Ravenous Reader #4

Daniel Perry is a fiction writer living in Toronto. Nobody Looks that Young Here is his first collection of short stories.

1.  Do you have an early memory of learning to read?
Yes, though it’s more of a recounted memory than something I clearly remember. Before starting kindergarten, in my school, you and your parent(s) would come in for a short sit-down with the principal. (I wasn’t supposed to be there, actually, but I was, with my father.) I had spent most of life to this point watching Sesame Street, and my parents had been teaching me, so I was a reader before I had even started school. The story goes that my dad asked the principal if I’d be challenged enough; “He can read, you know,” to which the principal said, “Well, I’m sure he knows a few words.” Dad picked up a for-parents pamphlet from the desk and handed it to me, saying “Dan, read this.” I asked where to start, Dad said “At the beginning,” and I’m told I sounded out pretty much the whole thing, and the principal said, “Holy shit, he can read,” (though that last bit sounds like standard working-class point-scoring). I didn’t end up skipping a grade – I’m born December 31, which would have made me two years younger than some classmates – but they did put me in French Immersion, which means I’m lucky enough to be able to read in two languages.      

2.  Have you always been an avid reader?
Other than a six-month dry spell after I washed out of grad school – I got the master’s, but didn’t turn up the next fall for the Ph. D. program that accepted me – I’ve always read, moving from Curious George through the Hardy Boys and R.L. Stine into John Grisham and Tom Clancy before hitting high school and getting into capital-L literature. I remember in undergrad, a former girlfriend’s roommate saw me somewhere that wasn’t campus and observed, “You always have a book with you, don’t you?” It’s especially true now that I live in Toronto and take transit everywhere. I never leave home without one.       

3.  How do you decide what to read next?
For the longest time, if I read an interesting review or excerpt, I’d go straight to the Toronto Public Library website and place a hold. What I read would then be decided by what came in when, and which books were closest to their due dates… and I was so overcommitted, most books spent the full nine weeks (three week loan, twice renewed) in my apartment. I’ve taken control, though: for 2013, I’ve placed myself under library moratorium and focused on reading books that I’ve bought but not read. There is a specific Read-Once-And-Get-Rid-Of pile that’s right beside my writing desk. I’m steadily plucking books off it, but it’s somehow growing anyway…

4.  Do you have any reading rituals that you follow? 
I try not to start a new novel unless I have enough time to get through a good 50 pages in the first sitting; reading Chapter 1 on the subway to work and Chapter 2 on the way home only results in having to read them both over again on the weekend. Also, I make myself write a paragraph about every book I finish, a sort of journal that I post from on my blog and my Facebook page.

5. What makes a great story or novel?
Selection. I struggle with it in my own writing sometimes, but to me a good story contains absolutely nothing that’s extraneous; as Chekhov said (paraphrase), if there’s a gun on the mantle in Act I then it had better go off by the final curtain. I go crazy reading novels in which every character is introduced with a paragraph about what they’re wearing – it so rarely comes to bear on the story! Show me what I need to see, and ditch the rest. Get on with the story. I haven’t read him in a long time, but I remember thinking there were no wasted words in Stephen Crane’s work.  

6.  Do you have a favourite genre?
I don’t think so… unless Literary Fiction is a “genre.” I try to read all kinds of different books, throwing in the odd thriller, mystery or historical page-turner to offset the classics, the award-winners, and the disproportionate amount of good, good, whole wheat CanLit.  

7.  Who was the first author you fell in love with? The last?
Leaving aside the series I loved as a kid, I think the first author I really devoured was John Steinbeck. His books were generally short, emotional wallops, and my dad was a fan; we had all the old Bantam paperbacks. Growing up in rural southwestern Ontario, I found they dealt with a kind of life and a class of people I could understand. More recently, I’ve read three books (and bought one more) by each of the New Zealand writer Lloyd Jones (try Mister Pip) and Kingston, Ontario’s own Steven Heighton (whose novel The Shadow Boxer is one of the most criminally under-celebrated books ever produced in this country).   

8.  What classic or well-known book have you never been able to get through?
The Lord of the Rings. This might go back to Question 5: too much scene setting. Eighty pages in, and still nothing’s happened…? No thanks. Tried it three times.

