the hilarity of child soldiers and sex slaves

Read Jane Bussman's The Worst Date Ever. Now. Go read it.

I had particular interest in Bussman's subject--the international aid organization I work for sent me to northern Uganda a few years ago, so the place is dear to my heart. I recognize that this will not be true for most readers. I also realize that I now have a fairly high tolerance for the details of human atrocities. One of the perks of my job. (It took a while before I realized that my friends had not developed this threshold along with me and that there are some things you don't talk about at dinner. When they ask about my work I should say it is "interesting," "busy," or "rewarding" without giving any details about the report I was writing on rape in DRC.)
 

(Why yes, this is a photo I took in Uganda of a midwife bandaging a child's machete wound in a "health clinic" with no electricity, water, or drugs but plenty of moldy 2x4s.)

Occasionally I bring reports home with me to read or edit and occasionally these documents have photos. I consider the piece a failure if my husband asks me to read in the other room because the images are disturbing him. If your audience looks away, they are not getting your message.

Bussman writes about a horrific war wherein children were kidnapped to become child soldiers or sex slaves. She writes about interviewing victims of mutilation. She writes about governments' complacency because of the cash cow that such a war can be. This book is a hard sell.

But what makes Bussman different from and better than almost any account I have read is that the book is hilarious. Which means my anger and disgust was tempered. I did not put the book down; I kept reading. And while I know I am not the average potential reader for this book, I think The Worst Date Ever is even better for the more squeamish audience than it was for me. Because through her humor, Bussman keeps the reader from getting too upset and looking away. And since you don't need to put the book down, you learn about a truth that more people need to learn about.

Jane Bussman bares witness to the victims of a horrible war. She does it with dignity and anger. But unbelievably, with humor. Go read it. Now.

bravery in Hunger Games

In the course of about one week, I read Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay. Admittedly, this means I now need to go back and reread Mockingjay so that I feel like I really caught everything. I've also purchased The Girl Who Was on Fire to read at a later date.

Of course I loved them. But I was surprised by just how bravely written they were. 

Um. Spoilers below.

After reading enough YA, I was not surprised by the violence or that two of my favorite principle characters (Cinna and Finnick) died. What did surprise me was the way both of those deaths were written. Finnick's death (as well as Prim's) was so barely present within Katniss's more urgent focus that I almost missed it. And this felt real and true to me in a way that more heroic death scenes rarely do. While I think YA is long past the point where I would call killing off beloved characters "brave," the--what's the right word? insignificance? fleeting notice?--of Suzanne Collins killing of Finnick and Prim felt brave in its honesty. The world does not stop for death. People you love die and it takes a moment for you to even see that above the noise of the rest of your life.

The love triangle that wasn't. I applaud you, Ms. Collins. While I often have a preference when reading books that involve love triangles, I rarely think that there is really no contest. The triangle between Katniss, Peeta, and Gale did not strike me as a matter of romantic choice or as a matter of Katniss deciding who she wants to be as most love triangles are. To me, there was never any choice. Instead, I watched Katniss realize who she is. This wasn't a choice, but a developing awareness. It can be difficult to recognize and accept who you truly are, and it is a powerful story to watch unfold. So while I don't think Gale was ever actually in the running, I thought use of a pseudo love triangle as a means of self analysis was fresh.

Lastly, I loved how fucked up Katniss and Peeta are by the end. This is not the story of two heroes that motivated a revolution. This is the story of two kids who are the collateral damage of other people's machinations. And I loved it. I can see where some readers might be left dissatisfied with the ending, but I thought this was so brave and so right.

Thank you, Suzanne Collins, for a fun and courageous series.

real live axe ad

This photo was taken during the Vancouver riots on June 15. There are no words for how much I'm in love.

Photo by Rich Lam/Getty Images

stepping into that same river again, or not

I first read Margaret Atwood's Oryx and Crake perhaps five years ago. A stunning experience. As I neared the end of the book, I could not escape the feeling that once I looked up from the last page, I would see a post-apocalyptic wasteland. Snowman's world. My reading would make it so. Fortunately, that did not happen. Instead, Oryx and Crake earned its place in my top all-time reading experiences.

So it took me until a few weeks ago to pick up The Year of the Flood, Atwood's companion book. How could it be anything but a disappointment after my visceral awe at Oryx and Crake? Having completed it I must say it was not as extraordinary. How could it? But it was still brilliant.

