Julie Innis‘s work has appeared or is forthcoming in Gargoyle, Prick of the Spindle, BLIP, Slush Pile, Lit N Image, Fogged Clarity, Pindeldyboz, The Long Story, and Underground Voices, among others. In May 2009, she was a finalist for the Glimmer Train Short Story Award for New Writers and in May 2010, she won the Seventh Glass Woman Prize for Fiction. She has high hopes for May 2011.

Susan Tepper: Julie, your story “My First Serial Killer“ is an eyebrow raiser right from the get-go.  So it’s the narrator’s first serial killer, does that mean she anticipates and even desires other serial killers?

Julie Innis: I don’t know how much this character desires serial killers as much as she desires meaningful attention from men.  This is probably a sad commentary on the state of Manhood today.  This story grew out of the title — which is pretty unusual for me.  There’s a toy called “My Pretty Pony” and I’d been playing around with riffs on that:  “My Pretty Pitbull” etc. and somehow managed to stumble onto the idea of “Firsts” and having a first serial killer made a lot of sense to me at the time, probably because I’m from Ohio, birthplace of a number of presidents and serial killers.

ST:  Desire, yes.  And connection.  She talks politics with her serial killer while he inflicts pain.  Is this a form of sexual transference going on?

JI:  I free-associated a lot of this story, probably more madness than method, admittedly.  The Dorothy Hamill haircut made me think of Ice Castles which reminded me of Robby Benson and then to Lloyd Benston. That I imagine this serial killer to be a Republican I hope makes clear the perilous situation our liberal-minded narrator finds herself in!  Had I written this story within the past year, perhaps he would have been a Tea Party member, though I hope my serial killer comes across as being somewhat well-educated, aloof, and fiscally conservative as opposed to rabid, insane, and fiscally suicidal.

As far as sexual transference goes, there’s a great deal of impotence involved with a serial killer who uses a dull knife.  (I’m sorry, Mom, if you’re reading this, but it had to be said.)

ST:  HA!  I’m sure your Mom will forgive you for the sake of art.   The narrator and her serial killer interact like a severely dysfunctional couple.  You write: Our days together fall into an easy rhythm–breakfast then a trip to the bathroom, his eyes politely averted…

It’s totally zany and funny despite the horrific aspect of torture and confinement.  Not an easy thing to pull off, Julie, yet you did.  How so?

JI:  I should admit that I wrote this story in large part to amuse myself, so it’s a huge relief to hear that someone else besides me finds it zany and funny.  I have been known to have a sick sense of humor.

True story:  I have not shown this story to my mother who would definitely not find it zany or funny, though my aunts (my mother’s five sisters) somehow managed to stumble across this story on the internet in the past year, circulated it among themselves, declared it ‘bizarre’, swore to never show it to my mother, and then agreed that it was typical of me since I’ve always been ‘the weird one.”  Ah family.

ST:  Julie that is exactly what I do.  Write to amuse thyself!  Why else write?

Well to add insult to injury (literally), her serial killer starts having girls over at night, which is an absolutely fabulous plot twist.  Total story insanity at this point.  Does this upset her?

JI:  Yes, the clack of those high heels is much much worse than any of the shallow knife passes or cigarette burns.  That he loses interest in her is the deepest cut of all.

ST:  I won’t give away your ending which is the cherry on the cupcake.  But did you know where this story was going or did the ending kind of fling itself at you?

JI:  I’ve read a lot of writers who talk about discovering the story as they go.  It always seemed like something that would happen to other people, but not to me — like being crowned Prom Queen, or getting a reality TV show.  So when it happened with this story, this ending that yes, exactly as you put it, flung itself at me, I thought Finally, now I am a real writer and big things are going to start happening.

This was over two years ago and I’m still waiting.  But I was glad to experience, if only briefly, the magic of the organically realized ending.

Read “My First Serial Killer” by Julie Innis

Monday Chat is a bi-weekly series in which Susan Tepper has a conversation with a Fictionaut writer about one of his or her stories. Susan is Assistant Editor of Istanbul Literary Review and hosts FIZZ, a reading series at KGB Bar.

Charles Baxter was born in Minneapolis and graduated from Macalester College, in Saint Paul. After completing graduate work in English at the State University of New York at Buffalo, he taught for several years at Wayne State University in Detroit. In 1989, he moved to the Department of English at the University of Michigan–Ann Arbor and its MFA program. He now teaches at the University of Minnesota.

