Fictionaut Five: Laura Ellen Scott

Laura Ellen Scott writes very short and very long these days, blogging about it at probablyjustastory.blogspot.com. She also curates a blog where writers and editors offer their brief thoughts on writing very short fiction, and in April 2010 will join Prick of the Spindle as fiction editor.

What books/films do you feel closest to?

“Feel closest to” is a good way of putting it—doesn’t imply that I recommend them. Films: Belizaire the Cajun, Repo Man, Return to Boggy Creek, Suddenly Last Summer. Books: Four Novels (Duras collection), Ancestors and Descendants of Norris and Elizabeth Bennett (by Ned Crislip) and The George Mason University Catalog.

Do you have a mentor/have you ever had a mentor/do you yourself mentor?

I’ve been in a university environment since I was eighteen, so the concept of mentor is institutional. However, one of my past students just referred to me as a mentor, and that gave me pause. I’d thought we’d moved on to the artistic peer stage, which is my strong preference.

When you were a child, what did you want to be as an adult?

Someone who made other people change their minds and like it. Mom says I was copying words from the dictionary, trying to write a book before I could read. That’s pretty arrogant.

What are your favorite websites and online artist’s resources?

Resources? Not so much, except to remind myself of the difference between affect and effect. I follow a lot of writers on twitter and use Duotrope’s “What’s New” like a gossip column. I read several writers blogs regularly—Scott Garson, Sean Lovelace, and Erin Fitzgerald mainly, but also Art Taylor’s Art & Literature blog—I’d say Art is generally responsible for recommending most of my summer reading. I read your prompt blog, Meg, but it makes me feel like I’m lazy. I just discovered Kuzhali Manickavel’s blog, which is glorious. I miss Barry Graham’s old blog, Fuck You Penguin, and Spamusement.

What is happening with your creative world right now?

I cracked Smokelong, thank you very much! I’m also in the debut issue of Corium Magazine and the second issue of Double Shiny, and all of those pieces come from my recently completed (though not published, hint-hint) chapbook of gothic-ghosty vsf that I’m calling Curio. So I’m at a stage of rest in terms of new writing, but I’ll soon be listed as the new Fiction Editor at Prick of the Spindle beginning with issue 4.2 (June 2010). As you know Adam Robinson had me choose the March roster for Everyday Genius, and I’m so honored that people think I can do this sort of thing.

The Fictionaut Five is our ongoing series of interviews with Fictionaut authors. Every Wednesday, Meg Pokrass asks a writer five (or more) questions. Meg is an editor at Smokelong Quarterly, and her stories and poems have been published widely. She blogs at http://megpokrass.com.