Q&A with Lydia Netzer, author of Shine Shine Shine

“This is the story of an astronaut who was lost in space, and the wife he left behind. . . . This is the story of the human race, who pushed one crazy little splinter of metal and a few pulsing cells up into the vast dark reaches of the universe, in the hope that the splinter would hit something and stick, and that the little pulsing cells could somehow survive.” ~ from Shine Shine Shine

Sometimes, it is in moments of distress that everything becomes clear. We see the truth in ourselves and in those around us. We risk showing that truth to others, and we find strange peace.

In Lydia Netzer’s debut novel, Shine Shine Shine, Maxon Mann is a scientist with Asberger’s, sitting on a rocket en route to the moon. His wife, Sunny, is a woman with alopecia, who hides herself behind several different wigs. When a meteor strikes Maxon’s rocket and threatens to send him and his fellow astronauts careening through space, Maxon and Sunny both search their pasts for bits and pieces that will save them. Maxon uncovers the core of his humanity; Sunny discovers that leaving her wigs behind relieves her of more than the physical weight of her long, blonde, fake hair. Throughout the novel, it is the simplicity of love between complicated individuals that yields the most power in the story. Here’s what Liesl Schillinger says about Shine Shine Shine:

[Netzer] slowly assembles a multitude of pinpoint insights that converge to form a glimmering constellation: the singularity of the miraculous machinery of the human organism.

I’m honored to host Lydia Netzer today, and thrilled to be giving away a copy of her novel. Leave your name in the comments (it’s that easy) to enter the giveaway. Random.org will choose the winner on Tuesday, October 16th, at noon.

And now, welcome Lydia!

CC: One scene in your novel that I particularly love is when Maxon realizes, moments before he proposes to Sunny, how deeply he has grown to know her and love her: “her movements, yes, and her physical shape. He recognized the tone of her voice and he noted persistent mannerisms and favorite vocabulary. . . . But what he realized, looking at her there splashing in the water, making a star with her body and then contracting down to do a somersault, was that he really recognized her, down inside. He knew that, if the planet was spun like a top, and stopped suddenly, and he was asked to point her out, that he could do it.” To drop in a quote here may not give the scene justice, but I couldn’t resist. I read that part several times over. Are you partial to a specific scene or chapter, one that stuck with you long after you finished the book?

LN: The scene that I feel the most happy about and also sad about is probably the scene where Sunny and Maxon are showing their signs to each other, when Maxon is in space and Sunny is watching him on a monitor at NASA. I wanted to give them a way to communicate that made sense to both of them, and would bring them closure, and resolve their discord. Probably if I tried to describe the scene to someone who hadn’t read the book, and said “They were looking at each other in web cams, and then they wrote notes to each other, and stuck them on their bodies,” it would sound a little bizarre… and like something that couldn’t be that emotional. It’s my hope that in opening them up throughout the book in different ways, I have brought you to a point, by the time that scene comes in, that you can understand what they’re saying to each other from the inside of their relationship.

The worst scene to write was when she takes her mother off life support.

The easiest to write was the scene at the neighborhood craft party, when Les Weathers makes an appearance.

CC: I do love that scene with the signs, and I think it’s perfect the way it unfolds.

Throughout the story, Maxon writes algorithms or explanations in computer speak that help him translate how he should interact with others and what he should say in certain circumstances. All those IF THEN statements and ending tags and brackets, I love it! We could all use such scripted lessons at times, and so much of Maxon’s character is revealed in this way. What inspired this idea, to give the reader that kind of visual insight in the workings of Maxon’s mind?

LN: Since I became a parent myself, I’ve become so aware of how many of our interactions are rituals — learned responses to a very small set of situations that occur in daily life. How are you? I am fine. How was your weekend? It was great. We might as *well* be robots, wheeling around, bumping into each other and powering up the appropriate green light so it can flash an answering sequence to the other robots’ green lights.