Baxter is the author of 4 novels, 4 collections of short stories, 3 collections of poems, a collection of essays on fiction and is the editor of other works. You can read his story “Gershwin’s Second Prelude” on Fictionaut.

Q (Meg Pokrass): What is your feeling about mentoring? Did you have a mentor or mentors for writing at any point?

The only real mentoring I had came from older teachers whose examples suggested to me that some kind of a writing life would be possible for me. Mentors should be good readers who can honestly tell you what’s good and not-so-good about your work and (most importantly) can tell you WHY, in detail.

What happens when a story isn’t happening, when something isn’t flowing? How do you overcome it?

If a subject isn’t working for me, I’ll try another subject. The subject has to create its energy and has to give the writer him/herself energy, too. You can’t force a subject, and if it bores you, it’ll bore everybody else.

What beguiles you now, in this time in book culture and its evolution alongside technology?

What’s exciting about the present time is that screen culture is in a pitched battle with book culture; there are all kind of people who want to kill off books, who really want them dead. It’s frightening to watch.

Who are your favorites in writing? Who do you return to time and time again for inspiration?

Katherine Anne Porter, Chekhov, William Maxwell, Shakespeare, Tolstoy, Paula Fox, Kawabata, Montaigne, many of course, many others.

What’s in the works?

A new book of stories, out in January:  Gryphon: New and Selected Stories.

What are the most common mistakes new writers make?

The most common mistake new writers make is one of vanity: they want to show off what they can do. They don’t realize that what has been blazing in their minds does not necessarily make it to the page.

The Fictionaut Five is our ongoing series of interviews with Fictionaut authors. Every Wednesday — and over the holidays, every Saturday — Meg Pokrass asks a writer five (or more) questions. Meg is the editor-at-large for BLIP Magazine, and her stories and poems have been published widely. She blogs at http://megpokrass.com.

Before we check in with JM Prescott, Fiction Writer and Fictionaut Member Cami Park passed away yesterday. She had been facing an illness for many years and was an inspiration as a writer but also as a person. Many writers who had the chance to work with or converse with Cami, myself included, sound in unison that she was a class act. A truly gifted writer known for encouraging, inspiring and appreciating others, she will be missed. Some of her work is archived here in her profile at Fictionaut and her personal blog here is yet another lasting testament to her positivity, charm and intuit: http://oddcitrus.wordpress.com/ Modern short fiction was better with her in it. I was personally inspired by her. She will be missed. -Nicolle Elizabeth

Q (Nicolle Elizabeth): Jo what’s the deal with the speculative fiction group offering people money or something? Tell us everything here this is a one question interview. Thought it would be more avant-garde this week. Minimalism, etc. I mean you shouldn’t be minimalist, you should be multiplicitious (not a word) with the deets, but still. Also some info on you, big words lots of words so many words, bird. I mean if you don’t care about the concept we’re fine with that. You could also make up a question you would like to be asked that would be artsy too. Dare I say, speculative? ZING.

A (JM Prescott): Hahaha, Nicolle, très avant-garde. The Speculative Fiction group is to promote a great contest and the winners will definitely be getting money – $500. Also, two honourable Mentions in each category will win $50.

The CZP / Rannu Fund For Writers of Speculative Fiction is and international contest for all writers of science fiction, fantasy, horror, magic realism, surrealism, and all things in between. The contest is running now through January 15, 2011 and a winner will be chosen for both fiction and poetry, as well as honorable mentions for each category. Anyone can submit and multiple submissions are welcome at a discount.

This contest began in 2008, so it’s relatively new and new writers have a real chance at the prize. The fund was started by CZP’s (ChiZine Publishing) Sandra Kasturi and Brett Alexander Savory, in honour of the 30th wedding anniversary of Sandra’s mother and step-father for their contributions to the arts and education both in Canada and Estonia.

The judges for poetry are last year’s winner Steve Vernon and honorable mention winner Colleen Anderson with poet and journalist Jacob Scheier whose poems have been published in literary journals across North America and in New York City, aired on CBC radio and have been used as inspiration for a choreographed dance performance at Toronto’s Enwave Theatre. The Fiction judges are last year’s winner Barbara Gordon and honorable mention winner Francine Lewis with author Peter Straub, his seventeen novels include Ghost Story, Koko, Mr. X, two collaborations with Stephen King, The Talisman and Black House, and his most recent, In the Night Room.

