Rhonda Browning White

Literary fiction often weighs in as heavy, and that’s no laughing matter. Literary novelists and short-story writers sometimes hold up a mirror to the reader, letting him or her see their own preconceived notions, flaws, or misinterpretations in new light, providing an opportunity for growth and change. Fiction writers often tackle difficult subjects, such as lies, divorce, abuse, and death. We are not strangers to tension and conflict; rather, we work hard to ratchet up the pressure on our characters, twisting our plots until we—and our readers—are gasping for air.

What better way to breathe, then, than to laugh?

Many of the best authors of serious literary narrative know the value of sprinkling a dash of humor here and there in their otherwise serious fiction; it’s a great way to disarm the reader and provide a necessary bit of lighthearted respite from a dark or dense story. A humorous scene, or even a deftly delivered one-liner, can be the equivalent of taking a steaming teakettle from the stove to release the pressure just before the whistle blows, only to quickly put it back on the heat, creating even more tension as we wait for the shrill shriek that we know is soon to come.

The late Flannery O’Connor was a true master of literary fiction, and even her darkest stories of corruption and grim reality are illuminated by sparkles of comedic laughter. She uses humorous character names (such as Manley Pointer to describe a randy Bible salesman in “Good Country People”), and religious ignorance (“‘What do I need with Jesus?’ he asks. ‘I got Leora Watts.’” in her first novel, Wise Blood). One of her most heartbreaking stories, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find,” tells us of an entire family murdered by escaped convicts while on a road trip instigated by the grandmother in the family. In spite of the horror, O’Connor allows us still to laugh over the thoughts, actions, and dialogue of the grandmother. “Her collars and cuffs were white organdy trimmed with lace and at her neckline she had pinned a purple spray of cloth violets containing a sachet. In case of an accident, anyone seeing her dead on the highway would know at once that she was a lady.”

Another strong example, Leslie Pietrzyk’s This Angel On My Chest is a collection of stories linked by grief. In each, a young female protagonist deals with the loss of her husband—a tragic and heartrending premise if ever there was one. Yet Pietrzyk finds a way in each of these stories to make us smile, if only through our tears. In “The Circle,” a group of female widows meets regularly for friendly conversation that always ends up on the topic of loss. When the protagonist finds her late husband’s secret journal, she tells the ladies about it, and they ask if she’s read it and what it contained, suspecting an affair.

. . . “He didn’t—?” Suellen asked.

“No,” she said. “He didn’t cheat on me. Or if he did, he was smart enough not to write about it.” Her half-smile, nervous, making the other two nervous, so the laughed lightly.

“That’s super-dumb,” Suellen said. “Dear Diary, Today I fucked a waitress I picked up.” And then they did laugh for real.

And so does the reader. This snippet of lighthearted banter in such a somber scene reminds us that, even when dealing with grief and death, it’s okay to live and to laugh.

Likewise, literary fiction doesn’t get much more searingly serious than Tim O’Brien’s tormenting story of the Vietnam War in The Things They Carried. Yet the author still gives us permission to laugh—a much-needed break amid the vivid horror—which allows us not only to catch our breath, but to see that gallows humor was necessary to the survival of those soldiers who fought the war.

In the story, we meet Rat Kiley, a soldier on the verge of complete mental breakdown, who tries to feed an orphaned baby water buffalo. When the animal refuses to eat Rat’s pork-and-beans, he kills it, but not in any humane way—he tortures it by shooting it many times, intentionally prolonging the animal’s death to cause it as much pain as possible, thus reflecting his own pain. It’s then easy for the reader to dislike Rat, to despise him, to never want to hear word of him again. Yet less than a dozen pages later, we’re chuckling over his braggadocios ways:

Among the men in Alpha Company, Rat had a reputation for exaggeration and overstatement, a compulsion to rev up the facts, and for most of us it was a normal procedure to discount sixty or seventy percent of anything he had to say. If Rat told you, for example, that he’d slept with four girls one night, you could figure it was about a girl and a half.

These opportunities to smile are what allows us to keep reading a story that’s rife with dreadful scenes and devastating anguish.

