more of her take on the differences between novel and short story-writing, see her blog post, aptly titled "For Better or Worse."

And, by the way, I encourage you to read The Civilized World, which is a moving collection of intertwining stories told from the points of view of women living in five African countries, including the Central African Republic, where Wyss was in the peace corps. As a dedicated public health worker for 20 years, Wyss saw firsthand the issues facing people who lived in that part of the world. At her reading, she described the moment she realized many of the women were overlooked and voiceless and how she decided to try and give them a voice. The Civilized World has been praised by reviews ranging from Publisher's Weekly to Booklist to O, Oprah's magazine, which named it a "Book to Watch for" in April.

Welcome to the latest installment of an occasional series about strange, funny, or simply awful book tour experiences. I feel privileged to present a guest post from the talented novelist Caroline Leavitt, whose newest novel, Pictures of You, is now available and poised to be a huge success, with raves from Vanity Fair, and Oprah's O Magazine, where reviewer Jane Ciabattari called it "Suspenseful...gripping. Leavitt is superb at revealing the secrecy inside many marriages."



Here, Caroline tells the unfortunate story of her television appearance from hell...

Sometimes publicity comes at you from an angle. When I wrote a piece about infidelity for a popular anthology, the editor, a friend of mine, and I were invited on a really prominent national television show. I was so thrilled! “It’ll be a fantastic opportunity to talk about your new novel,” my friend advised. Another friend, a media coach reminded me, that no matter what happened on the show, I could turn the questions in the direction I wanted by saying, “As a novelist, I feel…”

I thought I was prepared. I told everyone on the planet that I was going to be on national television, especially my mother. I spent hours changing my clothes and got to the NYC television studio hours in advance. The makeup girl swiped off all my makeup, sighing and reapplied it. The hair person frowned. “We like curly hair, but it has to be TV curly hair,” she said, and proceeded to flat iron my curls so I looked like someone’s prom date in the 1960s. It didn’t matter. I was going to be on national television and I was going to talk about my novels.

The studio is chilly, and it’s me, and three other women, and to my surprise, I’m not introduced as a novelist or even as a writer. I’m just “one of the women in the anthology.” Well, I figure people will know I’m a writer, right? My piece in the anthology is about a time in my life when my first husband cheated on me, and my best friend, his sister, had actually brokered the deal. I’m asked a few questions, but I’m never able to turn anything around to the fact that I am a writer, and then I happen to look at the monitor, and I see under my image, the legend, in big red letters: HER HUSBAND CHEATED ON HER. Nothing about my novel, nothing about my being a writer, nothing about the fact that it’s my first husband who did this and not my darling second. Not even my name! Every question I’m asked is about infidelity. Finally, during the break, my friend, who sees my discomfort, blurts out to the program host, “Did you know Caroline wrote all these novels? That she has a new one coming out? Maybe it would be good to mention it.”

The host smiles and waves her hand. “Oh, of course I know that. I’ll mention it on air after the break.” She pats my knee encouragingly.

“And did you know it was a betrayal by her first husband, not her current one?” my friend says. “The monitor just said husband.”

The host looks sympathetic. “Of course, I know that,” she says. “We’ll fix it immediately.”

The break is over, and I try to sit up straighter. The interviewer turns to me. “So, how did it feel to be cheated on?” This time I’m prepared. “Well, as a novelist—“ I start to say, when another guest interrupts me and goes off on a tangent about the psychology of infidelity. It’s at that moment that I feel everything is lost. I look up at the monitor and under my picture it now says, “BETRAYED BY HUSBAND.”

I come home. My hair is gluey with spray and I feel like I look ridiculous, my eyes are weighted down with mascara and I’m on a busy urban block. I pass a bus stop and two women suddenly turn and look at me. One of them frankly stares. “Hey, I saw you on television!” she crows and I smile weakly. Maybe they’ll remember my frantic quip about my book. “You’re the one whose husband cheated on you, right?” one woman says.