CZP publishes the weird stuff; the unsettling, fantastic and the disturbing. Stories with an otherworldly sense or ones that are bit too real. And stories that explore what it means to be human or what it means not to be. Their top priority is to publish well-written character-driven stories. The single most important quality we look for at CZP is resonance. It is said that if you like one CZP book, chances are, you’ll like them all.

If you submit to The CZP / Rannu Fund For Writers of Speculative Fiction contest you will be read by editors and writers who know what their talking about and your story could just be picked to win the $500 or even the $50. Send up to 5 poems, a short story or a novel excerpt in the body of an email to rannufund@gmail.com and submit your entry fee of only $10 ($15 for two entries) via PayPal. Find out more about how to enter at The CZP / Rannu Fund For Writers of Speculative Fiction website. Or contact me through The CZP / Rannu Fund For Writers of Speculative Fiction Fictionaut group and Facebook page if you have any questions. (I might even give you an inside edge.)

I recently joined the family at CZP and they have never found a warmer or more supportive group people; the writers and editors alike. And everyone connected with CZP is passionate about speculative fiction. No one is too important to help out in anyway they can to help, whether it’s raising money to fund contests like this or to help out at a book launch. CZP is a family and I’m glad to have been adopted into the very weird clan. The only down side is I can’t submit to The CZP / Rannu Fund For Writers of Speculative Fiction.

I am also editor-in-chief at The Glass Coin, an online zine of flash fiction, prose and poetry and am also a freelance writer. One of these years I’ll get up the nerve to submit my novel to CZP. I am so lucky to make my living working with words. Everyone told me when I was in school that I needed to get a real job – they might have been right but I didn’t listen.

Nicolle Elizabeth checks in with Fictionaut Groups every Friday.

Irish-born Ethel Rohan‘s most recent stories have or will appear in Hot Metal Bridge, On Earth As It Is, Bluestem Magazine, and Pif Magazine. In addition to her story collection, Cut Through the Bone, from Dark Sky Books, her second story collection, Hard to Say, is forthcoming from PANK in 2011. She blogs at ethelrohan.com.

How do you feel about the importance of having a mentor as a writer?

I’m a forever student, always seeking, always learning.

As a girl, I struggled with learning differences and every school day attended what back then in Ireland we called ‘remedial classes.’ Sister Gerethie, gray-haired under her black habit, with Multiple Sclerosis and a blackthorn cane, was my first true mentor. She took me from the mis-belief that I was stupid and a failure to the realization that I could be smart and successful.

In America’s equivalent to high school, I again felt mentored and nurtured by my English teacher, Miss Ryanie. She supported and encouraged my writing and stories, and made me feel worthwhile, as if I had something special to offer others through my words and imagination.

I felt mentored again in Mills College while earning my MFA in fiction, most especially by Victor LaValle, author of Slapboxing with Jesus and Big Machine. At a time when I was struggling mentally and emotionally, Victor championed my work and buoyed my faith in my voice, my uniqueness, and the stories that only I could tell.

Most recently, Kevin O’Cuinn, fiction editor, Word Riot, entered my life at just the right time to encourage and propel me, to reassure me that I was writing stories worth readers’ time, interest and investment.

If I’ve learned anything about myself and my writing by now, it’s that nothing will stop me putting words on the page. That said, each of the above-mentioned were vital to my growth and success as a writer, to my faith in myself and what I had to offer readers.

A mental ex-lax thing, do you have tricks to move things through when not feeling as inspired?

Honestly, I never feel blocked or uninspired. My struggle is more to remember to step away from my constant writing and attend to the rest of my life, especially my daughters. I used to worry I’d run out of material, characters, and/or imagination. That I’d have no more “good” stories to tell. That I would indeed get blocked. I don’t worry about any of that anymore. The words, characters and stories are endless. The challenge, I’ve learned, is to pick the right word, the right character, the right story.

What writers, artists, musicians (dead or alive) do you turn to again and again for inspiration?