It’s important to note that the humor in these serious narratives is delivered in small doses—too much would undermine their poignancy. The fleeting nature of their comicality or absurdity mirrors the evanescent quality of our own personal experience with humor and laughter in the real world. This light brush with funny moments preceding or following a story’s gravest scenes makes it more believable to us, more relatable, more real.

This realness and emotion is what we all want from the stories we write; to move our readers to laughter and tears. Add a little humor to your next work of heavy literary fiction, and allow your readers to laugh. You’ll smile at the results—I’m serious.

Rhonda Browning White resides near Daytona Beach, FL and works as a ghostwriter, editor, adjunct professor, and Realtor. (She does what it takes to support her writing habit!) Her work appears in HeartWood Literary Review, Bellevue Literary Review, Steel Toe Review, Ploughshares Writing Lessons, Tiny Text, New Pages, South 85 Journal, WV Executive, Mountain Echoes, Gambit, Justus Roux, Bluestone Review, in the anthologies Appalachia’s Last Stand and Mountain Voices, and is forthcoming in World Enough Writers: Ice Cream Anthology, by Concrete Wolf Press. Rhonda recently was awarded the Sterling Watson Fellowship for the Eckerd College Writer’s Conference: Writers in Paradise. She blogs about books, writing, and celebrating life at “Read. Write. Live!” found at www.RhondaBrowningWhite.com , and about the craft of fiction writing at www.WhyTheWritingWorks.com. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from Converse College in Spartanburg, SC.

Arlia Frink

There are days when my introverted nature barricades myself inside the house, brews a small (but potent) pot of coffee, turns the cell phone off (I mean, actually off, and not the do-not-disturb-off), starts the vinyl spinning, and wallows in the creative process of writing. And then there are those moments the extroverted tendencies of my nature propel me to seek community with others tackling this lovely adventure we call creating art.

One such episode of extroversion found me as a participant at my alma mater’s undergraduate humanities conference contributing to a round table discussion of creativity and humanities last month. That is all we (two professors, one alumna, one current student) were told about the round table: creativity and the humanities. This discussion could travel to any destination. This discussion could ask, tell, seek, excavate the loftiest of paradigms or the shallowest of concepts. Who knew, this discussion might even inspire some apathetic undergraduate student to ardently pursue a humanities field (dare we hope?). Intellectual and artistic stimulation at its finest, my friends, at its absolute finest.

For almost two hours, students and professors from a mixture of regional institutions, fields of study, diverse demographics, volleyed ideas and queries back and forth. Questions led to comments led to questions led to audience participation led to notations on paper and then more commentary. What and how do we personally define creativity? Can creativity be taught or learned, nurtured or cultivated? Is is innate? Is there a difference between analytical and creative thought? If there is, can they be separated? What qualities are essential to creativity, to the creative process? If there is artistic merit and beauty in science and math, then why do most call them the dichotomous sibling of the humanities? Can the creative desire be stifled or destroyed? Oh, what questions. And oh, what responses.

As party to this discussion, the opportunity I was afforded to witness both the inklings of philosophical thought and the wisdom of those more experienced, was richly satisfying. For this round table discussion demonstrated one of my favorite aspects of an artistic and academic environment: community. There is risk in exploring and exposing the creative process, regardless if that process concerns playing with language or manipulating computer code. There is even greater risk when that exposure and exploration is organic and fluid, because the lack of structure also brokers a lack of control (and let’s face it, most of us enjoy having a modicum of control). But when individuals gather to form a community, however briefly, the weight of that risk is often lessened—shared weight produces comfort. Shared community also produces quite a bit of laughter, as I discovered that day too.

And isn’t that simply a lovely aspect of this adventure? To share, to learn, to gather a supportive community where available, and to laugh as you each navigate the intricacies of crafting something of quality and worth? As you each pursue the clearest expression of your aim? If that’s not exquisite, then at least let it prompt a response along those lines.

Arlia M. Frink currently attends Converse College’s Low-Residency MFA Program. She is a nap, music, and coffee aficionado, who occasionally dabbles in radio broadcasting and children’s story-time at area schools. A Yankee-hybrid, she lives in Darlington, South Carolina, where it is impossible to purchase Cream Of Wheat.