I sit down on the bench beside them. I tell them I’m an author and that I was upset about the show because it was my first husband, not my current one who cheated, and that I really wanted to promote my novels. One of the women nods sympathetically. When I tell them the name of my latest book and what it’s about, one of the women ferrets in her purse and pulls out a pen and writes the name down. “I’m going to buy it!” one of the women says. “Me, too,” says her friend.

I get up and walk home. My hair still looks stupid, but I feel a little better. You never know what kind of doors publicity can open.

Caroline Leavitt’s new novel, Pictures of You, is a Costco Pennie’s Pick and was in its third printing before publication. For an engaging interview in which Leavitt actually does get to talk about her work, see this recent piece by novelist Susan Henderson at The Nervous Breakdown. Leavitt can be reached at www.carolineleavitt.com.

Maybe you've heard this news already, but Homeland Security has just released a document containing a list of words its staff monitors on social media sites, such as Twitter and Facebook. Thanks to a friend for pointing this out...on Facebook... My favorite comment on that thread was the person who said "I didn't friend Homeland Security."

Well, exactly. Because even though these are in some ways open fora, if you have not selected "public" for your privacy settings, you maybe didn't count on the government knowing how many times you've used the word "pork." Yes, that is one of the words. Which leads me to wonder if they're monitoring Congress, or just people like us who have little say over how the pork, er, money is divided up. And, by the way, is Homeland Security monitoring "pork" in their own house? Because this project should be tested for trichinosis.

Of course, Homeland Security is there to protect us. I say that with an utter lack of irony, and even though I bristle at the term "homeland"--which, I believe, is not on their word list. Anyway, they can monitor our public comments all they want. Nothing new there. If you really want to, you can monitor public comments, and so can I. But is Homeland Security a troll, attempting to friend you and then just leaching off your friend list? When it comes to your private exchanges, is 'probable cause' out the window here?

Where, then, to come down on this issue? Words are both innocent and potential weapons. Weapons for good, and weapons for not-so-good.

Some of the words that might interest you that are being tracked: Exercise. Trojan. Cain and Abel. Cloud. Bust. Plot. ("Plot" as in story? Probably not. But don't they have to read the posts before they know which kind of "plot" it is?) And now that Homeland Security has made this announcement, won't the people they're really looking for start using different words? Like "poultry" instead of pork, "Romeo and Juliet" instead of Cain and Abel?

So I have an idea. Call it the "Homeland Security Story Project." I think it might be fun to "write" a story containing the words on the list--sort of like a 4th-grade writing assignment, but with "grown-up" words--and publish it using social media. It could be posted one line at a time as Tweets by a large number of people, or it could be produced using status updates and comment threads on Facebook.

I'm going to kick out a couple lines, just as an example of what I have in mind. The Homeland Security-monitored words are in bold. Feel free to come up with your own story...



Once upon a time, there were two brothers, Cain and Abel. They did not eat pork. One day, while they were working in the meth lab, there was a black out.

"You swine," said Cain. "Did you forget to pay the electric bill again?"

"I think it's the grid," said Abel. "Can you help me out here? I have a date in Juarez, and I can't find my Trojans."

"Not that chick again," said Cain. "Didn't I tell you she's toxic?"

"I know it, man, but I need closure."



Did I say it had to be a GOOD story?? If anyone decides to take up this challenge, I'll post your work on my blog. And by the way, if you don't see me for a few days, please check that special room at the airport, the one lit by a single bare light bulb.

I find myself at that remarkable turning point for a writer, having finished something (something short, in this case, but finished nevertheless) and preparing to start work on something else. Luckily, I have numerous projects to choose from that are in various stages of completion.

In examining my options, I realize that I've written most of my short stories while also focused on a longer work. For whatever reason, some part of a story will come to me, and it bothers me enough that I have to set aside whatever else I'm doing to write it. Even though this image annoys me, I can't help thinking of the princess and the pea. The idea that won't give me any rest, that's the one I have to pursue. Most of the time, I go on with it until I have a full draft (but not always, which is why I have several half-finished stories that I now plan to work on).