I worry it’s peculiar to me, but I don’t usually write to music. I’ve sometimes played classical, New Age, and my favorite songs and artists while I write, but I prefer silence—just the sounds of our house and cat and the click-click of the keyboard.

I’m a ferocious reader and everything I read inspires me in one way or another—whether to aspire to, emulate, or police against.

Recent titles I’ve read (am currently reading) include (chap)books by Darlin’ Neal, xTx, Tillie Olsen, Paula Bomer, Eric Beeny, Denis Johnson, Matt Bell, Courtney Eldridge, J.G. Ballard, and Sam Lipsyte. I’m never far from a book. Never.

Three things every writer would benefit from?

Discipline, faith, and perseverance.

What is the best writing advice you ever got?

From Victor LaValle: Be interesting, strange and surprising. Also, know your weaknesses as a writer and police against them.

Tell us about your new collection!

Cut Through the Bone, from Dark Sky Books, is a collection of thirty very short stories. The stories center on my obsessions and preoccupations with missing parts, severed selves, and incompleteness. I believe in this collection and hope hard the stories will resonate with readers. Will leave them feeling moved and rewarded.

What is in the works?

My second story collection, Hard to Say, a little book of fourteen linked stories, is forthcoming from PANK, 2011. I’ve ‘finished’ a third story collection ms, The World Dented, that I haven’t submitted anywhere yet. I’m also working through a ‘final’ revision of a novel set in Dublin, titled Home Slippery Home.

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 the editor-at-large for BLIP Magazine, and her stories and poems have been published widely. She blogs at http://megpokrass.com.

The January 2011 issue of The Writer Magazine features an article about Fictionaut by Erika Dreifus. She says:

What I found impressed me: an engaged place, filled with energetic writers, both emerging and established… I was humbled and gratified by the responses that my own fiction received, and impressed by the quantity and quality of work that others were sharing.

You can read the entire piece as a pdf file here.

Used Furniture Review is a nice literary journal. David Cotrone of UFR has started a Fictionaut Group for it. Thought I’d ask him about that.

Q (Nicolle Elizabeth): What are some journals Used Furniture Review likes and why?

A (David Cotrone): We love PANK, Fifty-Two Stories, elimae, Kill Author, The Rumpus, The Collagist, AGNI, the list goes on. I couldn’t name all of them here. Our favorite journals tend to be those that give emerging voices — new and exciting ones — as equal a say as those already established. It’s always so exciting to stumble across a really blistering (in its ferocity and risk or in its subtlety and nuance) story and feel like you’ve just unearthed some invaluable treasure. It’s also really refreshing to see journals that promote the words on the page over author biographies, not that the latter aren’t insightful. That would also be pretty hypocritical of me to say I’m not a fan of bios, as Used Furniture Review features them. We view them as more of payment, though, since we can’t offer money at this point; we owe it to our contributors to promote their names. Still, they’re placed away from the text, in a designated section.

That was probably a wildly distrait answer to your question.

If Used Furniture watched TV, would it like Antiques Roadshow? Apparently Martin Fennelly Antiques in Ireland which dates back to 1792 boasts as the most famous antique furniture in the world. They seem good though this one time I went to Versailles and that seemed equally good. Also in Boston we have the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum which is not bad. You guys don’t use books to prop uneven tables though, right? I personally have trouble with chairs a lot because I am short and if I sit in any chair properly my feet don’t actually fully reach the ground true story. Napoleon, yep.

That’s a really great question. Without a doubt, it would DVR every episode. I actually have pretty distinct memories from when I was younger, watching Antiques Roadshow with my father. We were part amused, part mystified, I think. It’s always beyond funny to see the faces on the people in the background, the ones trying to get on (or off) camera, just there, gawking, transfixed by some piece of junk. But once there was a garbage man who brought a lamp onto the show. He found it in someone’s trash, and he liked it; he didn’t know what he liked, exactly, just something about it. The lamp ended up fetching a couple million dollars. How can that kind of fate and circumstance not get the blood pumping?

As for this talk of used furniture, it’s always fun to wonder where a certain antique came from, what it witnessed, how it outlived its owner. The name of our rag, however, Used Furniture Review, comes from a story I started to write but then abandoned. I wrote something like, “He felt like used furniture.” The metaphor seemed a little forced at the time but I still really liked it, so in thinking of a name for our Review, it was there to use.