Kristi Hébert

Dystopian fiction is not simply about the end of the world.  It is often defined as “A futuristic, imagined universe in which oppressive societal control and the illusion of a perfect society are maintained through corporate, bureaucratic, technological, moral, or totalitarian control.  Dystopias, through an exaggerated worst-case scenario, make a criticism about a current trend, societal norm, or political system” (ReadWriteThink).  In essence, dystopian fiction is not just a genre designed to terrify the world with what might have been or what will be, but a more sincere social criticism, and while literary fiction is a form that requires a writer to focus on meaning and artistic prowess rather than the entertainment value of the piece, dystopian fiction is often relegated to mere genre fiction—a subsection of novels meant for pure entertainment with little to no literary merit.

However, there are many craft lessons to be learned from genre fiction in and of itself, and specifically dystopian fiction.  While dystopian fiction may be entertaining, or fantastical, or within the realm of science fiction, it also focuses on dispossessed or marginalized people, and the politics of how the suppression of an entire culture of society occurs with the apparent permission of the general populace.  Dystopian fiction is a way for writers to examine the possibility for vast social change, often as a warning based on the social and political climate in which they are writing, while weaving a thread of utopian hope as a subtext throughout the novel.  These writers reject the notion that immense societal, economic, or political changes are impossible, while offering their protagonists a chance to unveil change from within the society that is oppressing him or her and thereby offering the writer as well as the reader a chance to see the society they are reflecting upon beginning to change as well.

To that end, one of the most powerful tools that an author can use is, of course, language.  However, it is not merely the act of writing that the dystopian novel can teach us.  When an author evokes setting through language, it can anchor a reader in a time and place that the reader is unfamiliar with, without explicitly stating that the setting is another world or time.  It eases a reader into the world of dystopia without offering too much information that would reduce the likelihood of a reader’s suspension of disbelief.  Furthermore, in both fiction and non-fiction, as well as in real life, language itself is often used as a tool of power by totalitarian regimes or authoritarian governments: to take away an individual’s power to learn, to gather information for his or herself, to speak a language or use words native to his or her tongue, or to disagree with the politics or beliefs of his or her time is to take away personal agency, creating a prison of language, rather than bars.

Cognitive estrangement—or the act of using a reader’s lack of knowledge in the fictive world he or she is reading to continue a suspension of disbelief—is a theory often applied to works in which the audience must be willing to believe a premise in fiction that they would never believe in the “real world.”  A dystopian text often begins by plunging the reader into the created world with no preamble or introduction; yet cognitive estrangement is often delayed by the sense of normalcy that is created by this lack of preliminary explanation.  It is the language, then, that portrays to the reader that all is not what it seems.  Either by the author him- or herself using their craft of language to portray a different world or time, or by the text itself having an official discourse of a dystopian power structure, language is often the key element in dystopian fiction.

The way in which language is applied to dystopian fiction can be of assistance to writers of all kinds, not just science fiction or other genres.  As an author, one of the most important decisions you can make is regarding word choice.  If the words are beautiful but meaningless, or the meaning is hidden behind an amalgam of confusing text, a writer has accomplished nothing but frustrating herself and her potential readers.  As a professor, using words that are well-understood by the general student body, but also convey the meaning of intellectual pursuits, is an essential skill.  Likewise, in dystopian fiction, word choice can convey more than beautiful sentences or pretty ideals.  In 1984, Orwell begins the novel with “It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.”  With one word—thirteen—the reader understands that something is different about this place.  If one is to create that fragile suspension of disbelief in a world where our laws of physics are broken, or there are strange rules and terrifying laws, or a nuclear holocaust has occurred, it is essential to ease the reader into the muck.  In dystopia, the author drops the reader into the world without explanation of how things got as bad as they did, but without an initial sense of normality, it is often too surreal to be believed.

Dystopian fiction has many craft elements that are not often seen through the veneer of entertainment that plagues the genre.  While zombies, viruses and nuclear holocausts are often the background of dystopian worlds, it is not the focus of the writing.  Dystopian authors must also have a fine control of their craft in order to properly frame the world in such a way that skeptical readers can overcome their hesitation.  Each sentence must be carefully thought out to provide meaningful beauty, lest the reader give up on the genre as childish fiction.  Writers of dystopia must work harder to make their pieces true literature, and it is only by focusing on the words and the language, whether it is displayed as the power of the author, protagonist, or regime, that dystopian fiction will prevail.