It's a common idea that one does not want to know where one is going when starting in on a work, besides perhaps some pertinent detail or event. Maybe you can start a whole novel based on one line that pops into your head; this has happened to me. With the story I just finished, the whole first paragraph came to me at once. Or, I might think of a scene I want to describe, not knowing what's happening yet, and then the story grows up around it. I might eventually cut that scene... and that happens because I'm not planning anything. It's like taking a trip by simply getting on a plane without looking at the departure board to see where you're going...or even knowing if you'll get off the plane. Which sounds both exciting and risky (and certainly not a trip I want to take my kids on...but I'll make up some kids, if that becomes necessary). You bring a suitcase, but you have no idea what's in it. Once you're on board, you can drink whatever you want. If you order a vodka tonic instead of a Budweiser, those are two completely different stories. Okay--enough of that metaphor!

There is the oft-quoted line from Doctorow, about driving in the dark, which I won't repeat, but it pertains. Doctorow implies he's comfortable with the mystery of the writing process and knows he'll get somewhere eventually. That's how most writers I know approach their work. They might have some big event in mind that they're working toward, but that's it.

Picasso took the same idea a step further, not just describing the ideal process, but criticizing the alternative: "If you know exactly what you are going to do, what's the good of doing it? There's no interest in something you know already. It's much better to do something else."

Not only is mystery important to the process, it's crucial. You can't just know a story and want to tell it; you have to be curious. Your story has to have elements that you don't understand yet, or you will be bored (or at least, that's what happens to me). The question then is, how much mystery do you need, and how much can you tolerate? There are degrees of knowing, after all. The answer may be different for everyone.

When I work on a short story, there is much I don't know, but it's a smaller frame and more contained than something the size of a novel. Not knowing on a novel scale seems huge. Some writers welcome that space.

When I think about my approach to the novel, I see that maybe I've been going about it in the wrong way FOR ME. The freedom of all that space can also be a burden; it can be paralyzing. Some writers break it down to smaller pieces or tasks. And ultimately, it's one word, one line, one paragraph at a time, like anything. But I find myself wanting to control the direction of it, to plan more than I ever would in a story. There's something daunting about the size, the sheer number of options, that makes some writers second-guess each decision, third, fourth...and never finish.

In grad school, no one ever said they were working on a novel; they always announced shyly that we fellow students were critiquing an excerpt from "a longer work." As if its continuation hinged on the reception we gave it. So of course, we'd always start by saying how difficult it would be to give feedback on a small, early (read: fragile) part of something so huge and incomplete. In other words, we'd start by saying--Don't listen to what we say!

This was, in my opinion, bullshit. It only happened because we were students and didn't yet have the confidence to keep going with something or to chalk it up without mass approval. And I can say that even though I was on the receiving end at least once, with my "longer work" that finally became my thesis. Your gut will tell you when to chuck it, I'm convinced. But what IS legitimate is that showing the work too early could interrupt the process.

Here's something funny that I do: When I'm starting something I think is a novel, I file it under 'Short Stories' on my computer. It is at that point, too early to tell whether it will work or whether I'll stay with it. But usually, I know that it's a "longer work." I will call it "my novel" when I talk about it, and when I think about it. Maybe that's the problem.

Maybe I need to trick myself. Maybe the uncertainty that comes from getting on a plane and not knowing where I'll end up, the huge mystery of a novel, is too large and daunting a set of unknowns to confront. After all, the short story structure and size has served me pretty well.

So here's what I'm going to try this time: A little reverse psychology. I have two stories I've started. Note that I call them 'stories.' And one of them may actually be two different stories. I don't care where on my computer I file them, but I'm going to write them like stories. I'm going to attempt to ignore anything outside of the immediate event I'm trying to describe at that moment. I'm not going to think about how this story will lead to anything later, how it fits into a larger picture, or what to do with the mailman who keeps trying to speak when I want him to just shut up and deliver the mail. Get the picture? I'm still getting on the plane to destinations unknown, I'm still ordering the vodka-tonic, and I'm not checking luggage--I'm leaving the baggage at home. For the time being, at least, I'm not going to think about what happens when the plane lands. I'm only going to tell the story about the flight attendant spilling the drink in my lap, which leads me to stand in line for the restroom, which leads me to overhear a conversation between an elderly man and a young girl who's bouncing a baby in her lap and wearing the baby's pacifier on the finger where a ring would otherwise be. You get the picture.