The Year of the Flood follows two protagonists who--similar to Snowman/Jimmy--bounce back and forth between their current post-pandemic survival and their lives before the world ended. Seemingly random main characters in the beginning, as the book continues, the reader realizes these two, Ren and Toby, were both part of an environmentalist religious cult before the "waterless flood." As the narrative continues, the reader realizes that they were both on the periphery of Jimmy/Snowman and Crake's lives. I went back to reread Oryx and Crake so that I could appreciate those tiny tossed away sentences that were all that Ren and Toby (not even named in the original book) contributed to Jimmy's life.

Much of the book centers around the cult, God's Gardeners. Despite the pages of ink dedicated to them one cannot in the end know if they are a force behind Crake's plague or lucky survivalists. And again, this mirrors

Oryx and Crake. Are the leaders of God's Gardeners MaddAdam? How much does Oryx know.

And I must say, perhaps my favorite part of the book was when Ren and Toby see Snowman. Despite all of the voices in his head throughout Oryx and Crake, I never thought of him as crazy. It seemed a perfectly natural reaction to being the last human alive, guardian to a new race and pawn of your best friend. It was only after reading Flood that I saw he was insane. And it broke my heart. It made the rereading of Oryx and Crake so much sadder, lushly pathetic.

Lots of parallels, but plenty of divergent plot and themes to make The Year of the Flood a masterpiece in its own right. A true companion to the first.

i feel like less-than for not having loved it

Maybe all of that that commercial, YA, and paranormal reading has finally gotten to me.  I read Lorrie Moore's A Gate at the Stairs and didn't love it.

I hang my head in shame.

Maybe I need to give back my elitist card.

Did I find it interesting? Mostly? Engaging? I guess. Beautifully worded? Of course. A striking commentary on post-9/11 America? Yes.

But. But... For the first third of the book I did not realize that the narrative was supposed to be written by Tassie (the MC) as an older woman. So I was incredibly frustrated by how wise and mature and paced the narrative voice was. Beautiful but inappropriate to a 20 year-old. I got over that about 120 pages in, but there should have been some earlier signpost for me.

Also, I hated Tassie. And not in that way where it is fun to hate characters. In that way where I didn't give a crap about her at all. I didn't like her and so having to watch her live her life for a few hundred pages made me hate her.

The vegetation. So much description of vegetation--natural, cultivated, and cooked. You could have cut 30 pages from the book by editing down the vegetation.

So what did I like?

The stories. All three. Mary-Emma's, Reynaldo's and her brother's. They wove together beautifully. The parts of the book that really told their stories made me so happy. I sank into the book at those moments.

And now, I feel like a literary snob failure. Like having read Stephenie Meyer and Charlaine Harris and Carrie Ryan has destroyed my capacity to appreciate "real literature" (though I don't believe that). I was supposed to love this book.

gaslight anthem is inspiring me today

When it comes to music, I'm a singer-songwriter kind of girl. Matt Nathanson, Tallest Man on Earth, and Dar Williams crowd my playlists. Occasional outliers like the White Stripes and Talking Heads make their appearance. But I am not a rock 'n' roll kind of girl, nor am I into punk. So when I fell in fast love with Gaslight Anthem some two years ago, I was somewhat confused. For those of you who don't know them, Gaslight Anthem is like Bruce Springsteen's punky nephews. And though I'm not one for punk or for Bruce Springsteen, Gaslight Anthem speaks to me like few musicians ever have.

Their upbeat songs (being most of them) have a kind of desperate joy about them. Like they know happiness isn't something you can hold onto in this world but they have it in their grasps for just this moment and the fleetingness does not lessen the joy at all. Makes it more manic perhaps, but also more meaningful.

The slower songs have a gritty beauty made more poignant by Brian Fallon's raspy voice.

I once told a friend that the innermost unchanging part of me has Gaslight Anthem as it's soundtrack. I hope that's true

For a bit of their desperate joy:

And a touch of their gritty beauty:

 

my desperate, stupid hope

Please be warned, if you have not already read Markus Zusak's The Book Thief, this post is one giant spoiler. Stop reading now, and go read this book.  Then come back and read on. I am not going to bother writing a full review since many people have already done so. Instead, I am going to focus on what I think was the particular genius of the book -- perhaps not intrinsically, but in my experience of it. A particular emotional journey. 

Markus Zusak made me feel desperate, irrational hope.

I wasn't a fan of the character of Death. I didn't feel like I gained anything by knowing what colors were in the sky or how tired he was. I didn't need him to have a personality. What Death added, as a narrator, was his omnipotence and pretty great foreshadowing. The dangling, "he would be dead in six months," that made heartache so inevitable. Rather perfect for a book taking place in Nazi Germany.