Kristi Hébert was born near Buffalo, NY, but she now lives in a mosquito-ridden bayou jungle in Louisiana.  She works as a dog trainer, for which she didn’t need any of her three degrees.  She’s currently getting a fourth degree just for fun.  She likes to write about the end of the world, and she has been mistaken for Ariel, the Little Mermaid, at least once.  She is the Blog Editor of South 85 Journal.

Featured Image Credit:  Photo courtesy of National Nuclear Security Administration / Nevada Site Office [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Francis DiClemente

As one who writes in his spare time, while holding down a full-time job, I am the literary equivalent of a Manhattan waiter refusing to give up on a dream, however farfetched, of securing a leading role on the Broadway stage. But it’s clear the term literary does not apply to my publishing aspirations. I compose poems, stories, essays and other forms, send them out into the world and hope someone pays attention. Most of the time the work is ignored.

So why do I keep trying? Why do I rise at 5:30 a.m. every weekday and write before going to my job as a video producer at Syracuse University? Because I must—because I cannot ignore the compulsion to create. Yet I have discovered the world is not waiting for my words; no readers or editors clamor for my work.

Still I do not give up. And when I get discouraged about my progress I write in my journal, and these entries take the form of pep talks to myself. Here are some I have made in recent years:

Notation

I need to make use of these thoughts, however trivial, to put them down on paper and give them life. Otherwise, they are impotent, just swimming around my head without direction or purpose.

My words testify to my existence. They say, “I was here. I spoke. I wrote.” And if you failed to hear me, you do not have to look far to find me—for the evidence is stockpiled in the archived documents I left behind for others to sort out.

A Writer’s Regrets

I must let what is inside me out, regardless of the unlikelihood of success.

Failure meets me along the way.

I receive two forms of rejection. One is silence; the other is some variation of the following email: “Thank you for your submission. We appreciate the chance to read it, but unfortunately this piece is not for us.”

I wish God had implanted in me the desire to fly fish or hunt elk, to cook world-class entrees or pastries or make stained-glass windows in Gothic cathedrals. Anything but the need to string together words that no one wants.

I’m like a boxer on the ropes taking repeated blows to the head but refusing to go down. I wish my knees would buckle or the manager would throw in the white towel. Then I could give up on my dream of becoming a professional writer (one requiring no other employment).

Yet I keep at it, even though I may die as an unknown scribe with a stack of manuscripts bulging in a dresser drawer, heaps of paper suited for kindling in a pot-bellied stove.

And when I am gone I will haunt the rooms where I once wrote, unable to let go, raising my voice to get someone to listen, someone to read the collection of unpublished texts.

And this makes me wonder: do words have life if no one reads them? Are they real without an audience? Or are they just jumbled sentences searching for a home?

For now I concede failure. And I ponder why I am such a fool to keep writing. And yet I know I will.

On Writing

What if I didn’t need to write? Then I could live without paying attention to the world. I would not feel compelled to look around for subject matter—people, scenes and stories to capture and write about. I could enjoy the course of my day without seeking to preserve some aspect of it.

But this is not a choice; it never has been. I’ve been blessed and cursed with the desire to be a writer.

Yet ambition alone does not translate to success. Wanting to write, striving to express something of value, to steer the collected thoughts and ideas into vivid, lucid prose—all of this is meaningless. You are judged by the work alone. And you face rejection daily. I feel like a .220 hitter still trying to crack the opening day lineup.

But maybe even a bad writer can write something good at least once. And that notion keeps me going. And giving up is an option I cannot accept.

Why I Write

I have to let go of the need to succeed with my writing. Otherwise, publication and praise become the motivation for my work. Instead, I must celebrate the accomplishment of seeing ink arranged by my hand, the paragraphs stacked neatly on clean white paper.

I may never taste the fruit of this labor but I will not stop working. The reason is simple. I was a writer before I could even recite the alphabet. This aspect of my existence came with the package my parents created, like being left-handed or parting my hair on the right side.