I'll let you know how it comes out.

From a conversation with my 9-year-old:

Boy (sees book on shelf): Who's John Updike?

Me: He's a great fiction writer.

Boy: He writes about rabbits?

Me: No, there's a man called Rabbit...

Boy: John Updike is a rabbit?

Me: No, the character in the book is named Rabbit.

Boy: But he's not a rabbit?

Me: No, he's a man.

Boy: Why is he named Rabbit if he's a man?

Me: That's his nickname...

Boy: It's not about rabbits. That's weird.

Me: It's about what happens to him in his life, the man called Rabbit.

Boy: Oh. Can I read it?

Me: Maybe not yet... Maybe...when you're 10.

Boy: You always say that.

Me: That's my job...

Take a listen to this fabulous interview with author A.S. Byatt by Charlotte Higgins at The Guardian. Byatt is one of my favorite writers (you're beginning to think I have too many "favorites," but when one considers the vast number of published authors, really, my list still seems insignificant). In this interview, she touches on everything from how difficult it must be to grow up the child of a children's book author ("children's writers want to prolong their own childhood") to the difficulty with defining one's identity in the absence of a religious framework.

It's her discussion of the latter that I find most intriguing. She refers primarily to Western society when she says that the map of the world provided by religion is gone--that religion itself has "gone away," leaving only an interest in "ourselves." She talks about the various frames for trying to understand ourselves--how to work out identity--and finally identifies the "blogosphere" as the place where people are attempting self-definition. She says that everyone needs a mirror to "tell you who you are"--and that we are finding that mirror on Facebook. According to Byatt, Facebook has, in that sense, replaced God.

If we do look to Byatt's "blogosphere" for self-definition, that presents an interesting problem. Because the identity people construct, their online "persona," is just that: a construct. A fiction. Is that the primary mirror through which you see yourself, this fiction you've created?

For the sake of argument, how is this different from any other locus of self-definition? Isn't any self you put forward a fiction, exclusive and exclusionary, by definition? Shaped by you, both consciously and unconsciously?

I would think that, more than any other medium, the web's sheer pervasiveness, and the possibility of spending so much of one's time and "relationship" energy there, could make it the overwhelming source of one's self-definition.

I'm obviously not a scholar of philosophy, and I'm not a psychologist, I only play one on TV. But if Facebook (etc.) really is where we locate our primary sense of self, that seems dangerously reductive and illusory.

Byatt thinks someone should write a book about it. I think she's right.

In this enlightening interview with novelist David Mitchell at The Rumpus, Mitchell is asked about the sheer variety of his work. He tells interviewer Alec Michod that writers are like duck-billed platypuses "and critics are taxonomists, and to us duck-billed platypuses the question of whether we should be considered as an egg-laying mammal or what is a pointless exercise... A novelist’s job is to write a novel, not worry about how it fits into one’s oeuvre..."

I've always wondered what to call myself: fiction writer? humor writer? food/travel/grocery list writer? At some point, I settled on..."writer." But now I'm thinking duck-billed platypus might be a more descriptive label.

Mitchell comments on maturing over time as a writer: "...the older you get the more familiar you become with your own ignorance. Your writing, hopefully, has more spontaneity and verve as you age. Now it can take painstaking weeks...to excrete a single sentence. It can be like having a hemorrhage, but one hopes the quality is superior the greater the excretion."

Mitchell's hemorrhages are a good deal better quality than most. His latest novel, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, has been long-listed for the Man Booker Prize. His earlier acclaimed novel, Cloud Atlas, was shortlisted in 2004.

Carolyn Parkhurst is back from a whirlwind tour to promote her new novel, The Nobodies Album, which Liesl Schillinger reviewed glowingly in the NYT this past Sunday. Carolyn has condensed her on-the-road experiences into this list of hilarious book tour wisdom. Highly recommend.

A sampling:

Stay in character. When you call home, have your kids ask you a few questions about narrative voice.

In-flight writing exercise: Choose an item from the SkyMall catalog and try to imagine a character who might actually use it.