9.  What book or books do you reread?
I rarely reread – there are too many books in the world! – but I recently reread an assigned undergraduate book, Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice, as a mate to Geoff Dyer’s Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi. From time to time, I also pick up Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried or Denis Johnson’s Jesus’ Son. These two books contain some of the best short stories of our time, and I can always learn more from what they’ve done with the form. Plus, Johnson’s book is so small, I can read it on the streetcar on the way to a Jays’ game then put it in a pocket and not have to worry about lugging it around all night.

10. Do you have dry spells where you stop reading or read very little?
No. I sometimes wish I did, but I’m pretty steady: five books a month.

11. How do you organize your collection?
I have a small bookcase for drama, poetry, and non-fiction – most of it left over from university or high school – and two larger fiction cases: one for the books I’ve read and one for the unread. The small bookcase and the stuff I’ve read are alphabetical by author, while – aside from one shelf that’s restricted to short story collections – the unread bookcase is in no order whatsoever.   

12. Do you enjoy recommending books to others? What criteria do you use?

I do enjoy recommending books, and I try especially hard to think of what the person likes: similar authors, style, subject matter. I read somewhere that Scandinavian cultures consider a book the most thoughtful gift you can give – long winters, just like we have in Canada – and I can’t say that I disagree. Turning someone on to a given author is a pleasure, and it’s especially nice to have the favour returned: I’ve never been into SF, but a friend suggested China Miéville’s The City & the City to me recently, and it’s one of the best books I’ve read in the last year. A great reco makes you feel honour-bound to do just as well by your friends.

13. You host a dinner party for five authors (dead or alive). Who’s invited?
Jorge Luis Borges, Henry Miller, Bill Bryson, Ernest Hemingway and… William Shakespeare… just to see if that famous portrait is actually his. (Yeah, I know. Boys’ club.)

14. Do you write? If so, how does reading influence your writing?
I do write, primarily short stories, so it’s almost the other way around: my writing has greatly influenced my reading, in the sense that I’ve probably read a thousand short stories in the last three years, and continue to be fascinated by them. There’s no one “right” way to do it, and I’ve come to like stories so disparate that (hopefully) no one influence is too discernible in my own work (except, probably, Alice Munro). What I find that reading does do is remind me how it feels to be a reader, and keeps fresh that feeling of disappointment when characters, scenes or (especially) sentences don’t pay out; I often catch myself revising as I read, saying “I’d have said it this way.” It’s like a passive(-aggressive?) form of writing practice, I guess.       

15. What are you reading right now?

I want to mention two books I recently finished, Canada by Richard Ford and The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides, because they’re two very accomplished contemporary novels, and big books that don’t feel at all unwieldy. And as I write this, it’s Super Sad True Love Story, by Gary Shteyngart – funny and clever story of a loveable loser, set in the new future. I’m enjoying it.  

Ravenous Reader is a regular series.

May Lit Links

Sensitive Skin. The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved

the guardian. Sons and Lovers: a century on

terrible minds. 25 Motivational Thoughts for Writers

Daniel Perry Fiction. The books in your home, and how to get rid of them

Currently Living. Q&A with Kris Bertin (Part One)

The Poke. Unfortunate publishing layouts of our time

Little Fiction. Kevin Hardcastle for #shortstorymonth

The Barnstormer. What, if anything, is wrong with CanLit?

The New York Review of Books. Why Read the Classics?

Peevish Penman. Do you Fear Success or Failure?

Ravenous Reader #3

Dan Murphy is author of The Amazing Adventures of the Dispatch Rider.

1.  Do you have an early memory of learning to read?
Yes, I'm at home, and my mother would ask me to read something and then quiz me on what I remembered about the story. And I couldn't tell her because I didn't know anything I had just read.

2.  Have you always been an avid reader?
No. My avid reading started in my early twenties.

3.  How do you decide what to read next?
I go to the book store or library. I will switch genres if I can, almost every time.

4.  Do you have any reading rituals that you follow? 
No, I read mostly on transit and would hate to think what would happen if I could afford a car. Ha!

5. What makes a great story or novel?
For me, it's leaving out a lot of detail because that just bogs me down and makes me tired. I like a fast paced story.

6.  Do you have a favourite genre?
No. I read all kinds of books.

7.  Who was the first author you fell in love with? The last?
That would have to be Hunter S. Thompson. The last would be J. K. Rowling.