So, by the time Rudy, Hans, and Rosa are dead, by the time Himmel Street is destroyed and everything in Liesel's life is gone, I was ready for it.  It is brutal but feels like the only possible story the little girl could have lived. Except...

Max.

Oh, Max.

It broke my heart that Max left when he didn't have to. And then I hoped against hope for his safety. We heard nothing of him, which drove me mad, but it felt right since Liesel didn't know what was happening to him either.

I maintained a stupid, irrational, desperate hope that Max was going to be ok.  I mean, of course he's not going to be ok! He's a Jew on the run in Nazi Germany! But I hoped, like Liesel, I hoped. And I justified this hope by saying, "Death has already told me about everyone else dying, so maybe no news is good news when it comes to Max's fate."

So my heart fell into my stomach when Max came through Molching on the death march. And I cried when he and Liesel had their goodbye.

I stopped reading after the bombing of Himmel Street and had dinner with my husband. I spent half the meal telling him about the story and how depressed I was and how beautifully Zusak told it. (He did not understand how anything that would upset me this much could be counted as "good." Yet the man reads Cormac McCarthy.) After dinner, I told him I wanted to finish the book but that it couldn't possibly upset me further. With everything taken from her, death would be a relief for Liesel Meminger. Or, she'd survive as the lone candle of remembrance. Either way, I was past hurt.

So yes, I was surprised and inappropriately relieved when Max came walking into Liesel's shop after the war. And while the only epilogue they are given was their hug, I choose to believe that their care and kindness slowly morphed into love and they moved off to Australia together to raise three children and die of old age. 

Shut up, you can't convince me otherwise.

I tip my hat to you, Markus Zusak. Thank you for your incredible storytelling. And for taking me on such a desperate journey of hope.

naming challenge

Working on a newish story and I'm stuck on what to name a principal character. He's a doctor, a scientist, but also seen as a romantic rival for our narrator. We never can quite pin down whether he's a good guy or not.

I'm thrown because most of my characters are so concrete to me that I know  their names.  Even if the names change over the course of drafts, they are the right and only names at the time.

So, what to name him?

Suggestions?

How do you name your characters?

adapting to the right medium

Last night, I watched John Krasinski’s film adaptation of David Foster Wallace’s Brief Interviews with Hideous Men.  I should say up front that I have never read the book.  My previous experience with the content was from another adaptation, a theatrical production that John Krasinski knew as well.

So this should be an interesting post… comparing two adaptations into different media without knowing the source material.  And I must distinguish between the quality of the adaptation and the appropriateness of its medium.

I’ll begin with the theatrical adaptation.  Picture yourself, if you will, at Brown University. In addition to the official theatre department productions and the various plays put on by student groups, occasional enterprising students mounted shows independent of any producing body.  These often happened in the upstairs space of the student theatre—a rehearsal room come lobby come rec room—dark and poorly maintained. In the early 2000s.

It was in this space that Chris Hayes (now Washington editor of The Nation) directed an adaptation of Brief Interviews.  Just a serious of monologues performed with a chair, sparse lighting, and pages in hand if the actors had not memorized their parts.  It was a who’s who of the best male acting talent at Brown.

I went to see the production with two girlfriends, fully intending on going to a party afterward.  Our experience in the theatre that night was so raw and powerful, disturbing, dare I say it—hideous—that our plans for the rest of the evening were abandoned.  We returned to my dorm room to drink rum into oblivion in silence.

Chris Hayes’ production was unapologetic.  It put forward a number of men’s stories for the audience to judge and to judge themselves by.  I can’t say whether it had the same feel as Wallace’s work, but I can say it is in my top five most affecting nights in the theatre.

John Krasinski performed one of the monologues that night.

So it was with a great deal of anticipation that I watched his film adaptation yesterday (with an associate producer nod to Chris Hayes). 

Alas.

By giving the interviews a framing device—Julianne Nicholson is a grad student interviewing men while coping with her own ex-boyfriend’s infidelity—the content was diluted.  Cheapened.  Context robbed the monologues of their ferocity.  And this particular frame left me feeling like this was supposed to be a romantic comedy that never got romantic or comedic.

The monologue performed by Dominic Cooper’s character in the movie was the climax of the theatrical production for me.  It’s brutality has only ever been rivaled for me by Martin McDonagh’s The Pillowman.  But with the context of an angry student trying to fight a bad grade (or is he really reaching out for help?), it became overwrought.  John Krasinski’s monologue about the hippie rape victim becomes insipid when it is his excuse for cheating on his girlfriend.  Alas, the frame was poorly crafted.  The movie, disappointing.

