Monday, October 29, 2018

TBR: Famous Adopted People by Alice Stephens


TBR [to be read] is a semi-regular, invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming, interesting books who will tell us about their new work as well as offer tips on writing, stories about the publishing biz, and, from time to time, a recipe! 


Give us your elevator pitch: what’s your book about in 2-3 sentences?

Korean-born adoptee Lisa’s identity issues are slowly wrecking her life. After an explosive argument with her best friend while they are in Seoul searching for their birth mothers, she takes an impulsive trip with a handsome stranger only to find herself in North Korea. Held captive in a palatial underground compound, Lisa must come to terms with who she is and where she’s going.

Which character did you most enjoy creating? Why? And, which character gave you the most trouble, and why?

The character I had the most fun with was Lisa’s half-brother Jonny, who is based upon a real historical figure. I wanted to get that balance of satirical and yet informative, and add a psychological glimpse into how a flesh-and-blood human being can become a brutal dictator. He is also an example of the ultimate unanswerability of the nature vs. nurture question that perpetually vexes adoptees: which part of me is embedded in my genetics and which part is due to my upbringing? The character who gave me the most trouble was Lisa herself. She is not me, but in writing her, I had to confront the same pain, alienation and confusion that I experienced growing up as a transracial adoptee.

Tell us a bit about the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.

The highs were writing it, which was cathartic, and its eventual acceptance by Unnamed Press, a fantastic indie press that publishes fierce, bold and highly literate works and who gave Famous Adopted People it’s perfect forever home. The lows were the many rejections I had to endure during the years-long submission process. My agent submitted it to 41 editors, and I myself sent it out about 20 times. (Unnamed Press was a cold submission, so writers take heart that manuscripts can make it out of the slush pile and onto an editor’s desk!) Rejection is caustic to the soul. But I took heart that the manuscript was never rejected because of the quality of the writing or any other fatal literary flaws, but rather because the individual editors just didn’t fall in love with the book. Quite a few claimed that Lisa was unlikable, which I took as editor-speak for the story doesn’t appeal to the soft middle of American culture and so we don’t want to take a chance on it.

What’s your favorite piece of writing advice?

Read the hell out of the genre in which you are writing. Read with a critical eye to see what works and what doesn’t. Don’t just read for the story, read for all the intricate moving parts that go into making an effective piece of literature.  

My favorite writing advice is “write until something surprises you.” What surprised you in the writing of this book?

I was surprised how intimate of a look I was allowing other people into my life. Though Lisa is her own fictional character, many of her experiences growing up as a transracial adoptee are mine. I’m a fairly private person and so it was somewhat shocking to find myself spilling my guts about my own personal pain.

Who is your ideal reader?

Besides adoptees, my ideal reader is a literary fiction buff who is willing to have the conventional view of adoption as a happily-ever-after fairy tale or a touching story of rescue and second chances challenged.

Inquiring foodies and hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book? (Any recipes I might share?)

Food plays a big part in my book, which features a Japanese chef who strives to make western food to please his employer. Food also serves as a symbol of gross economic inequality which is so perfectly illustrated by North Korea, where a select few gorge can gorge themselves on luxury foods while the vast majority make do with subsistence fare in between famines. Food is also an important cultural marker, and I enjoyed exploring the different palates of international cuisine, the raw fish of Japan, the dumplings of China, the noodle soups of Korea, the creams and sauces of France, the simple comfort of a tuna fish sandwich. I’m a big lover of noodles, and though I don’t have any recipes to share, I can tell you that the best ramen place in the DC area is Ren’s Ramen in Wheaton, the best Korean fusion is Seoul Food in Takoma Park, and the best sour soup dumplings and liang pi noodles can be found at Northwest Chinese Food in College Park.


READ MORE ABOUT ALICE STEPHENS: https://www.famousadoptedpeople.com/


ORDER THIS BOOK FOR YOUR TBR PILE:  http://www.unnamedpress.com/checkout/cart 




Monday, October 22, 2018

TBR: How to Sit by Tyrese Coleman


TBR [to be read] is a semi-regular, invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming, interesting books who will tell us about their new work as well as offer tips on writing, stories about the publishing biz, and from time to time, a recipe! 

Give us your elevator pitch: what’s your book about in 2-3 sentences?

How to Sit is a collection of essays and stories meant to represent a memoir or memory based writing. It is meant to confuse the line between fiction and nonfiction, while examining elements of my life and identity.

Which piece did you most enjoy writing? Why? And, which piece gave you the most trouble, and why?

