09-25-09: A 2009 Interview with Kirsten Imani Kasai: Ice Singer
Every world has an "in." Whether we meet a hobbit living in a hole in the ground or witness the arrival of a winged loner to the city of New Crobuzon, every writer of fantasy of science fiction has to usher the reader into their world. Kirsten Imani Kasai takes the reader into the world of 'Ice Song' with the shock of the new.
In my conversation with Kasai, I wanted to find out how she created this world, and we talked about her world-building process. But just as important are her character building skills; it’s a tribute to the writer that the two are seamlessly inter-twined in this layered, exotic novel. She'll be appearing this Saturday, September 26 at Borderlands Books. She's well worth your time to see, to meet and to talk to. You can get a preview of what's to come that is slightly less shocking than immersion in a sea of ice by following this link to the MP3 audio file of our conversation.
09-24-09: A 2009 Interview with Erin Lee Gafill
"The writing is really a daily approach." — Erin Lee Gafill
Interviews are as varied as authors; not surprisingly, some are easier than others. And some just seem to flow like a river. Having read Erin Lee Gafill's 'Drinking from a Cold Spring: A Little Book of Hope,' I had some residual worries. The writing was beautiful the scenery is beautiful — would the author live up to the simplicity of her work? She was, after all, primarily a painter. It's one thing to paint or write, quite another to sit in front of a microphone in the back office of Capitola Book Café.
But there is, I'm beginning to believe, something as magical about that damn office as there is about Nepenthe. The sound is great, so long as I remember to unplug the phone. And Erin and I had a delightful conversation about her book. It was almost as if we were picking up from where we had left off not long ago, though we'd never spoken before. Like Erin, my kids are now pretty much launched, and I can look back on those years of fitting things in with some perspective. You can hear our discussion of domestic duties and creative work, of writing in the nooks and crannies between family, friends and keeping back the domestic chaos, by following this link to the MP3 audio file.
09-23-09: Michael Kurland and Nalo Hopkinson "moderated" by Terry Bisson : SF in SF, Saturday, September 12, 2009
"It's something I try to teach my students, they've all got something they're obsessed with..." — Nalo Hopkinson
You get a couple of writers like Nalo Hopkinson and Michael Kurland up there in front of a few readers on a Saturday night, give everyone a few "shots for tots" as Rina Weisman likes to say, and it's not surprising that you’re going to get a pretty lively discussion.
Kurland is an interesting and pretty volatile speaker, with strong opinions that he's enjoys speaking of in no uncertain terms. Hopkinson is a thoughtful presence with lots of presence, whose smooth undertones shimmer with emotions. This is the sort of literary discussion we need more of, both inside and outside the science fiction genre. I'm rather surprised, now that I think of it, that the sort of mini-panel format hasn’t been more widely adopted by the literary establishment. Having two writers, moderated by a third (though the word "moderate" is not necessarily one that one would associate with the engaging Terry Bisson) is a great way to dig into the reading, to get at some of the writing and publishing and life issues that the best books bring out. You can hear this edition of the SF in SF panel by following this link to the MP3 audio file.
09-22-09: Nalo Hopkinson Interviewed at SF in SF on Saturday, September 12, 2009
"No matter what you believe, this is miraculous; and we forget." — Nalo Hopkinson
Nalo Hopkinson induces wonder, on two levels. Obviously, there's the quality of what she reads. Her reading at SF in SF was a perfect example of that. The words themselves wonder in the old-fashioned science fiction "sense of wonder" way, even if what she writes is not, strictly speaking, science fiction.
But Hopkinson also induces wonder on a personal level as well. She's a powerful presence, and even when she's bewitching you with her powerful words you can't help but be aware that she is superbly and uniquely talented. So it's always fun to talk to her, and it was especially fun to dig into her work in the unheimliche, the uncanny, that she read from a forthcoming novel thus far titled 'Donkey.' Even that harmless word takes on a disturbing undertone when she uses it. You can hear her use it by following this link the MP3 audio file.