While you're on the road, you're functioning as an Ambassador of Literature. This means you can pretty much park anywhere.

(On my way to the DMV now to get one of those Ambassador of Literature hang-tags for my car...)

I just finished reading Scott Turow's New York Times review of Mr. Peanut, the new book by first-time novelist Alex Ross. The book sounds marvelous, exactly the sort of story I'd enjoy reading. It's about three faulty, possibly deadly marriages, and includes a character based on the real-life Sam Sheppard, who was accused (and then acquitted) in the murder of his wife. All three husbands portrayed here consider killing their wives. Which made me want to ask my husband a few questions. Anyway, the plot is complex, the story multilayered, and Turow describes it as "daring, arresting" and praises its "audacious and moving honesty." So far so good; it sounds brilliant, and I can't wait to read it.

And then Turow interrupts himself midstream to congratulate Ross on tackling such a forbidding topic: Marriage.

Really?

Turow tells us that back when he was in writing school, Richard P. Scowcroft, then Director of Stanford's Creative Writing Center,
"told those of us in the advanced fiction seminar that the one subject he had always feared writing a novel about was marriage, because it still seemed to him the most complex and frequently unfathomable of human relationships, notwithstanding his own long and successful marriage. Scowcroft’s remark is a testimonial to Ross’s bravery. In many ways it would have taken less courage to present a sympathetic portrait of Osama bin Laden than it did to write this novel, which flouts the treasured conceptions of love and marriage many of us depend on to make it through the day."

Wow. Did I read that correctly? Less brave to write a sympathetic portrait of an international terrorist than to write a deep and accurate portrait of marriage? Flouting treasured conceptions? Maybe it depends on who's doing the flouting.

If all novelists did was reinforce conventional wisdom, I suppose that would be pretty dull stuff. So, is that what most novelists who write about marriage are doing?

My complaint about Turow's review has nothing to do with what sounds to me like an intriguing book that I'd love to read. It's about Turow's puzzling assertion.

Normally, when one writes about marriage--attempting to get to the meat of it and portray, deconstruct, analyze, explore, whatever--well, such books are not often called out for their brave importance, are they? The authors are not usually lauded as fearlessly confronting this awesome yet central human territory. And yet, there are so many that do it. I'll leave their mention to others. (Yes, I'm being lazy, but this is my blog... so I'll just say that the first one that came to mind was Nadine Gordimer's None to Accompany Me, and the second was Paula Fox'a Desperate Characters.)

I'm led to wonder--I just wonder...whether the topic of marriage is suddenly deemed such a difficult and brave one to tackle because a man finally decided to write about it.

Those of you who know me will know that I'm not given to knee-jerk feminism, and usually I pay little attention to these kinds of inequities. That's because I'm not interested in keeping score or evening out a playing field just for the sake of it. And frankly, I want some help changing that flat tire. But this strikes me as all too rich. Our little novels of domesticity written by women are considered a dime a dozen, but as soon as a man tackles the subject, whoa, what courage!

One would think that women rarely produce myth-busting examinations of marriage, and only the husbands lie in bed at night dreaming of murder.

Susan Coll's hilarious new novel, Beach Week, is featured on NPR in Lizzie Skurnick's Three Degrees of Failure for the Recent Graduate.

I like this part: "It might seem odd to describe a novel that involves barfing in cars, stalking boys and a drunk dad playing beer pong in his underpants as heartwarming..."

Behind the barbs that Coll wields are understanding of and affection for her targets, and that's part of what makes the book's humor so effective.

Three Books is a regular NPR feature in which writers recommend their favorite three books in a given category. (You can read my contribution to the series here.)

Terrific review in The Washington Post for The Nobodies Album, which I blogged about here a few days ago. Art Taylor calls Parkhurst's novel "brisk and engaging...a meditation on writing itself and on the curious intersections between the imagined world and the real one."

What did I tell you?