Don’t worry about your chair issue, by the way, I think there’s a little bit of Napoleon in all of us. We all want to be or feel taller than something; that’s probably why we write, and even read. It’s part of the whole experience. And no, we don’t use books to prop uneven tables. Ceramic coasters, and sometimes napkins, tend to remedy that particular problem.

Is Used Furniture Review accepting submissions, if so what kind?

We’re excited to say that we’re currently accepting submissions of all kinds. (It’s worth it to note that, at the moment, we have no plans of closing submissions, either.) We love writing of all kinds: fiction, nonfiction, poetry, experimental. We also love to see photography and artistic submissions, as well as interviews with authors and writers. If someone had an idea other than that, that would be really great, too. I’m thinking of a video of an author reading their work, something like that. We’re really open to any given contributor’s creativity. Everyone and anyone is encouraged to submit, multiple times. We recently accepted two poems from a poet who we had rejected several times before. We like to think of rejections as “This wasn’t bad, just not right for us. Please submit again.” Everyone has a talent, a voice to harness — to deny that would be an awful thing.

Does Used Furniture Review endorse used books?

We endorse used books just as much as we support buying a book fresh off the bookshelf. Personally, my own bookshelf is packed with used books; I have less that are new. For me, used books have a certain charm to them, the writing seems more fresh, somehow. Also, it’s always really great to find a used first edition of your favorite author, or to check out the annotations of the book’s previous reader. It’s like reading two books at once; simultaneously getting inside the heads of a few different people. What more could a writer ask for?

Please tell us more about you, your own writing and projects. Aspirations, dreams. Or don’t, it’s entirely your choice we’ll accept either way, we’re mellow.

I tend to think I’m more of the fiction mind than the nonfiction, though I love writing and reading both. Whatever I’m writing, I’m interested in getting to the stuff of humanity, what it is that makes us feel split into pieces, what makes us feel empty, and eventually what makes us feel whole again. I’m currently working on a piece of fiction, Crooked As We Go. It’s finally starting to find its shape; I’m not sure if it will eventually turn into a novel or a novel-in-stories project. Either way, I’d be happy. That being said, my greatest hope is that I “make it,” that I can live off this thing called writing. I know how absurd that sounds, almost laughable. But I really wouldn’t be able to live without words, my notebook, something to write with. Ain’t that the truth.

Nicolle Elizabeth checks in with Fictionaut Groups every Friday.

Rick Moody is the author of five novels, three collections of stories, and a memoir, The Black Veil. His most recent novel is The Four Fingers of Death (2010). His next project is a collection of essays, On Celestial Music, forthcoming in 2012. He also plays music in The Wingdale Community Singers.

You can read his story “Fragment from an Untelevised Revolution” on Fictionaut.

Q (Meg Pokrass): Have you had mentors?

Two: Angela Carter and John Hawkes, both when I was an undergraduate at Brown University. I have said a great deal about this, and I don’t want to digest things I have already said. I believe my essay on the subject of mentoring vs. the writing workshop is available online via The Atlantic Monthly website. The short version is: I think mentors are essential. I wouldn’t be here, conducting this interview, if not for hard work of Carter and Hawkes.

Do you have tricks to move things through when not feeling as inspired?

No tricks, just will power. Work makes me a better person. I live to work. Not vice versa. So I work even when I don’t feel like working. It improves me to do so.

What is exciting about this time as a writer w/ the internet and what it offers. What is (conversely) not so good about it?

I don’t find it more exciting than others times. The task is the same: make beautiful sentences that say something important about the world. I think all the debate about technology is sort of wasted air. The dust will settle, eventually, and writers will be doing pretty much what they were doing before. And, I hope, getting paid for it.

What are you favorite literary sites? What sites do you find yourself going to to read? Or just, your favorite web sites?

I don’t much read literary web sites, excepting The Rumpus, where I am a contributor. And Fictionaut on occasion. In general what I like to read are: books. The physical objects.

Any favorite writing exercises would be hugely appreciated.

Interview your character before you write the scene.

A reading list, if you can give us one?

Read a lot of dead writers.

What writers, artists, muscians (dead or alive) do you turn to again and again for inspiration?