I am a writer and I will no longer be afraid to write, to try, to fail. And while I must accept the judgment of others who may reject the words I offer, I refuse to get so discouraged as to quit writing. And why should failure stop me? A writer writes, as the saying goes. And that’s what I intend to do.

Francis DiClemente is a video producer and freelance writer who lives in Syracuse, New York. He is the author of three poetry chapbooks and his blog can be found at francisdiclemente.wordpress.com.

Author’s Photo Credit: Susan Kahn

Debby DeRosa

Twice a year during the Converse College Low-Residency MFA student residencies, I meet with current students of the program to tell them about the opportunity to work on the journal.  At the meeting this past January, I walked away with a page-long list of people interested in being on staff – possibly because my meeting this time happened at the main lunch table for the residency.  If people wanted to eat, they had to listen to my talk.

Therefore, I am excited to announce the Masthead for the Spring / Summer 2016 issue, which will come out on June 15.  I look forward to the fresh insight our new editors will bring as well as the wisdom that our more seasoned editors will contribute.

Returning to staff are:

● Melissa Sherrer (continuing as our Managing Poetry Editor)
● Anthony Reese (replacing Jacob Allard as our Managing Prose Editor and taking over the Social Media Director position)
● Aaron Dargis and Reed McFarlin (returning Poetry Co-Editors)
● Monica Torres (moving from the Non-Fiction Editor position to serve as a Poetry Co-Editor)
● Courtney McQueen (Artistic Director and Poetry Co-Editor)
● Shianna Whitner (returning Fiction Co-Editor)
● Kristi Hébert (continuing as our Blog Editor)
● Rick Mulkey (continuing as our Contributing Editor)
● Stephen Gray (continuing as our Webmaster)

We would like to welcome to staff:

● Gwen Holt and John Newlin (Fiction Co-Editors)
● Jonathan Burgess, Annette Sanders, and Kay Stewart (Non-Fiction Co-Editors)
● Angela Raper (Review Editor)

We are sad to say goodbye to a few retiring editors. Jacob Allard served our journal first as the Non-Fiction Editor and then Managing Prose Editor. Lisa Hase-Jackson served as Review Editor and will stay involved to help our new Review Editor transition into her position.  Shea Faulkner served as one of our Fiction Co-Editors.

All three of these editors did fabulous work in their positions and have left a legacy for us to follow. Since they are all graduates of the Converse MFA program, they have graciously agreed to step down from their positions so that new people can experience working on the journal. We wish them the best and look forward to seeing what they will do next!

Thank you for your continued support of our journal – by reading our blog, submitting your work, and reading our issues. If it weren’t for our readers and contributors, we wouldn’t exist! We look forward to putting out our next issue in June.

In the meantime, write like mad, and if it’s good, we want to see it.

Debby DeRosa holds a BA in English from the University of South Carolina-Columbia and an MFA in Creative Writing from Converse College.  In addition to being the Managing Editor of South 85 Journal, she is the Marketing Manager of Five Star Plumbing Heating Cooling in Greer, SC, and she freelances as a copywriter and content developer.

Finn Janning

After my brother’s death, I wrote, “I need to live double.” That day I became a writer.

My brother died between the 3^rd and 4^th of October, sometime after the night had ended but before the next day had begun. It was in 1993 that an overdose killed him. He was 26 years old. I learned of his death the next morning. That day I wrote my two first lines as a writer: “I need to live double,” followed by, “Now, it’s up to me.”

I was 19 years old at that time. Dare I say, I was a typical boy, spending most of my time playing football, hanging out with friends, watching films, and occasionally chasing girls. I was not even a reader. My brother’s death changed that. From one moment to the next, I was transformed.

The day of his funeral, I bought Friedrich Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra and a notebook. I had no previous knowledge of philosophy. Shortly afterward, I discovered libraries.

I relish the solitude of writing. Writing connects me with something that breathes. Words: whether I am reading or putting my own down on paper, they never argue with me. I speak with them, dialoguing in a friendly atmosphere, even when I feel a lack of agreement with them. It’s like a generous experimentation with different forms of life.