Teaching a child manners, learning the ins and outs of a new job, surviving a first date, going to church, working out, we respond to input with well-defined outputs, and in training a human to cope with these situations, you find it’s not that much different from programming a robot. The amount of time we spend actually generating some heartfelt interaction with new ways of saying things that we’re inventing on the spot? Probably close to zero percent, given the span of our lives.

It’s very hard for an autistic person to interpret intentions, to understand inflections. And it’s hard for autistic people to mimic nuanced language, and facial expressions. However, it’s possible for a high functioning autistic person, or someone with Asperger’s Syndrome or Hyperlexia, to learn enough “cheat codes” that they can pass in most situations. It’s not always necessary to understand someone, if you appear to understand them. It’s not always necessary to love someone, if you can appear to love them. Thinking about these questions really led me to evaluate how children are socialized, how adults behave, and what is the real difference between a human brain and sophisticated AI?

CC: In this Q&A on Kristin Bair O’Keeffe’s blog, Writerhead, you say, “When I pack for a writing retreat, I need certain smells: Crabtree & Evelyn ‘West Indian Lime,’ Viktor & Rolf ‘Flowerbomb,’ Thierry Mugler ‘Angel.’ Also Vick’s Vapor Rub, grapefruit shampoo, and rosemary. When I was writing Shine, Shine, Shine, the smell of…bergamot helped me think about Sunny and Maxon’s burgeoning love affair.” Do scents still play a part in your writing ritual?

LN: Absolutely. I’m currently writing a story in which one of the mother characters uses lavender scent to mask the smell of alcohol, so that her whole house and everything connected to her is constantly reeking of lavender. Her daughter, in contrast, is lemons.

CC: What are you reading these days?

LN: Right now I’m reading Gods without Men by Hari Kunzru, Zombie by J.R. Angelella, Gilgamesh the King by Robert Silverberg. I’m reading Flatscreen by Adam Wilson and Girlchild by Tupelo Hassman to prepare for our panel at Nashville’s Southern Festival of the Book. And I’m reading a couple more things: Patriots by David Frum and Looking for Salvation at the Dairy Queen by Susan Gregg Gilmore. I like to have as many books going at once as I can. I’m too hungry a reader to only have one thing on my plate.

CC: What advice can you offer writers on the rise?

LN: Never give up and never quit. Find the story that’s most important in the world for you to tell, and then grab onto it and don’t give up on it ever. When it seems like telling it has gotten too hard, know that you’re doing it right. It’s worth it.

Don’t push your difficult material away by putting your best scenes in summary, in flashbacks, in distant characters’ lives, or locked inside the brains of dead people or children. Don’t smooth over ugliness, don’t skirt around violence or close the curtains on sex. Your difficult material is your best material. Stuff that’s easy to read and write doesn’t matter much. Tear off as many layers as you can between your reader and what really matters, give them all the information you can give them as honestly as you can give it to them, and as soon.

Push every button on the control panel. Don’t hold back. If there’s a way to do it harder, do it. If there’s a choice that’s going to push it farther, make it. This means uncomfortable, personal, honest introspection and a willingness to reach into your own brain, or heart, or soul if you have one, and pull out your secrets.

~

I’m Lydia Netzer, and my first novel, Shine Shine Shine, is a People Magazine “People Pick,” an IndieBound Next Pick, the Amazon Spotlight Book for July, and is available now! I’m a nerd, a mom, an electric guitar player, and I want to make you lunch.

~

For more on Lydia Netzer or her book, watch the book trailer, check out her website here, follow her on Twitter, or subscribe to her page on Facebook.

Don’t forget to leave your name in the comments for a chance to win a copy of Shine Shine Shine.

Book Review: The Salt God’s Daughter

“Perhaps the blueprint of a life remained the same even if the place and people were different.” ~ from The Salt God’s Daughter

I have to be honest, I’m not the best reviewer of books. There are many other bloggers out there who do this on a regular basis, who are faster readers than I am, who can whip out a review in one days’ time or less. I wish I were of their making.