I really enjoyed writing “Thoughts on My Ancestry.com DNA Results.” It’s my favorite piece in the collection because it is the one I had the most fun writing. I embraced my speaking voice and syntax completely. I went outside my comfort zone with structure, even including footnotes. I kind of just threw up my hands and decided I was going to go for something I felt was completely new and different. It’s the first time I ever explored speculative essay writing. This is where I am speculating on possible facts based on the information in front of me. For an essay on ancestry from someone whose ancestors were slaves, really the only thing you can do is speculate. And I had a lot of fun thinking about all the different stories my ancestors could’ve been a part of.

“How to Mourn” was the most difficult to write. It is was the most technically difficult because I wanted to play with point of view. Ultimately, it’s a craft essay wrapped up in the story about my grandmother’s death told in first person, but through third person. It’s complicated to say the least, but deceptively not hard to read and that took a lot of work. But, it is also one of my favorites and the essay that received a notable in Best American Essays.

Tell us a bit about the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.

Well…I think the highs and lows for me came in trying to conceptualize what this book would be and look like. Early on, I had this thought that I wanted to a chapbook that was flash creative nonfiction novella. That changed when I wasn’t getting any traction or bites. I was speaking to my friends Donald Quist and LaKiesha Carr and they asked me why I was so married to the idea of a chapbook and if I had enough pieces for a full length collection. They were the ones who encouraged me to go back to the drawing board, put the fiction and the nonfiction together and see what happens. This all coincides with learning about other collections that combine fiction and nonfiction. I had no idea that that could be a thing. After that, I submitted to a few open calls with independent presses because I knew that something genre-less with no defined bookstore shelf would be interesting to agents or big publishers. Luckily, I found Mason Jar.

What’s your favorite piece of writing advice?

Actually, something you told me, Leslie*, which was to write the stories that scare you the most. I really took this advice to heart when drafting the pieces in this collection. But, my question for you is, when those stories see the light of day, are we allowed to hide?

My favorite writing advice is “write until something surprises you.” What surprised you in the writing of this book?

Almost all of these pieces started off as memoir, or an attempt to write about a real life situation that happened to me. What surprised me were those instances where I realized that the way this happened in real life is pretty boring. I was surprised by those moments where I felt I needed to jazz it up and turn it into fiction because you always think that your life is much more interesting than it really is. And maybe at that time, that moment is full of emotion and tension, but later on when you are trying to reenact it on the page, its dull and “so what.” I wasn’t expecting that to happen as often as it did.

How do you approach revision?

I am a slow writer. I have no idea how people churn out think pieces or write so quickly about the news. 800 words can take me a month to write. This is because I edit as I go along. I revise what I’ve written before every time I pick up a piece of writing I’ve started. It is hard for me to do a quick and dirty draft. So, when I revise, my hope is that the piece is as close to what I want it to be as possible. That isn’t always the case. When I need to do a heavy revision, sometimes I start off by rewriting the entire piece. It helps to find holes or problems I did not see before.

Inquiring foodies and hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book?

Nope. However, if you want to bring ME some food, I will eat it. I am more of a heater-upper than chef.

***

READ MORE ABOUT TYRESE COLEMAN: www.Tyresecoleman.com

BUY THIS BOOK FOR YOUR OWN TBR PILE: www.masonjarpress.xyz/chapbooks-1/how-to-sit
  
READ AN EXCERPT, “How to Sit”: https://pankmagazine.com/piece/sit/



*Blushing! And always pleased to see former students leap forward so beautifully, sparked by something I have said.

Tuesday, October 16, 2018

TBR: Carry Her Home by Caroline Bock

TBR [to be read] is a semi-regular, invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming, interesting books who will tell us about their new work as well as offer tips on writing, stories about the publishing biz, and, from time to time, a recipe!  



Give us your elevator pitch: what’s your book about in 2-3 sentences?

Forty-seven stories—from flash fiction to full-length works, deeply felt, autobiographical fiction—unfold across the decades from the 1960s to present day and reveal a family’s hopes and fears, truths and lies, and love.


Which character did you most enjoy creating? Why? And, which character gave you the most trouble, and why?

Many of the stories are about this real character, Pop. Murray Blech. Veteran of the Korean War. Jew from the Bronx. A guy who marries, after a short tumultuous courtship, Louise Garofalo, an Italian-American from Maspeth, Queens, and whose joy turns quickly to tragedy. Even more so, Pop, in his heart is always running away, but ends up staying, for his children, because that is who is. He’s also a very good dancer. I loved writing Pop, I knew him well. In comparison, for Louise I had to research the contours of her life, walk the streets in Queens and Greenwich Village that I imagined she walked, listen to music from 1960s, practice the mambo, the dance she loves, and I’m a pretty bad dancer. Of course, Murray Blech and Louise Garofalo are my parents, and I am imagining their courtship and what came afterwards.
   