Ever since that day in October, I needed to write my way through my life. Writing became a way of making sense. I don’t mean psychologizing or looking for meaning, but rather making sense on a more intuitive level. Words can reach in and out. They can connect. I do not write because I have an agenda or something important that I need to pass on. I don’t believe in writing as relieving one’s heart. My heart is a muscle that pumps blood. The Chilean writer Roberto Bolaño wrote, “There’s nothing inside the man who sits there writing. Nothing of himself, I mean…He writes like someone taking dictation.”

That’s how I feel. I don’t reject anything. I am receptive. It’s my job. I have tried many strategies for living two lives, but I only feel doubly alive when I write. It’s spacious. Dictating all of the life that is not really mine. Passing it on. Perhaps I don’t really write to live, but to survive. Being a witness to life; many lives.

I am what passes through me. Some of it leaves behind a trace on the paper. Too much of what passes through are things I still don’t notice. If there is a deeper purpose behind my brother’s too early death, it is that his absence makes me more aware. Now, it truly is up to me to live all of the life that he missed.

Finn Janning is a writer and philosopher. His has published both fiction and nonfiction. His most recent publication is the book The Happiness of Burnout with Koenig Books.

Noelle Sterne

A writing friend wrote me that she had just been let go of her full-time office job. She was now based at her kitchen table, she said, and chafing mightily at being home—alone.  “I don’t know how you stand it!  I get distracted so easily and bored being home by myself. Help!”

Having worked at home for many years in both my writing and my editing businesses, I felt for my friend. She was experiencing the shock of going from a busy, people-filled environment to a solitary one, and she didn’t even have a dog. I immediately stopped working on my current project and wrote her back.

I “stand it,” I told her, because I am at heart an introvert and love to be alone (with an occasional interruption from my husband).  But, I added, you don’t have to be a confirmed recluse to make it work, and even I need some shakeups. In response to my friend’s plea, I thought of several remedies for the “stale at home” quandary. These work for me, and I hope they do so for you:

1.  Take your computer and go work in a library, coffee shop, or mall.

2.  Get a little dressed and with your laptop go to a hotel. Sit in the lobby as if you’re waiting for your colleagues to arrive for The Meeting. While you’re waiting, set up your materials. You will look and feel professional and busy, you’ll be around people, and you may even score some complimentary bottled water and nuts from the lobby bar.

3.  Get together with a friend and write for a period you decide on. Then talk and sip your lattes.

4.  Set a timer for a certain number of minutes to work or set yourself a certain number of words and pages per session.

5.  When the timer bings, get up and skip around your house, walk or jog outside, do a couple of physical errands.

6.  Phone someone (set another timer). An old friend or writing colleague will be mightily pleased. You may even get an essay out of it.

7.  Blast iTunes/radio/tv/your special mixtapes. Dance around (great for your aerobics).

8.  Take a nap (set the timer again).

9.  Wallow in a trashy magazine or novel for a half hour. You’ll be rarin’ to write (“I can do better than this!”)

10.  Make a date with yourself for a few hours. Choose something that’s a real reward. (Haven’t you always wanted to explore that automotive store?)

11.  Make a date with a friend for a new exploration or adventure—the zoo, a new outlet mall, the new park nearby you haven’t yet gotten to.

12.  Always take a notepad and pen or install a recording device on your phone—ideas will come to you when you don’t think you’re thinking about your work.

As you mull over these suggestions, realize and be grateful for the benefits of writing at home:

1.  No office politics or gossip.

2.  No outside demands for deadlines.

3.  No impossible boss to deal with.

4.  You can get up and get a (healthy) snack or (healthier) drink whenever you want to. (No stale office break-room coffee.)

5.  You can slip in some necessaries as breaks—a load of laundry, a swipe around the microwave, a programming of the TiVo (absolutely necessary).

6.  You can walk out, literally, any time you want to.

7.  You can work, literally, any time you want to without thinking about how tired you’ll be in the office if you get up to write at 5:00 a.m. or work until midnight.

So, choose one or more of the suggestions above. You’ll probably come up with your own variations. And if you need more convincing, remember the benefits of writing at home. Now, get out…  I mean, stay in!