Mark Rothko, John Cage, Brian Eno, Frank Zappa, La Monte Young, Morton Feldman, Terry Riley, John Coltrane, Roland Barthes.

What is happening now for you? What is in the works?

Essays on music! And then a new novel.

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 the editor-at-large for BLIP Magazine, and her stories and poems have been published widely. She blogs at http://megpokrass.com.

Susan Tepper: Foster, your story “Moon View Mountain Road” is a strange and interesting tale with a compelling title.  From the title, and then your first line: I once read a book of warnings — I’d say it’s fairly certain that we’re in for a dark ride.  What about this title?  How did the title come, did you choose it first or did it come to you during the writing or even after?

Foster Trecost: Hi Susan. Titles are the hardest thing I write and they always come last. I can bang out 500 words in no time, but a five word title could take days or more and I’m still never happy with what I come up with. Such was the case with “Moon View Mountain Road,” so I did what I usually do — I borrowed a phrase from the story, and this wasn’t even my first choice. I liked “The Book of Warnings” better, but I didn’t like the way it would have been repeated in the opening line. I wanted something ominous and this, paired with the first line, seemed ominous enough to me. Titles give me so much trouble, I’ve thought of numbering my stories instead, but then everyone would see how unfruitful I am. Maybe I’m just lazy.

ST: Well based on this story you don’t strike me as a lazy writer — far from it!  Perhaps more a self-effacing writer would describe you.  Refreshing!  Well in any case, the “warnings” that you peppered throughout the narrative are amazing little bits of almost poetic bible-speak.  They push the narrative hard.  Your second warning reads:  Do not lose beauty in everydayness, for to be surrounded by unnoticed beauty is to live in its absence. Is this also part of your own personal belief system?  Because the story, to me, felt intensely personal on many levels.    

FT: I think you’re on to me! Most of my stories are very personal and this one certainly is, but I feel like I can hide behind the fiction, reveal without revealing. Some writers are so good, so creative, that they can just invent everything. The best I can do is invent some things (but I did invent the ending of this story!). Maybe it’s a balance – I’m private in person, but still feel a need to put things out there. Maybe this is how I do it. I enjoyed coming up with the warnings and I’ve been asked if they came from a real book: nope, these are mine. And I think beauty should be appreciated and sometimes that means taking the time to find it.

ST: Ah ha!  So, I’m onto you!  Well, that’s cool.  As for you hiding behind the fiction, you do it very well.  I never pictured you as the narrator, but I saw the “warnings” plus the narrator’s affinity with nature as coming from within the author.  These warnings you wrote have an obsessive quality, even the purest of them.  It’s been said /written that for a story to be successful, there must be an obsession that runs through like a red thread.  Did you consciously try for that obsession in the writing or did it come out of your unconscious mind?

FT: Susan, when I write a story, it happens so fast that I don’t think there’s much time for obsession. OR, it happens so fast because it’s based on an obsession. I’m not sure which, if either, but I think there’s truth in what you said. I like that you picked up on the nature component, because that’s an example of something that came out without me realizing it – makes me wonder what else gets written by my unconscious mind. Hmmmmm, I think I’ll be reading through my stories in a bit.

ST: Foster, SEX.  This story is clearly about sex.  And love, I guess, or at least what the narrator perceives as love.  You write: “She had become bored with me, but found it easier to say she had become bored with the moon.  We stopped talking [Do not speak with your silence, for it will say things unintended.] We stopped everything.  Earlier that day, I pleaded for her return and suggested we take a drive.”

This is such a lyrical way of expressing her waning (moon?) feelings toward him.  And a big transition point in the story.  Did you know at this point the startling turn the story would take?

FT: Oh, dear. I wasn’t aware of that…

In the beginning, I wasn’t sure where this story was headed, but as I’m writing, I’m trying to feel what the narrator was feeling, trying to be him and write what I think he might do. Believe me, there were alternatives, alternate endings, but this one made the most sense (which I find troubling). By the time I reached this point, it had become clear that this would be a very dark tale. I never set out to write such a story, but I felt good about the ending, which is to say I felt it wasn’t too far-fetched, that it could really happen.

ST: You’ve been extremely open and generous in allowing me to probe your mind, Foster.  And this is such a mind-story!  I’ll finish by quoting another of your amazing warnings:  [Do not ask questions unless you are prepared for the answers, for the truth often hurts.]