I am always amazed by Carolyn Parkhurst's seemingly limitless imagination, and the unique lens through which she views the world, both of which are evident in her writing. I've known Carolyn since we were in grad school, and now we're in a fabulous writing group together. As a result, I've had the privilege of reading her new book, The Nobodies Album, as she was writing it. It's an absorbing, intelligent, complex work, and I thoroughly enjoyed watching the process as it unfolded, eagerly awaiting each new installment. The structural task Carolyn set for herself seemed huge: The main character, Octavia Frost, is a novelist late in her career. Her newest book is a rewrite of the final chapters of EACH of her previous novels. These final chapters, and their revised versions, are actual chapters in Parkhurst's book. In the novel's "present" story, Frost learns that her son, a famous rock musician, has been arrested for the murder of his girlfriend. Frost and her son are estranged because of something she wrote in one of her novels. The story of the murder and the mother-son relationship is told in chapters alternating with those final chapters of Frost's novels.

It sounds like one of those things one is told not to do in writer-school. But, that is because most people couldn't pull it off. Carolyn, however, DOES pull it off, which makes it a fascinating read.

It may seem like I'm putting too much emphasis on the complex structure, which I don't want to do--I don't want it to put people off. Because the amazing thing about it is that while it sounds complex in the explaining, when you read it, it's quite clear and clean and even elegant in its logic. And human--because Carolyn nails the mother-son relationship in all its strains, as well as the desire to remake one's own "story."
Booklist calls The Nobodies Album "a stunning blend of craft and ingenuity."

Publishers Weekly says that Parkhurst has "the gift of a real storyteller."

In case it wasn't enough to merely write this book, Carolyn has also created a real website for Octavia Frost, her fictional author-protagonist, which even includes book covers and descriptions of Frost's (fictional!) works. And, Carolyn has begun posting an entertaining series of tweets, which you can find on Twitter under #selfpimpinghaikus. Each tweet is a clever haiku that relates to her novel. And if you'd like to know what music inspired various aspects of the characters and story, on Carolyn's website, you can find a playlist that she used in the course of writing the book.

I may be Curiouswriter, but it's very likely that Carolyn Parkhurst is Geniuswriter.

I neglected to mention that Susan Coll will read from her new novel, Beach Week, this week.

Thursday, June 3, 7pm
Barnes & Noble
Bethesda Ave. at Woodmont Ave.

See you there!

For more scheduled events, see Susan's website.

I feel privileged to present a guest blog from the funny and talented novelist Susan Coll, whose newest novel, Beach Week, will be available in stores on June 1.



Seeing as Paula was bold enough to guest blog for Alternate Sides about an embarrassing moment in air travel, I thought I’d return the favor with an anecdote about my most embarrassing moment in book promotion. I should probably add, my most embarrassing thus far.

My last novel, Acceptance, was a satire about college admissions hysteria, with some inevitable subtext about the culture of hyper-parenting in the affluent suburbs. Because I approached this book with something of a journalistic eye, interviewing academic deans and admissions officers, and using source material, I came to know a lot about college admissions. I also wrote a piece for the Washington Post Outlook section about helicopter parenting. Somewhere along the way, the line between fact and fiction became a little blurred, I suppose, and I found myself frequently being asked in interviews for advice on raising teens and on shepherding them through the transition to college. These questions caught me off guard each time, but I answered them politely, even somewhat confidently at times---hey, I may not be a child psychologist, but I am a mother!

A couple of months into the book promotion cycle I was invited onto a network news program in the New York City metropolitan area---a small coup for a novelist. Accordingly, I went all out and bought a new brown top from Banana Republic and spent a fair amount of time trying to decide whether or not to wear my glasses. I made my way into the building, past security, and up the elevators at 30 Rock, trying to channel my inner Tina Fey. But the disaster began with the first question, and I never recovered. The young producer, probably just out of college herself, clearly had me confused with Dr. Phil, and began to ask me a series of parenting questions way beyond the range of even a battle-weary mother of three. I tried to fudge my answers for a while until the whole thing began to feel dishonest; I had visions of some aggrieved parent banging on my door demanding to see my Ph.D., and in return I’d slip her a slim comic novel. I finally interrupted the interviewer and asked if she was aware that I had written a novel. Um, no, she was not. The ride back down the elevator was something of a blur, particularly as I’d removed my glasses. The segment never aired. I gave the brown shirt to my daughter and she wore it to a recent interview. At least she got the job.