8.  What classic or well-known book have you never been able to get through?
This is a bad one because I rode a motorcycle for seventeen years, but I could never finish Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. I think I tried three times.

9.  What book or books do you reread?
Books that I read a long time ago and just can't remember. A book like W. P. Kinsella's Shoeless Joe. Kinsella's words just went to the centre of my brain. I heard it, when I read it.

10. Do you have dry spells where you stop reading or read very little?
Rarely, but I almost always have something set up for the next one or go to the library if I don't. 

11. How do you organize your collection?
I don't; they're everywhere. I've always said that if I ever buy a house, I'll put them all on shelves. 

12. Do you enjoy recommending books to others? What criteria do you use?
I do like passing along a book, but usually I'll know the person and will already have a sense of what they like.

13. You host a dinner party for five authors (dead or alive). Who’s invited?
Stephen King, J. K. Rowling, Paul Brickhill, Pierre Burton, and Charles Dickens. 

14. Do you write? If so, how does reading influence your writing?
Yes. I think my writing is influenced (subconsciously) by just reading so much and hopefully learning structure that way. 

15. What are you reading right now?
I'm reading an autobiography by Rob Lowe who has some great stories to tell.

Ravenous Reader is a regular series.

April Lit Links

Buzzfeed. The 30 Best Places To Be If You Love Books

Melville House. Is this really a golden age for short stories?

Writer's Digest. Life of Pi's Yann Martel Shares His Writing Secrets

the guardian. Good Sex in Literature: why is it so hard to find?

Lauren Holder Raab. Handy Hint: On to vs. Onto

The Malahat Review. Above our Biology: Naben Ruthnum in Conversation with Kris Bertin

terribleminds. 25 Ways to Unstick a Stuck Story

Beyond the Margins. The Psychology of Books: Why We Read What We Read

The Baltimore Sun. Good grammar doesn't entitle you to be smug

Lit Reactor. This is Not a Checklist: How to Write a Story

Muriel Barbery

Excerpts from The Elegance of the Hedgehog:

The Great Work of Making Meaning

"There is always the easy way out, although I am loath to use it. I have no children, I do not watch television and I do not believe in God - all paths taken by mortals to make their lives easier. Children help us to defer the painful task of confronting ourselves, and grandchildren take over from them. Television distracts us from the onerous necessity of finding projects to construct in the vacuity of our frivolous lives: by beguiling our eyes, television releases our mind from the great work of making meaning. Finally, God appeases our animal fears and the unbearable prospect that someday all our pleasures will cease. Thus, as I have neither future nor progeny nor pixels to deaden the cosmic awareness of absurdity, and in the certainty of the end and the anticipation of the void, I believe I can affirm that I have not chosen the easy path."

Profound Thought No. 9

". . . this is the first time I have met someone who seeks out people and who sees beyond. That may seem trivial but I think it is profound all the same. We never look beyond our assumptions and, what's worse, we have given up trying to meet others; we just meet ourselves. We don't recognize each other because other people have become our permanent mirrors. If we actually realized this, if we were to become aware of the fact that we are only ever looking at ourselves in the other person, that we are alone in the wilderness, we would go crazy. . . . As for me, I implore fate to give me the chance to see beyond myself and truly meet someone."

Profound Thought No. 15

"You know what? I wonder if I haven't missed something. A bit like someone who's been hanging out with a bad crowd and then discovers another path through meeting a good person. . . . Sigh. I don't know. This story is a tragedy, after all. 'There are some worthy people out there, be glad!' is what I felt like telling myself, but in the end, so much sadness! They end up in the rain. I really don't know what to think. Briefly, I thought I had found my calling, I thought I'd understood that in order to heal, I could heal others, or at least the other "healable" people, the ones who can be saved - instead of moping because I can't save other people. So what does this mean - I'm supposed to become a doctor? Or a writer? It's a bit the same thing, no?"

Making Maple Syrup at Maplewood

My dad has been making maple syrup on the McArthur lot (in Ottawa) for the last twenty-five years. I visited in March and helped him make batch #4. During the day, I engaged my dad in a little Q&A about the maple syrup process.

Maplewood

How did you learn to make maple syrup?
I watched Walter (our neighbour) making it. He showed me how to drill the holes, and I read some articles about the process.