Did you find the answers you were seeking in the writing of this story? You can just answer YES or NO.  Or MAYBE.

FT: YES, but I think this chat asked more questions than just the ones you posed, and I guess I’ll be thinking about their answers for quite some time.

Susan, thank you so much for including me in this series.

Read “Moon View Mountain Road” by Foster Trecost

Monday Chat is a bi-weekly series in which Susan Tepper has a conversation with a Fictionaut writer about one of his or her stories. Susan is Assistant Editor of Istanbul Literary Review and hosts FIZZ, a reading series at KGB Bar.

Daniel Crocker is here and has started a Group for Trailer Park Quarterly. He has been a staple of the indie fiction community for like more than a decade. Figured we could all say hi. Hi Daniel. Awesome. I agree with his reading advice thusly, actually.

Q (Nicolle Elizabeth): Hey Dan. You have a ten plus years history in the indie fiction universe and are the editor of Trailer Park Quarterly and have started a group for it here at Fictionaut. How is the group going so far what are your plans for the group?

A (Daniel Crocker): Closer to fifteen, I think. Though I took some time off there for awhile. So far, I guess the group is going well. I would like to see it end up a place where group members post their on work, or turn the rest of the group on to something they should be reading. The good news is, I think, that anyone interested enough in a group called “Trailer Park Quarterly” to join probably likes the same sort of writing I do.

TPQ has a fairly strong voice and aesthetic. Can you spell it out for us? (The voice and aesthetic, not the TPQ abbreviation.)

That’s a good question, and one I’ve thought about, then stopped thinking about, then started thinking about again. It’s pretty simple in the long run. I like poems that make sense and stories with plots and characters. Obviously it’s more complicated than that, but it starts there.

I especially get frustrated with poetry. Poetry, deep down, is probably my favorite art form, but I don’t often admit it. So much of it is so bad. It’s no wonder why people, even poets, don’t read much of it. The thing is that a good one, a really good one, will knock you on your ass more than a story or film or even a song.

If no one can understand what the hell is going on, however, then I don’t see the point. A poem should be about a lot more than just being clever. Edward Field, a fine poet that everyone needs to read, once said something along the lines of poetry isn’t a place to hide things in. I agree. If I wanted to read a riddle, I’d read a riddle. I don’t like poetry for the sake of pure language–stringing some words together because they sound neat. I get it. Sometimes it is neat. In the end, however, I want something that makes me laugh or feel. Humor is always good. It’s hard to be funny and I appreciate it when writers send me work that makes me laugh. There doesn’t have to be a deeper meaning for me. Funny is good by itself. Work that connects on a deep emotional level is always appreciated as well.

Starting in issue two one of my favorite poets, Rebecca Schumedja started handling most of the poetry editor duties. She has done a great job. I’ll still solicit things from poets I know are going to lay down some clean lines though.

In the end, people usually want to know about the title. I grew up very, very poor. I’ve lived in a trailer park. Poor people like poems, too. In fact, poetry is made for them. As for the no Hipsters policy–that’s pretty self-explanatory, right?

Who are some writers TPQ feels are nourishment equivalent to eating dinner?

There’s so many, and I don’t know if you mean unknown or the big names. I’ll list a few of both. Stephen Graham Jones is one of my favorite younger writers. He can do everything–literary, horror, etc, etc. Nathan Graziano is probably my soul mate. Mary Miller is always writing good stuff. On a line by line basis, her fiction really pops. Gerald Locklin. I read “Howl” about once a year. When I feel like I’m losing my way as a writer, I go back to Carver and O’Connor a lot. Both writers who were fountains of emotion, but knew their craft well enough to be restrained about it.

It may sound cliche, but I go back to Bukowski, too. Because he could, after a while, pretty much publish what he wanted and because they’re still coming out with books of his poetry that probably shouldn’t be getting published, people forget how good he really was when he was on. Sure, his persona gets in the way. It either bothers people or, conversely, and especially with writers who discover him young, makes people want to be like him. There’s not going to be another Bukowski though. That’s a good thing. Most writers drinking like a fish and living on the streets are just going to end up homeless alcoholics because they don’t have the talent or willpower Bukowski had. He read a lot too. That’s always good advice for a writer.

What is the best dish soap for washing dishes?