© 2016 Noelle Sterne

Noelle Sterne (Ph.D.) publishes in many venues, including Author Magazine, Chicken Soup for the Soul, Children’s Book Insider, Graduate Schools Magazine, Inspire Me Today, and Writer’s Digest. Her Trust Your Life: Forgive Yourself and Go After Your Dreams (Unity Books) helps readers reach lifelong yearnings. Her new book, based on her academic coaching practice, assists doctoral students: Challenges in Writing Your Dissertation: Coping With the Emotional, Interpersonal, and Spiritual Struggles (Rowman & Littlefield Education). www.trustyourlifenow

Kevin Welch

A few years back, I sat in the office of an influential music agent. I was early, and he had business to wrap before an evening of overpriced drinks, appetizers, and dinner. It was my first trip to New York.  Given the agent’s status in the industry, I did not want to be late. He invited me to sit with him while he finished his day instead of having me spend over an hour in the front lobby.

My job at the time involved making music decisions for a major market radio station. He, on the other hand, was a multi-millionaire with unlimited influence in music culture and an impressive list of clients, bands, and artists you probably have in your iTunes library. Most with his resume and client list had a blinding arrogance; he, on the other hand, was the kindest gentleman I’d ever met in the industry. During the next 90 minutes, I learned a lifetime of lessons that I could apply seamlessly to writing.

#1

The agent said, “You have your whole life to write your first album. You have eight months to write your second. This is why so many bands fail – the Sophomore Jinx. Bands take those eight months and give only a passing thought about writing their follow-up. Second albums are horrible.”

The writing lesson. As a writer, you have a lifetime of ideas for your first novel. If you’re fortunate and your book gets published, make sure to keep writing. It’s easy to get caught up in the glitz of success and forget what it took to get you there. By now, you should have a system of writing in place. Stick to that system.

#2

He said, “Signing a record deal doesn’t mean you’ve made it. Tons of albums have been shelved even after they were paid for. It’s nothing until it’s out, and then it’s only one.”

Getting a book deal means the work has just begun. I’ve talked to a number of writers who have told me writing their novel was the easy part. All the readings, signings, travel, panels, hotels, and meetings take it out of a person. Signing a deal is just the beginning. After all the promotion and touring, writing, editing, and revising, you have another book to write.

#3

“Obsessive bands get signed. Whether it’s in the writing, the practicing, or paying attention to bursts of inspiration no matter the time of day. Some of the best songs were written on a Casio piano at 2 am.”

Story ideas come at us all the time. You won’t remember them if you don’t take a minute to write them down. I have musician and writer friends who tell me if a dream or an idea occurs, they wake, get their guitar or computer keyboard to work the idea out then and there. Simply letting the ideas slip away with a thought that you’ll remember it and write it down later is a disservice to your craft.

#4

“The bands I work with often know more about new artists than I do. They’re students of music. Getting a deal didn’t stop that. In fact, most often my new clients come from recommendations from my current clients.”

Have a touch of writer’s block? Read. What’s new, who’s hot, and how are they writing? You can’t expect the way you’re doing something today to be relevant in a year. You won’t know what’s relevant if you don’t know what’s out there. Besides, you’ll sound incredibly knowledgeable at the next function.

The agent made one more phone call, arranged a driver, and grabbed his jacket. I stood, gathering my thoughts and feeling quite inspired.

“You’re going to love this new band of mine tonight,” he said. “You ready to eat?”

I don’t remember the band we went to see after dinner but will never forget the 90 minutes I spent in his office prior.

Kevin Welch has an MFA from Converse. He teaches part time at Mt. Hood Community College in Portland, Oregon.

Karin Gillespie

Trying to teach novel writing in one college semester is like trying to stuff a king-sized bed comforter into the tub of a compact washing machine. You can’t possibly fit it all the material in no matter how much you try.

I have only sixteen weeks to teach students elements of novel craft like characterization, setting and point of view. But I also want to give them my very best advice, wisdom I wished someone had told me fifteen years ago when I started writing novels.

I begin by telling my students it takes time to get skilled at writing novels, probably ten years depending on how often you practice, and you really should practice every day. I talk about the novelist Ben Fountain, author of Billy Lynn’s Longtime Halftime Walk, who took eighteen years to learn his craft, writing for hours every day while his wife supported him, a luxury most of my students won’t have.