Susan Coll is the author of four novels, including Acceptance, which was made into a Lifetime Network film starring Joan Cusack. Coll's new novel, Beach Week, is a dark comedy that examines a suburban teenage rite of passage--the adult-free, post-high school trip to the beach. Teenage girls plan an unhinged blowout at the beach, while their misguided, affluent parents are too busy worrying about legal liabilities to fret over some missing pills or random hookups. Beach Week will be available on June 1. Also check out Susan's funny blog, Alternate Sides: Adventures Along the Northeast Corridor.

I think the humiliating book tour story could become a regular feature on this blog, so for those of you who have such tales and are willing to publicly humiliate yourselves (a second time?) for the benefit of...art...please get in touch!

Author C. M. Mayo has been living in and writing about Mexico for many years. Luckily for me, she also spends a good bit of time in Washington, DC, and I've had the chance to chat with her on many occasions. Not only is she a wonderful writer, she is full of helpful information, innovative ideas, and contagious enthusiasm for all things writing-related, and she doesn't mind sharing with the writing and blogging community at large, to our great advantage. See for instance, her tips on "How to hang in there and finish your novel" (yes, I'm taking copious notes...) on Leslie Pietrzyk's fabulous Work-in-Progress blog.

If you have not already had the pleasure of reading C.M. Mayo's novel, The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire, which was a Library Journal Best Book of 2009, rush out and get the paperback, which is now available. The Last Prince follows Maximilian’s short-lived career as the unfortunate Emperor of Mexico, and focuses specifically on his doomed adoption of a half-Mexican, half-American boy he chooses to be his heir. This little-known and fascinating piece of history is brought to life in Mayo's novel.

Publisher's Weekly calls The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire, "an engaging story brimming with majestic ambition."

Library Review says, "Mayo's cultural insights are first-rate, and the glittering, doomed regime comes to life."



Mayo's story collection, Sky Over El Nido, won the Flannery O'Connor Award for Short Fiction. She is also the author of the widely acclaimed travel memoir, Miraculous Air: Journey of a Thousand Miles through Baja California, the Other Mexico; and the anthology, Mexico: A Traveler s Literary Companion. Mayo is an avid translator and editor of contemporary Mexican literature.

Here, you can watch an interview with C.M. Mayo on WETA's Book Studio, hosted by Bethanne Patrick.

Here, you will find Mayo's Library of Congress lecture about her novel.

C.M. Mayo is a blogger extraordinaire, writing-savvy and internet-savvy, and she can be found in that incarnation at Madam Mayo. I especially admire her writing exercises, known as C.M. Mayo's Giant Golden Buddha and 364 More Daily 5-Minute Writing Exercises. Honestly, I don't know where she gets the energy for all she does! I wish I could borrow one-tenth of it now and then. Maybe when she takes a rare nap, she wouldn't mind... Madam Mayo, do you nap?

Author Debra Galant has me thinking about cars. I am a person who can mark time by the types of cars I've owned--or didn't own. From my grandmother's '63 Chevy Bel Air, which didn't survive quite long enough for me to get my driver's license, to my first car, a '68 Dodge Coronet 440 (the only car my dad ever bought new)--which did survive, barely, unless you factor in how it would stall out every time I was about to turn left across three lanes of oncoming traffic. The car I drive today is the first one I really chose for myself, plus it has XM radio (my first one only had AM...), so it's my favorite.

Now, Debra Galant has brought us the funny, poignant new novel, Cars From a Marriage, which charts the important events--big and small--in one couple's relationship by way of the automobiles that drive them throughout the course of their lives. The cars steer the reader from Ivy and Ellis's first meeting, to their first fight, and down the line to a family funeral. Finally, on a drive along the Pacific Coast Highway, Ivy and Ellis come to some serious and illuminating realizations about their lives.

Publisher's Weekly calls it "an affecting and strikingly honest look at a marriage."