I am a slow reader. Even slower to process my experiences after reading a book. I’m a writer, after all. I like to sit with the words awhile, go back into the story, search for the parts I missed or misunderstood. I worry I won’t do a book justice if I write about it in short order.

But, I immediately said yes to reviewing The Salt God’s Daughter when Booksparks contacted me. I read Ruby’s debut novel, The Language of Trees (my Q&A with her can be found here); I loved the story, the bits of poetic prose, the part that setting plays in the novel, and the mystery behind the characters.

My Review

The Salt God’s Daughter carries on the legacy of Ilie Ruby’s prose and amazing use of setting as character, telling the story of three generations of women – Diana, Ruthie, and Naida – who are caught in the magic of the moon and the ocean and in the complexities of mother-daughter relations. For Diana, the Farmer’s Almanac becomes her guide for living, looking to each full moon for direction. Later, the almanacs become her journals, as she records bits and pieces of their nomadic lives in the margins. For Ruthie and Naida, the ocean acts as enemy and savior, drawing them into danger and then giving them sanctity, and life. In all three women, unpredictability, abandonment, and a need for home tear them apart and bring them back together again.

As in her debut novel, certain characters in The Salt God’s Daughter pulled at me, like Graham, who appears in Ruthie’s life unexpectedly and leaves just as quickly. Again and again he comes to her under the light of a full moon. And, at each sudden departure, I wanted him to return to the page as much as Ruthie longed for him to return her. The mysticism and folklore running throughout The Salt God’s Daughter kept me wondering about the nature of the main characters, and the actions of characters on the periphery reminded me how quickly the world judges or oppresses those who are different from the norm.

My recommendation.

Do not read this book in bits and pieces. Certain stories can be read in small doses, but Ilie Ruby’s novel is written with a poetic style and deserves a concentrated attention. Because of a hectic schedule, I read the book in short spurts, and there were times when I became lost. When I finished the book, I turned back to the first page and skimmed through it again, discovering subtleties that I missed the first time.

Do read this book with a friend, or those lovely ladies in your book club. There are parts in the story you will want to discuss, like Graham, his comings and goings and his ties to the ocean. Some places, you will want to go back and re-read, such as the night when a storm erupts and Naida disappears. Hints and clues – to the mystery of these women (and men) and the power the ocean and the full moon wield over them – may reveal more if uncovered in a group.

My favorite quotes.

“Many times abandoned, I now spent my life trying to hold onto people.”

“Some places were so magnetic and full of energies that they drew the same people back, again and again.”

“You needed to keep one hand behind you touching the wall of your past, and one hand in front of you, open to the future.”

And, this passage:

“Once, in the gallows of our green stationwagon, my mother had spun an orange ribbon into my hair…to weave it in a braid. She rarely touched my hair. Hardly able to contain my excitement, I’d mad the mistake of a simple, “Ow,” which made her let go. She’d let the ribbon fall on my shoulder. I knew it had all been lost just then, by what I’d done. . . . I’d wept loudly at the edge of the forest near the campsite, standing in my blue Dr. Scholl sandals, the morning air billowing my purple sundress. I’d howled into the trees. I’d almost caught her, my mother.”

If you decide to read this book, Ilie Ruby provides discussion questions on her website. While perusing her website, click her events page to see if she’s coming to a bookstore near you. Also, read this great review and Q&A on The Huffington Post between Ilie Ruby and Leora Tanenbaum.

And, much thanks to BookSparks for the opportunity to read The Salt God’s Daughter.

Redirect: How to Approach the End

Today, my first post as a regular contributor goes up on Write It Sideways. I’m talking endings. Not sad goodbyes, but a farewell to characters. How do you end a story? It isn’t as easy as just typing the words.

Click on over: What are the Best Ways to End a Story? Then, tell us how you tackle the final scene.

“A great ending can save a saggy middle, but an ending that’s abrupt or ill-thought-out can ruin all the goodwill built painstakingly page after page by an otherwise good book.”
~ Jael McHenry, “Flip the Script: End Anywhere”