I tell them that the only way you can learn the craft of novel writing is to write novels. Short story writing is a noble endeavor, but short stories are as different from novels as an associate degree is from a PhD.  Every now and then a writer will publish a short story that’s expanded into a well-regarded novel, but generally the author has a style or voice so distinctive it compensates for undeveloped storytelling skills.

I think it’s important for students to recognize what readers are looking for in a novel. Yes, they want to be entertained or edified. Yes, they want metaphors so apt that they will pause to savor them, but what they unconsciously seek is character growth. Television audiences didn’t get hooked on Mad Men because of the vintage clothing and three-martini lunches; they got hooked because they were invested in the evolution of Don Draper’s character.

And how do characters evolve? Through forces of antagonism, but those forces need to be applied in a specific way, and that’s where storytelling skills comes into the picture. Beautifully crafted sentences add to a novel but they alone will not sustain a reader’s interest for the many hours it takes to read a 300-page book. To be a novelist is to be a storyteller. Screenwriting books are a good place to learn the craft. I always recommend John Truby’s Anatomy of Story: 22 Steps to Becoming a Master Storyteller.

I’ll usually get some disagreement from students on my next point, but I strongly believe you should have a plan before you write a novel. I know a lot of writers quote E.L Doctorow who said, “It’s like driving a car at night. You never see further than your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.”

But most reasonable people who go on long car trips have a general idea of their destination, and they consult maps before they head out. Very rarely do they say, “Car! Take me away.”  A novel is a complicated undertaking, and it pays to have some kind of direction. Very often you’ll deviate from your plans, but it’s wise to have something in place from the onset.

Also it makes sense to write all the way through your novel without going back to perfect your prose. Writing a novel is analogous to building a house. First you get down the foundation. While you pour out the shape of your story, you shouldn’t be worried about the color of the tile in the master bath or what backsplash you want in the kitchen. In revisions large sections of prose are often cut so it makes no sense to tinker with it in first drafts.

I’ve written ten novels, seven that have been contracted with publishers, and yet in some ways I feel as if I’ve just begun on this journey, which leads me to the final point I make with students.

Choosing the novelist’s life is very analogous to the character arc of a protagonist. At first you plunge into the endeavor with an assortment of flaws, defenses, and preconceived notions that will initially hold you back. You’ll experience many obstacles to publication and very often you’ll cling to your weaknesses and bad habits, which will further thwart your goals.

At some point you’ll become so frustrated you’ll want to give up, but it’s crucial that you don’t. Just beyond your despair is the possibility for growth and change. If you can power through your dark night of the soul, you will bring more clarity and strength to each creative work you attempt.

Karin Gillespie is the author of seven novels and has an MFA from Converse. Her nonfiction writing has appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, and Writer Magazine. She writes a book column for the Augusta Chronicle and is a humor columnist for Augusta Magazine. She’s a part-time instructor at Augusta University.

Our Fall / Winter 2015 issue is up and ready for viewing!

Creative Work

We are pleased to present work by the following contributors:

• Artwork – Michael Brouwer, Thomas Gillaspy, Kyle Hemmings, Priyadarshini Komala, Allison Merriweather, W. Jack Savage, Harry Wilson
• Fiction – Ron Burch, Justin Justin Eisenstadt, Jasmine Evans, Marija Stajic
• Non-Fiction – Louis Bourgeois, Shiv Dutta, Marlene Olin, Marisa Mangani, John Soltysiak
• Poetry – Jeffrey Alfier, Rebecca O’Bern, L.D. Bohn, Carl Boon, Kevin Carey, Ross Howerton, Charlene Langfur, Marian Shapiro, Ellen Roberts Young

Reviews

Wondering what to read over the holiday?  Check out our reviews of the following books:

• It Had Been Planned and There Were Guides: Stories by Jessica Lee Richardson (Fiction)
• Blackout by Sarah Hepola (Non-Fiction)
• Paradise Drive by Rebecca Foust (Poetry)

Special Thanks

South 85 Journal is published by the Converse College Low-Residency MFA program.  Thank you to our staff of volunteers who put countless hours into making this issue happen. We hope you enjoy reading this issue as much as we enjoyed putting it together!