In an interview from Crazy for Books, Galant talks about the slightly nontraditional structure of the book:

Unlike my first two books, “Rattled” and “Fear and Yoga in New Jersey,” which are satires, “Cars from a Marriage” strove to tell a really nuanced story of the way romantic love fades over the course of a marriage. With each successive chapter, Ivy and Ellis grow further apart, telling secrets to the reader that they wouldn’t dare tell each other. This breaks one of the rules of fiction writing, which requires a single protagonist. Because Ivy and Ellis get equal weight in the story, sympathy shifts between them. In a way, the protagonist of “Cars from a Marriage” turns out to be the marriage.

Crazy for Books says the author "deftly navigates" through the lives of this couple "with humor and insight."

You can also hear Ms. Galant discuss her book in this interview with Brian Lehrer on WNYC radio.

Full disclosure: I met Debra Galant during a residency at the VCCA, where she hooked me into playing the diabolical, addicting game known as Ex Libris. I was daily entertained by her perceptive wit, and I had the opportunity to hear her read from her funny and absorbing work. I highly recommend it!

Kermit Moyer, author of The Chester Chronicles, which I discussed here, has interesting things to say about the intersection between fiction and autobiography. After I heard his quote in a Writerscast interview, which I mentioned here, I knew he had only scratched the surface of his thoughts on the matter. Here, then, more on the subject from Kermit Moyer (and enough said by me).

I believe that the best way to tell the truth about yourself and your experience is to lie—that is, to write fiction rather than a memoir. Having just published an autobiographical novel called The Chester Chronicles, I can tell you that, first of all, it’s simply easier to tell uncomfortable truths about yourself when you seem to be talking about someone else. As the poet Richard Hugo has said,

The poem is always in your home town, but you have a better chance of finding it in another. . . . Though you’ve never seen it before, it must be a town you’ve lived in all your life. . . . [Here] it is easy to turn the gas station attendant into a drunk. Back home it would have been difficult because he had a drinking problem. (The Triggering Town)

But there’s another, even more crucial way that fiction is necessary if we’re going to tell the truth about our lives. If my recounting of my experience is to be as detailed and as richly textured as my experience has been, I have no choice but to use my imagination as much as, or more than, my memory. Because it’s simply impossible to do justice to life’s intricate and filigreed surfaces, its detailed particularities and varied textures, without resorting to imaginative invention.

And who can do without dialogue? But if dialogue occurs in a memoir, it tends to be suspect, to partake of the imagined rather than the remembered, since we can’t usually recall whole past conversations verbatim. So the inclusion of dialogue tends to compromise the memoirist’s primary obligation, which is to be true to the actual facts of the author’s life. The fiction writer’s primary obligation, on the other hand, is to be true to feeling rather than to facts. As E. L. Doctorow says:

Good writing is supposed to evoke sensation in the reader—not the fact that it’s raining, but the feel of being rained on.

Finally, I think the special power of fiction has something to do not only with the way it can render a felt sense of life in all its intricacy but also the way it can render life’s moment-by-moment spontaneity and its constant openness to surprise. I may start with the feeling of a remembered situation, but to be true to my experience, I have to let things develop on the page as they will, just as they do in life. Sometimes they take a course I’m familiar with; sometimes—in fact, more often than not—they don’t. Unlike the memoirist, I am free to allow my narrative’s course to be open to the living moment and to unfold as organically as life itself does rather than being predetermined by the facts of my life.

Which is also why I opted to use the present tense for The Chester Chronicles, even though the point of view is retrospective: the present tense indicates that the recounted experience is happening again right now in the memory and imagination of the narrator, and of the reader. And if the reader is living through it imaginatively along with the narrator, the effect is to make readers feel like the story has happened to them too, that it is actually part of their own experience. And when that happens . . . well, that's it, isn't it? That's what we're aiming for.

Kermit Moyer grew up an Army brat in the 1950s. He got his BA, his MA, and his PhD in English from Northwestern University and in 1970 joined the faculty of American University in Washington, DC, where he taught literature and creative writing for 37 years. His short fiction has appeared in The Georgia Review, The Southern Review, The Sewanee Review, and The Hudson Review, and he is the author of Tumbling, a collection of stories published by the University of Illinois Press. He lives with his wife Amy and their dog Zora on Cape Cod.