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Guest Post: Michael A. Ferro on the Side Effects of Publishing

If you’re a writer, you dream of publishing your work. Maybe an essay, hopefully a collection of stories, definitely a novel. If you’re a writer like me, you figure the putting the words in good order is the hardest part– get the book finished (dammit!) and *then* you’ll be on easy street. Traveling the road to publication though is…well, not necessarily fraught with potholes or full of dead ends; the book will still reach the shelves of readers. But when an author (say, Michael A. Ferro) steps up to the podium at his next reading to share an excerpt, he first may lean in close to the mic and whisper a warning.

Welcome Michael A. Ferro as he talks about the side effects of publishing. Tune in to the end and enter the giveaway for a chance to win a copy of his debut novel, TITLE 13.

My Eye Exploded
Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying
and Love (or Cope) with Publishing

It was mid-May of 2017 and I could not have been more excited: I’d signed a contract a few months prior to have my debut novel, TITLE 13, published by the wonderful press, Harvard Square Editions. My dream had come true. (And thankfully it wasn’t that one recurring dream where I turn into a hot dog and get eaten by a kid at a minor league baseball game.) Since I’d signed the contract at the beginning of 2017, I was feverishly working on preparing for the big publication date nearly a year in the future on February 1, 2018. One of the biggest tasks to complete was working with my unbelievably talented editor to get the manuscript finalized for the first printing of advanced reading copies. As someone who also works a full-time job, I thought I’d prepared myself for the amount of work that would go into getting my novel published.

I was stupid, naïve, and wrong.

One day near the end of the editing process and in the midst of other book-related activities, I noticed that I suddenly couldn’t see out of my left eye. It happened without warning. Through my left eye, all I could see was a large black “burn” spot like the kind one gets after they’ve been starting at the sun for a while. I remember thinking: Hmm, this seems not right. I asked myself whether I had been staring at the sun that day like an idiot. No, I hadn’t. Plus, it was dark out and I’d been working at my computer. Had I accidentally poked my eye with a toothpick? I wondered. Nope. The ordeal puzzled me more so at first rather than terrified me. Perhaps I just needed to sleep. As many writers know, long hours in front of a computer screen spent well into the night can often produce some oddball oculary concerns. I went to bed and thought nothing else of it.

When I woke the next morning, I still couldn’t see out of my left eye. Concerned, I did what any rational person in my situation would do: I ran to Google. After a bit of searching I was convinced I had cancer of the eye (as well as a nasty case of Marburg Hemorrhagic Fever), so I finally decided to visit a doctor (but not before I did a quick Google search for affordable, unadorned coffins). After being sent to the emergency room and seeing ophthalmologists for hours of observation and tests, they claimed they had just a few more questions for me.

“So, Michael, tell me: are you under a lot of stress?” asked the doctor.

Being a manly man, I didn’t want to appear weak, so I sort of shrugged off the question.

“Eh, I’m okay. How are you?”

“Michael…” the doctor said, looking impatient as I wasted their valuable time.

“I suppose you could say that I am a complete and total wreck, riddled with uncontrollable anxiety and fear,” I surrendered.

“I see,” the doctor said. “And would you categorize yourself as a ‘worrier,’ or someone who can be obsessive about certain things?”

I was too busy rearranging the tongue depressors, cotton balls, and other medical equipment on the examination table to listen. The doctor seemed satisfied with his assessment and made a note on his paper. He said he’d finally diagnosed my problem: Central Serous Chorioretinopathy.

As I heard the news, I prepared to call my mother and ask that the family bury me in my inflatable Tyrannosaurus Rex costume and that my house and all my belongings be placed in a trust for my faithful dog, Rube. Thankfully, the doctor informed me that I wasn’t going to die. Rather, he stated that CSR was, unfortunately, somewhat common in white males between 30-50 years of age who are not only highly stressed, but tend to be a bit obsessive compulsive and anxious by nature. Unfortunately, I could tick off all those boxes.

While there is no cure for CSR, I was told that my vision might return in time. As the doctor explained, some individuals release higher levels of cortisol (known as “the stress hormone”) than others, and that it can build up on the back of the eye, causing a rupture in the retina that allows fluid to pool under the central macula, effectively blinding the patient. The most important thing, the doctor emphasized, was that I needed to reduce my stress levels. He asked if this would be possible. I replied, “Probably not.”