What makes a good maple syrup tree?
Good sap producers are at least 10" in diameter (the trunk) and have a large crown (upper part of the tree).

Collecting Sap

How do you know when it's time to tap the trees?
I don't keep track of dates but usually the end of March, earlier if there's a warm snap. This year I got started around the 10th. 

How many buckets do you hang?
I used 9 buckets in the beginning. This year, I'm up to 17 because it takes about 40 gallons of sap to make 1 gallon of maple syrup.

Firepit

How long does 1 batch (about 6 pints) take to make?
It's a day's work. I fill garbage pails full of sap, heat it up in two pots (on burners) in the garage, and then pour the warm sap into two pans on the firepit in the laneway. I just keep transfering from pail to pots to pans all day until I've run out o' sap. 

How many batches do you make in a typical year?
It all depends on the weather fluctuations, but usually three or four. I may cook up a fifth batch next week as it's supposed to go below freezing and back up again. It's been a productive year because I've persevered. (Batch #5 was made five days later.)

Pot to Pan

What do you enjoy most about the process?
It's fun to get out of the house, especially in the spring after you've been cooped up all winter. You get out in this beautiful sunshine - it's great.

Would you call this a one-man operation?
Yep.

Sap to Syrup

What is most challenging about making maple syrup?
Well physically, it's chopping all the wood. But other than that, getting it off (the fire) at the right time so you don't overcook it.

Have you ever overcooked the syrup?
Yes - the day it all burned. It was almost ready, but I went inside and got side-tracked watching some crappy TV show, and when I came out the whole pan was just black. It had boiled down to the the point where the sugar caught fire, and the pan was like tar. It took a long time to clean that pan up, son of a bitch (laughs). We finally did and were back in business, but that was a whole day's work gone up in flames. No fun at all.

Filter Set-Up

How do you know when to stop cooking the syrup?
I can tell by the look of the bubbles in the pan; they should be a caramel colour. And by the thickness of the syrup. It's better to take it off a bit earlier than later, as I can always cook it a bit longer inside on the stove if I need to. 

What's next after it's off the fire?
Time to dump it through the filter, at least twice, usually three times to get rid of what your mum calls "sand". Another mess-up happened one year before we had these factory-made filters. Mum thought she could make a filter, and she already had some black felt. These white ones are even made out of felt. Well, when we poured the hot boiling syrup through the black one, all this dye got washed into the syrup and, lo and behold, we had black syrup - not very appetizing at all (laughs). That was bad news; another day gone. You spend all day - boiling, boiling, boiling, cutting wood, feeding the fire, and whatya got? Dead syrup. So that was a bad day... but today is going to be a good day.

Pot to Jars

After filtering, what's left to do?
The syrup is pretty well ready to bottle after that. I sterilize the jars in the oven and boil the rings and lids on the stove. The trick is to keep the syrup warm for easy pouring. 

Where do you store maple syrup?
Well, I used to keep it in the cold cellar in the basement, but your mum didn't like that, so any batches from years past are now in the freezer in the garage.

Batch #4

What determines the colour variations from batch to batch?
Depends on how long it's cookin' on the fire. The longer it's cooked, the darker it is. But also, each batch in a season becomes a bit darker than the last.

How would you rate this year's syrup?
Most excellent. I think batch #3 is the best I've ever made.

Happy Sap

It was a great day, and I was able to bring some of the #4 Julie Dad batch back to Toronto for syrup loving friends. 

Backyard Maple Syrup Production

Maple Syrup: FAQ

March Lit Links

the guardian. Anton Chekhov: a lifetime of lovers

Book Riot. Start Here: Read Your Way Into 25 Amazing Authors

Poets & Writers. Agents & Editors: A Q&A With Editor Chuck Adams

Peevish Penman. Forging Relationships with Other Writers

Brain Pickings. 10 Tips on Writing from David Ogilvy

Salon. "Most contemporary literary fiction is terrible"

terrible minds. 25 Virtues Writers Should Possess

the Atlanctic Wire. If One Were to Use the Subjunctive Mood

Open Letters Monthly. Is Cormac McCarthy a Terrible Writer?

Daily Writing Tips. How to Revise Bullet Lists for Grammatical Consistency