October 2013

One of the toughest questions a writer faces is, “What is your story about?” I’ve awkwardly stumbled through so many answers to this question—with loved ones, with fellow writers, with strangers—until I instituted the policy of not answering it. The answer the question is to diminish the story itself. To say that Moby Dick is about a man obsessed with catching a whale is to reduce it (not that I’m claiming to have written Moby Dick).

Still, it’s a question every author must ask himself or herself. I’ve noticed that most of my stories follow certain motifs: transience, desuetude, drifting states of abeyance. As one who grew up in a small rural town and saw so many putting on Norman Rockwell smiles of good citizenry to cover up any deviant behavior or thoughts, I’ve always been interested in, and sympathetic to, those drastic lunges of what I’ll call selfhood—the daring jail breaks from social norms, whether misguided, doomed, or embarrassing, that are often so necessary for a person to feel alive.

I guess that’s where “The Names of All Things” started. I had moved to Tucson, Arizona, with Heather Mackey, who is now my wife, while she got her MFA in creative writing at the University of Arizona. The Southwest was a new and arresting place for me. I worked all sorts of jobs in a place that didn’t offer many good ways to make a living. One of them was as a substitute teacher at a somewhat sketchy private school for rich, wayward youth. I was struck by how transient and uncommitted the other teachers were, and how the kids, despite regular drug tests, seemed to have been abandoned, let loose upon the world in their privilege or loss of privilege. Let’s just say that these ingredients made it a very dramatic, if not combustible, place in my mind. I wanted to follow one of those combustions in a story.

The other impulse of the story was simply a desire to write about the Southwest in all of it vast craziness and sweeping beauty, to capture its ragged, desultory rhythms, inhabit the burns of its textures, lose myself in what I’ll call its sacred godlessness. This is a spiritual story in its way.

The story underwent many outright revisions and many more tweaks, largely because of the number of times it was rejected. Perhaps those rejections were a good thing. I wish I had an accurate count of the number of lit journals that rejected it, but it’s safe to say 30 or 40 of them. It finally received second place in the Southwest Review’s David Nathan Meyerson Prize for Fiction, and then the Southwest Review blessedly decided to publish it.

The path of most creations has to wend through a dark forest of rejections. I like to think each rejection made the story a little better. Each rejection helped me better answer what this story is about.

And now, since the story has been available only in print, I’ve decided to self-publish it as an ebook. It was a goal of mine this year to learn about self-publishing, and the only way to learn about these things is to do it. Fortunately, I discussed the project with Brooke Warner at She Writes Press, and she guided me to Patti Capaldi, a masterful cover designer, who then found a ragged, moody photo by Alice Grossman, which adorns the cover. I felt as if publishing this piece was an extension of the original creative act, except with the help of others.

Also, kudos to Jim Brown for formatting this as an ebook.

I don’t really expect to make a dime, even though it sells for $0.99. It’s always just nice to have a story in the world, and to work with good people to make it so.

Confession: I haven’t read my stories in public since 1999. But I’m reading at tonight’s Lit Crawl. So I’m a bit nervous. And I can’t figure out what to read.

The 1999 reading was hosted by the Berkeley Fiction Review at a Barnes & Noble. There was a healthy crowd of erudite folks, most of them wearing stylish intellectual eye wear. I brought two stories: one was a lyrical flash fiction piece (“Heat,” which was later published in Word Riot), and the other was a chapter from a novel I was working on at the time, a gritty urban tale involving lots of sordid activities which befell my hapless, lost protagonist.

I decided to read the more daring piece, the chapter from my novel. I read into a microphone, but I didn’t really think of the sound traveling through the entire store. Afterward some of the folks in fine spectacles came up to me to tell me how much they liked the piece, and all seemed good. But then as I was walking out, a woman tugged my elbow. “Don’t you know there are kids in here,” she said.

She was right. My piece wasn’t the best for those in the kids’ section. It didn’t exactly rhyme with anything in Dr. Seuss, and Babar was long forgotten by my main character. It was a good lesson: always read a story that’s appropriate for the setting.

So I’m sitting here at Philz in an over-caffeinated state trying to decide to read what to read at tonight’s Lit Crawl event. I’m so damn honored to be reading with the likes of Pamela Painter, Meg Pokrass, Frances Lefkowitz, and Jane Ciabarti. I admire their writing so much that, well, it’s hard to imagine reading alongside them.

Since 100 Word Story is hosting the event, I’m not considering reading any novel chapters or longish short stories. The thing is that I’ve written about 150 100-word stories, so reading through them to decide which one to read is one daunting “Sophie’s Choice” moment. It’s hard to get rid of my darlings.

The one bit of advice I received was to read something funny because Lit Crawl can be raucous. Good advice, except I don’t really have anything that’s funny. (Note to self: start writing some light, humorous pieces).

I’m deciding whether to read a sampling of 100-word pieces so folks get an idea of the form or to read The Filmmaker: Eight Takes, a series of eight 100-word pieces that appeared in eclectica a while back.

While reading through my pieces, though, I had an intriguing epiphany: I tell more than I show in these pieces. I’m not sure if that’s good or bad—I don’t necessarily adhere to the “show, don’t tell” school of writing—but it’s something to be more conscious of when I write, as in does telling serve the story or would a little more showing behoove me.

The nice thing about doing an event like this is that the pressure of preparing for them forces this type of scrutiny and observation. I have to think about how I’m going to read each piece, so I notice things I didn’t notice when writing. I wonder if I’ll notice other things while reading tonight.

It’s hard not to be nervous. But the only way to learn is to put yourself out there and risk embarrassment. At least there will be plenty of wine to drink. I know because I’m bringing it.

First Self-Publishing Project: The Names of All Things

Stretch Goals. Telling, Not Showing. Lit Crawl 2013. Trepidation.

Archives for October 2013