09-21-09: A 2009 Interview with S. G. Browne
"Lucio Fulci's Zombi back in 1978, that was actually a double feature with Scanners..." — S. G. Browne
S. G. (Scott) Browne set out to do a bit more than Lucio Fulci ever did. Not to deny Fulci his due; he wanted to scare the crap out of you, and that he did. Browne, on the other hand, uses zombies to explore not what it’s like to confront living dead corpses, but rather to determine just what the boundaries of human are.
And, of course, to tell more than just a few good jokes. Up until recently, Browne was a total local, and he admits in my interview with him, that his protagonist Andy, lives not far from where the author himself lived. Residents of Santa Cruz will get a kick out of Browne's local name-checks, and out of his gentle pokes at our own version of society. In Santa Cruz, zombies get more than rotten tomatoes and old Taco Smell burritos thrown at them; they’re just as likely to find themselves drenched in Jamba Juice as a Starbucks latte. We talk about developing the prose style, the mythology and the perceptions of the living dead, but I turned off the recorder when he told me about the movie, which he said, changes stuff (of necessity) but preserves the essence and voice of the novel. As ever, read the book first. The way things work in Hollowood, there's as good a chance that zombies will overrun the nation as there is that a decent movie will be made from this excellent book. Breathers, yes, we do tend to screw things over. To our credit, most of us don’t eat brains. Not literally, at least.
New to the Agony Column
02-01-12: Commentary : Stan Lee Splashes 'Stan Lee's How to Write Comics' and 'Stan Lee's How to Draw Comics' : Lessons in the Form, From the Master
01-23-12: Commentary : Sara Paretsky Nails 'Breakdown' : The Machine Stops
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2012 Interview with Sara Paretsky : "Everything in a courtroom is a story; it's not justice, it's combating narratives."
01-18-12: Commentary : Téa Obreht Conjures 'The Tiger's Wife' : The Grammar of Vision
01-13-12: Commentary : Hard Case Subterranean Block : Not from Bob's Basement Tapes
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2012 Phone Interview with Lisa Randall : "...there seems to be some evidence, especially from one of the experiments."
01-10-12: Commentary : Archive Review: Terry D'Auray Catches Lawrence Block and 'The Burglar on the Prowl' : "A show well worth the price of a ticket."
12-29-11: Commentary : My Life in the Bush of Books : Island of Vice by Richard Zacks, Iago by David Snodin, The Coincidence Engine by Sam Leith and The Dipatcher by Ryan David Jahn
12-21-11: Commentary : Cold Hand in Mine by Robert Aickman : From the Seedy to the Sublime
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Three Books with Alan Cheuse : 'Kill Bin Laden' ; Ryu Mitsuse, '10 Billion Days and 100 Billion Nights' ; Michael Crichton and Richard Preston, 'Micro'
12-20-11: Commentary : David Blackbourn Visits 'Marpingen: Apparitions of the Virgin Mary in a Nineteenth-Century German Village' : Externalizing a Culture Clash
12-15-11: Commentary : Ayize Jama-Everett Reveals 'The Liminal People' : The Powers That Be
Agony Column Podcast News Report : The Agony Column Live with Lisa Goldstein and Ayize Jama-Everett, and music by Fenyang Smith, December 10, 2011 : "... let's look at what happens if people have abilities that other people don't have ..."
11-28-11: Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2011 Interview with Scott Wallace : "Within months of first contact, these groups experience a huge die-off."
11-22-11: Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2011 Interview with Charles Frazier, Part Two : "It's not me telling you, there's this storyteller voice."
11-21-11: Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2011 Interview with Charles Frazier : "If we're going in the wrong direction, we could turn around and go back."
11-17-11: Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2011 Interview with Gianni Mola : "The only way you can learn, I told them, is to watch me cook it."
11-11-11: Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2011 Interview with Karl Marlantes : "...the way I "think" about things, with quotes around think, is I tend to write them down..."
10-31-11: Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2011 Interview with Colson Whitehead : "In the Apocalypse, somebody's gonna have to do the grunt work..."
10-17-11: Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2011 Interview with Russell Banks : "They are in a sense, permanently marked and thrown into this darkness..."