The restaurants I’ve worked at have all used whatever they could get the cheapest when it came time to put in that week’s order. Now you have me all nostalgic about my dish washing years (something I still do in the summers at a small bar and grill one of my friends owns). It’s a great job. When you’re done, you feel like you’ve really put in a night’s work. You don’t take your work home with you. It’s very liberating. Doesn’t pay for shit, but if restaurants offered health insurance then it’s the job I’d still be doing full time. Who knows…if we can get a universal health care plan . . . .

Talk to us about your own books, actually.

First, I can’t believe anyone still remembers my books. It seems like a long time ago. Like I said, I took some years off as well. I didn’t stop writing, but I stopped submitting. At the time, I couldn’t tell you why. I think I just had to change things up though. I’d written just about everything I could about being young, impoverished, and pissed off about it. I’m a middle aged man now. I couldn’t do another 20 page poem like “People Everyday.” It would be ridicules. For a nineteen year old (when I wrote it), it has some good lines in it. That book–People Everyday and Other Poems– could have only been written by a 19 year old, I think. It’s still the book I get the most comments about. The title poem and “Sorry, Richie” still seem to hit home with some people. I can’t really read them anymore, though. All I usually see is the sloppiness. I’ve really got to try to be generous with myself when I read those old poems.

As for the other books, well, they have their moments.

Nicolle Elizabeth checks in with Fictionaut Groups every Friday.

C.B. Murphy is the author of the novel Cute Eats Cute. C.B. is a writer, visual artist, filmmaker and cartoonist. Murphy’s short films have been shown at colleges, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, and at the Willis Gallery in Detroit. Murphy’s cartoon series (“CB Murphy”) appeared in the alternative weekly The Chicago Reader. Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art selected one of Murphy’s books-January is Alien Registration Month-for its permanent Artists’ Books collection. Murphy’s illustrations-drawings, paintings and computer-generated photo collages-have appeared in many national magazines. The Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art selected his book, January is Alien Registration Month, for its permanent Artists’ Books collection.

Q (Meg Pokrass) What interests you in writing your character-driven novels?

When people ask me what I am “about” or what I write about, I often end up talking about voice. It’s not particularly new to say voice is important, but I think what’s getting even more difficult is keeping an individual voice with so many voices around us, screaming to be heard. Staying true.

What are the obvious challenges about publishing a book and finding an audience at this time?

There is a great deal of homogenization going on. As an example, “liking or disliking” something implies you may not change your mind tomorrow. I think also that we live in a highly polarized environment in which people want to know what you are about before they read you. It’s harder to be ambivalent about things or in the middle and I think creativity lives in gray areas, not in sunshine that is too bright.

Talk about your creative process. What spins your wheels, and your imagination…

The Jungian idea that stories are “given” to you and “come through you” and your job is to execute them as best you can, attend to your material. I guess this flies in the face of “originality” at times -we keep telling the same stories over and over again but in new voices. There are archetypes. It is about our own way of seeing. Writers and artists digest the culture.

About your art and writing – how do they affect each other, how they help each other ?

I have discovered they are different voices that support each other, nearly cross-training. My visual artist-self is more used to people disliking or not caring about his work, so he is more “pure” in a sense in pursuing his own interests. My writer is still seeking some approval, admittedly. The artist, when criticized, either laughs or says that’s interesting. I once had two people in a short time period walk through my studio. One said my art was satanic and she couldn’t stand being in there. I thought that was great! The other said, “How did a white boy like you come to paint like an African? Africans also paint about death!” she said. I loved that.

What do you enjoy about reading your work for an audience? Do you find it easy? Some writers are a bit shy…

I have occasional stage fright which is probably somewhat common. I have had moments when I’ve read when I try to think about how this sounds to people while I’m reading and then I get confused and panicky. For my recent reading I practice the section a lot, which had been suggested to me, and it surely helped.

A homeless man come to one of my readings and he asked a great question. He asked if my writing and art presented a system of thought. What an amazing question.

I think in many ways I’m lucky because I’m interested in people and how they see things. I’ve been to writing classes where people sit around and wonder what they want to write about and I thought, are you kidding me? Look around… everything’s interesting.

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 the editor-at-large for BLIP Magazine, and her stories and poems have been published widely. She blogs at http://megpokrass.com.