Tell us a bit about the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.

Many lows and one big high. I first tried to write this book as a linked novel-in-stories. No one wanted to publish it. The agent that represented my young adult novels (Lie and Before My Eyes) didn’t think she could sell it as linked short stories. I thought I could expand on the stories that were set in the 1960s, and that are the heart of this collection, but I couldn’t quite make it to a novel. The highs began when I started writing flash fiction, (fiction 1,000 words and under).  I started expanding outward with the characters, even naming one recurring character, Caroline. Naming the character after myself gave me permission  somehow to go deeper with the stories, to fill it what I didn’t know, or don’t, frankly, want to remember. These shorter stories began to be published in literary magazines. A year and a half ago, I decided as a goal to put the stories set in the 1960s with these flash fiction stories and see if they “hung” together, see if they felt like a whole collection—and they did. I decided to submit the collection myself to small presses. And one day last spring, sprinting to teach a class, I received a call from the wonderful publisher, Kathleen Wheaton. My collection had won The 2018 Fiction Award from the Washington Writers’ Publishing House and that as part of the prize they would publish my book.

What’s your favorite piece of writing advice?

“Character is the very heart of fiction,” to paraphrase John Gardner. I always start with a voice in my head and think: who is this person? Why am I thinking about him or her? Why do I want to write about them, and by extension, why should a reader, any reader, care? Of course, if I think too much about this, especially the last question, I don’t write. So my other self-generated advice is: Write. Write more. Don’t think. See what happens with the words. Remember: you love words. Tempestuous, heat-seeking, full-bodied words often save you, and  your characters, from the void, from despair. Write.

  
My favorite writing advice is “write until something surprises you.” What surprised you in the writing of this book?

I wrote the stories in Carry Her Home over the last six years, and I was surprised that once I put the stories together that there seemed to be an arc from beginning to end—even the stories that are much less autobiographical, less personal, less drawn from my family, since not all are linked by blood. The whole is more expansive than its parts.
           

How did you find the title of your book?

Carry Her Home is the title of one of the works—a story told from Murray’s point of view about his wife, felled by tragedy, and how he wants, desperately, to carry her home from the state psychiatric hospital. I had to go inside another’s head and heart in this story. I broke apart writing this story. But it wasn’t the first title for the collection. It wasn’t the title I submitted the collection under—I went with a more neutral title: String Theory, the title of another story in the collection that the publisher didn’t think was the most resonant piece in the book, and she was right. When I suggested Carry Her Home, I knew it was the better, braver choice. I wish that I had named the collection that from the start.

 
Inquiring foodies and hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book? (Any recipes I might share?)

I’m half Italian (Sicilian) and half Jewish, how could there not be food? There are several stories in the collection in which Sunday dinner, appetizing and noshes are central. There is also a story about cake pans entitled, “Bundt Cake Pans.” So, here is the original recipe from my husband’s Grandma Ray for the most delicious Chocolate Chip Coffee Cake, which can made in a Bundt cake pan. I have added in parentheses a few notes from the times I have made this recipe. (Scroll to bottom for the recipe.)
  

READ MORE ABOUT CAROLINE BOCK: www.carolinebock.com

ORDER CAROLINE’S BOOK FOR YOUR TBR PILE: http://ww.politics-prose.com/book/9781941551165

NOTE: Caroline will be reading at Politics & Prose (main store 5015 Connecticut Avenue NW, Washington DC) on Sunday, October 21 from 1-2 pm. All are welcome!


Grandma’s Chocolate Chip Coffee Cake

¼ lb butter or margarine (unsalted)
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract
2 cups flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 cup sour cream or plain yogurt (not fat free)
6 oz. chocolate chips

Cream together butter, sugar.
Add eggs and vanilla.
Sift together all dry ingredients.
Alternate sifted flour and sour cream into butter mixture.
Stir in chips.

Pour into greased round tube or spring form pan. Can use Bundt cake pan.

Mix topping ingredients then sprinkle topping over batter:
½ cup brown sugar
1 tsp. cinnamon
½ cup chopped walnuts (optional)                      

Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes or until a tester comes out dry. Cool. (Enjoy!).


Tuesday, October 9, 2018

TBR: Anagnorisis by Kyle Dargan


TBR [to be read] is a semi-regular, invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming, interesting books who will tell us about their new work as well as offer tips on writing, stories about the publishing biz, and, from time to time, a recipe! 



We don’t expect an elevator pitch from a poet, but can you tell us about your work in 2-3 sentences?