But I wonder whether it would have been possible to create any film adaptation that would do the work justice.  A modern American movie version cannot allow a series of disjointed monologues and any plot threading them together softens some of the ragged edges. 

And then there is the lack of being present in a movie.  Theatre’s power is in its presence.  In the audience being in the room and sharing the experience with the performers.  Theatre makes the audience complicit in the production.  It implicates them while film distances.  (I am now thinking of Oskar Eustis making the same argument in a dramaturgy class at Brown.)

I write about Brief Interviews here, not because I felt like ranting about a disappointing movie, but because it has led me to think about medium.  Film was the wrong medium for an adaptation of Brief Interviews with Hideous Men.  On the other hand, I have read plays and thought, “why is this a play and not a novel?”  

There are stories and experiences better suited to particular media and that is something, as a writer, to think about.

the just war, love, and writing

The US media is focusing quite a bit on Libya right now.  One of the most interesting questions that I have only heard a single pundit ask on twitter, without any subsequent answer or dialogue in any other medium was: Who are the rebels in Libya?  We are so focused on Gadhafi that I think most Americans assume the rebels are good guys--that Egypt arming them and the coalition bombing Gadhafi is a good thing.  I don't know.  Maybe they are good guys.  Maybe they are Islamic fundamentalists bent on bringing jihad to a mall near you.  Don't know.  Nobody's talking about them.  Instead, there is a lot of dialogue about "just war."  That protecting the civilians of Libya is the first opportunity for "just war" since Bosnia and what should have been Rwanda.

Since my goal in this blog is not to write about how I feel about the fine line between voluntary human shields and combatants, but to write about writing, I want to focus on the concept of "just war" and why it inspires me. 


I loved my grandpa.  We had a pretty special relationship.  By all accounts from family and friends he was an angry, bitter, violent man.  From stories, I know that he was abusive, prejudiced, and reveled in being mean.  But that's not the grandpa I saw.


My grandpa let me brain his comb-over down the wrong side of his head to play Indian chief.  He took me to the beach on cold days and walked up and down the boardwalk plying me with hot dogs while we talked about the solar system and Greek mythology.  He kidnapped me for the day to drive up to Maine so we could have lobster rolls for lunch.  He would growl at me--an imitation of his fierce persona to the rest of the world--and I growled back.  My grandpa loved me more than anything in the world and I was the exception to just about every rule of how he behaved in the world.


While this was an awesome experience as a little girl, it rather destroyed my capacity to have a realistic, loving romantic relationship for a while.  Prior to finding my husband and finally understanding what it means to be an equal member in a relationship, I expected all of my boyfriends to be like my grandpa.  Namely, I wanted them to prove their love by being the exceptions to their rules.  

Is art the most important thing to you?  Nope, I am now.
Are you a good boy who never breaks the rules?  You will for me.
A jerk who can't settle down?  It's not settling when it's me.

This was unfair to them, unfair to me, and didn't end well for anyone.


While being the exception to the rule is no fair expectation in a real-world romantic relationship, it makes a strong statement in fiction.  In fact, it is short-hand in just about every romantic comedy for "he really does love her."  Richard Gear climbing the fire escape in Pretty Woman.  While it is unfortunate that people have gotten lazy using the trope, it works for a reason, and not just in love.


My stage combat professor (who is coming up in blog posts quite a bit lately) once asked my class, "what is worth fighting for?"  Mind you, he asked this to a room full of liberal college kids.  Most people said, "Nothing!  Fighting is never justified!"  I caught quite a bit of shit when I raised my hand and said, "My family.  You try to hurt my dad or my sister and you bet I will hurt you."


I am not a violent person, but protecting my family is the exception to my rule.


This brings me back to Libya and the "just war."


I don't know whether the rebels in Libya are fighting a just war, and whether the coalition backing them are either.  I don't have enough information to make a call on that.  But I find the concept fascinating.  No one questions whether the Allies were fighting a just war in WWII.  Everyone knows that not interceding in Rwanda was unjust.  "Just wars" involve an entire country or culture choosing collectively to find an exception to the general rule that war is bad.  This is powerful.


When people decide that one person or cause is more important to them than the general paradigm of how they interact with the world, that makes for some intense stakes, some real drama.  It makes for good story-telling, whether in the headlines or fiction.

words and violence

My professor in a stage combat class told us often that no matter the type of combat scene--sweeping, emotional, comedic, whatever--the creators of the scene have a moral responsibility to depict pain.  Violence hurts.  And to suggest anything contrary to this fact is dangerous.