I have been writing about my travels to China for some time, but it has taken me years to actually become comfortable with widely publishing such material as the opportunity to travel to China has always been bittersweet for me. The two times I have traveled there, I have been hosted by the Chinese Writers Association, and they were very kind to me. At the same time, it isn’t a secret that there are a slew of native Chinese writers—those openly dissident and those not—that the Communist Party silences and jails. So if I am writing honestly about China and my time there, I cannot be writing only about the wonders, of which there are many. But what happens then when those people who have been kind to me read work of mine which is part critical of their country? (The other option, which I had been defaulting to, was to write nothing.) So that, as well as being bold enough to include straight nonfiction in the book, was the challenge for ANAGNORISIS.

Tell us a bit about the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.

No low points writing this book. I will say that significant aspects of it were inspired by my disappointment over the reception of my last book, but aside from processing that frustration into poems, it was wonderful getting to work with a blk woman editor, Parneshia Jones, for the first time (a rare opportunity for anyone still, sadly).

What’s your favorite piece of writing advice?

The only writing advice I offer universally is that everything you write—any draft, any revision, any book—is only an attempt.  (I actually articulated this in a tweet recently that went shockingly viral—someone quoted it back to me at a reading.) And what I am suggesting is that there is no need to be particularly hung up on attempting something in your writing because the best thing you ever write and the worst are both only just attempts at articulating a vision—a try. And tries are plentiful for writers.

What was your experience ordering these poems?

There is a strong hand at play in all my books’ structures, but with ANAGNORISIS in particular I wanted to curate a very specific experience. The movement away from, or out of, the State and psychic violence of early 2010s America to China (with the nonfiction passage serving as a bridge) and then back, bearing new perspective, is the same geographical and emotional journey I endured writing the book. One Amazon reviewer—bless them—wrote “[t]he beginning sequence of poems was compelling in its language and flow of raw, yet lyrically refined frustration and rage […]. The energy of the first half seemed to fade and I was left, however guiltily, to grind my way to the end.” That is exactly the point, though. I was not trying to, nor do I believe I have to, sustain a rage for the entirety of a book. At some point, that would become more performative than a true reflection of my honest processing. So the fish tastes like fish—its strong notes and subtlety. Sorry.

Inquiring foodies and hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book? (Any recipes I might share?)

So speaking of food, while I cannot cook a lot of it, the thing we ate the most in China was actually Corean (Korean) food—barbeque & bibimbap. (There is actually a poem about dining at a North Corean restaurant in the book.) Done well (and I know the difference now), or at least done with an attention to tradition, I can’t recommend it enough.

Japchae is a great Corean dish that is easy to make at home. With the nod to tradition earlier, I would recommend this preparation video by food blogger Angela Minji Kim: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyA-3nJD4TA


READ MORE ABOUT KYLE DARGAN: http://www.american-boi.com/

ORDER ANAGNORISIS FOR YOUR TBR PILE:  https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780810137844



Friday, October 5, 2018

Fall Classes!


Maybe I’ll see you at one of my two fall single-session classes??


Saturday, October 13
10:30 ~ 12:00 noon
Fall for the Book Festival
George Mason University

FIND YOUR CREATIVE VOICE
Have you always wanted to write but couldn’t quite find the courage to pick up a pencil? Or perhaps you’re a secret writer, scribbling stories in private notebooks, compulsively filling the pages of your journal? This supportive, hands-on workshop with Leslie Pietrzyk will give you courage to write and direction about how to proceed. Through discussion and writing exercises, participants will learn some basic techniques of fiction/memoir writing. The goal is to leave with a couple of promising pieces to finish at home. Bring a pen and lots of paper or your (charged) laptop!

Note: This class is appropriate for beginning and intermediate writers.

This is a ticketed event. Tickets are $40 and may be purchased from: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/find-your-creative-voice-creating-memorable-fiction-memoir-tickets-48895624128


*****

Monday, October 15, 2018
6:30 ~ 9 PM
Politics & Prose Bookstore
RIGHT BRAIN WRITING: Material Goods
$45 (10% off for members)

Explore your creative side in this session, one of a series of stand-alone classes with prompts designed to get your subconscious flowing. Through guided exercises, we’ll focus on writing about the variety of items we own or have owned along the path of our lives. Can we love a “thing”? What happiness (or sadness) might “things” bring? No writing experience necessary! This is a great class for beginners and also for those fiction writers and/or memoirists with more experience who might be stuck in their current projects and are looking for a jolt of inspiration. Our goal is to have fun in a supportive, nurturing environment and to go home with several promising pieces to work on further.  Please bring lots of paper and pen/pencil or a fully charged computer.




Work-in-Progress

DC-area author Leslie Pietrzyk explores the creative process and all things literary.