I think about what my professor said more often than one might expect.  I no longer choreograph or act in combative scenes.  I do not write violence.  But that question of the moral responsibility of artists has stayed with me.

There is a line one can cross between "you cannot depict violence without pain" and "you cannot depict sex outside of marriage."  I am fervently anti-censorship, and yet the question of a writer's responsibility lingers with me.

Back around the same time that I took the stage combat class, I wrote a sex advice column for a fairly large and famous men's magazine.  I wrote under a pseudonym, which was a good thing, because I received death threats in open letters in our school newspaper.  I was accused of being a part of a culture that plays into men's fantasies and causes women to be raped.  I did not take any of this lightly.

When I wrote the advice column, I had a rule with myself: while I might tailor my voice to the publication, I would never lie.  I would never write something because it was what I thought men wanted to hear.  It was always what I felt was true and all of the anecdotes shared were my own or those of close friends.  I have never questioned the morality of my participation in a men's magazine.  But there are those who might suggest that I am an enabler of "rape culture."

Today's post was inspired by Roxane Gay's "The Careless Language of Sexual Violence."  Read it.  It is important.

And now I ask you: do we, as writers, have a moral obligation in the language we use?  The circumstances we depict?  The violence we portray as painless?  I think we do and, though I can't pinpoint exactly where this sits on the censorship scale, I think that it is dangerous and childish for artists to believe that we have no responsibility for the words we use.

return of the prodigal blogger

She enters tentatively, ducking her face away and trying to hide a grimace.

It's been a while.  

Sorry.

I'd like to be able to say that I've been squirreled away writing or so engrossed in reading gorgeous literary prose that I have not come up for air.  Or to blog.  Alas.  No.

I have not blogged because I have not been writing and I have been reading crap that isn't worth blogging about.  Intentional crap.  Therapeutic crap.  I got a bit overwhelmed with my attempts to become a writer and  I forgot how much I loved words.  And stories.  And reading.  So I hid for a little while to rediscover it all.

And what brought me back?  A word.  

Snick.

While reading one of those crap stories that I am only willing to read on the subway thanks to the literary trench coat of an e-reader (won't even read it on the couch at home, where my husband might ask, "what are you reading?") I came across the word, "snick."  Used as a verb, to click.  And it had a great onomatopoetic quality.  The word was so satisfying I think I sighed.  Even amidst the schlock I found so perfectly used a word that it reminded me of my love for words.
 Hello.  
I am writing again.  
I am blogging.  
And I am currently reading a book of essays about Jane Austen that I am perfectly happy to be seen with on the subway.

Mid-read review of Run

When reading Ann Pachett's Bel Canto, I was so engrossed that I found myself reading the book while at the gym.  I couldn't put it down.  While this made for some awkward weight lifting sets and seasick moments on the elliptical, I couldn't let go.  The story:

Somewhere in South America, at the home of the country's vice president, a lavish birthday party is being held in honor of the powerful businessman Mr. Hosokawa. Roxane Coss, opera's most revered soprano, has mesmerized the international guests with her singing. It is a perfect evening—until a band of gun-wielding terrorists takes the entire party hostage. But what begins as a panicked, life-threatening scenario slowly evolves into something quite different, a moment of great beauty, as terrorists and hostages forge unexpected bonds, and people from different continents become compatriots. Friendship, compassion, and the chance for great love lead the characters to forget the real danger that has been set in motion . . . and cannot be stopped. 

I had no interest.  Nothing about the back cover called to me.  But finally enough friends had the "You haven't read Bel Canto?" moment and a writer on a forum I frequent suggested it to help me with some POV trouble in FLIGHT.  I gave in and read.

So I picked up Run.

Again, no interest in the plot.  Zilch.  But the writing is keeping me going.  And I think I have finally pinned down what has me so engrossed in Pachett's work: She writes the way I think.  The cadence of her voice is akin to the way thoughts break across my own brain.

Run is not textured the way Bel Canto was, it is nothing like sinking into warm bath water or running your hand over a new quilt.  I do not love any of the characters the way I grew to love many of the principles in Bel Canto, but I feel them, I know them.

More than halfway through the book, I still feel like the plot hasn't really kicked in; it's all still set up.  I don't think this is actually true, but something in the way Pachett has set up the book makes everything feel like background, waiting for something to begin, a shoe to drop.  I'll be disappointed if the book meanders in its beautiful way without ever arcing or climaxing.  But I lose myself in Pachett's words and would follow her anywhere.  I look forward to seeing where she leads.