“Why not?”

“Well, I have a book coming out next year and it’s quite an effort to do everything involved with that and also work a full-time job.”

“Oh, really?” said the doctor, noticeably interested now. “What do you write?”

“Literary fiction. The book is a novel.”

“Ah, what’s it about?” he asked.

I always find it hard to describe my novel to strangers. TITLE 13 is an eclectic mishmash of satire and emotional realism that follows the oft-absurd story of a young alcoholic named Heald Brown who lives in downtown Chicago and works for the federal government. And while there’s plenty of postmodern, Kafkaesque tragicomedy within the pages, much of the novel also centers around the brutal realities of addiction and the divisive nature that has consumed our society and poisoned our culture in a broken modern America.

“It’s a book about a stupid idiot,” I said to the doctor after a long pause. We looked blankly at one another.

“Ah, I see,” he said, his eyes returning to his clipboard. I was discharged shortly after.

Since then, I’ve been seeing an ophthalmologist monthly for regular checkups (not the same ophthalmologist—he’d had enough of me). My vision has improved somewhat and fluctuated from good to bad again, and odds are it will remain this way for the rest of my life I’m told. Still, all things considered, it could be much worse. I could be turned into a hot dog and eaten by a kid at a baseball game.

Plenty of writers, male and female, have similar dispositions: anxious, detail-oriented, and prone to high levels of stress. Whether it’s approaching deadlines, concerns over a career path or level of success, or just the arduous task of sitting down and actually writing something, it’s not an easy life to live. My experience in dealing with CSR while preparing for the publication of my first novel has taught me one important thing, though: if you’re lucky enough to find a publisher for your book, just take it one step at a time and don’t sweat the small stuff. Trust me—your eyes will thank you.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Born and bred in Detroit, Michael A. Ferro holds a degree in creative writing from Michigan State University. He has received an Honorable Mention from Glimmer Train for their New Writers Award and won the Jim Cash Creative Writing Award for Fiction in 2008. TITLE 13 is his debut novel.

Michael’s fiction and essays have been featured in numerous online and print publications. Michael has lived, worked, and written throughout the Midwest; he currently resides in rural Ann Arbor, Michigan.

For more information on Michael’s writing and TITLE 13, check out his website, find him on Goodreads, explore his Amazon page, and read about him on his Poets & Writers profile. He’s been interviewed on Michigan Quarterly Review and Chicago Tribune Radio with Host Rick Kogan. He’s also keeping up his status on Facebook and Twitter. 

ABOUT THE BOOK

A timely investigation into the heart of a despotic faction within the government, TITLE 13 deftly blends satirical comedy aimed at the hot-button issues of modern culture with the gut-wrenching reality of an intensely personal descent into addiction.

Young Heald Brown might be responsible for the loss of highly classified TITLE 13 government documents—and may have hopelessly lost himself as well. Since leaving his home in Detroit for Chicago during the recession, Heald teeters anxiously between despondency and bombastic sarcasm, striving to understand a country gone mad while clinging to his quixotic roots. Trying to deny the frightening course of his alcoholism, Heald struggles with his mounting paranoia, and his relationships with concerned family and his dying grandmother while juggling a budding office romance at the US government’s Chicago Regional Census Center. Attempting to combat the devastating effects of his addiction, Heald’s reality digresses into farcical absurdity, fevered isolation, and arcane psychological revelation, hilarious though redoubtable in nature. Meanwhile the TITLE 13 secrets remain at large, haunting each character and tangling the interwoven threads of Heald’s life, as the real question looms: Is it the TITLE 13 information that Heald has lost, or his sanity?

ABOUT THE GIVEAWAY

It’s easy to enter. CLICK HERE, watch for an email on Tuesday, March 13th.

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Q&A with Lynn Sloan, author of This Far Isn’t Far Enough

“Right here, I’m laying you down, Momma,” I say, but I don’t feel anything important, just unbearably tired. I start to sing, “Precious Jesus, let me live my life in thee,” and lift the urn up–it’s not heavy, it’s not light–and swing my arm in as wide an arc as I can manage, and there she goes, sifting into the air, drifting full wide between the trees and over the brush, and out across the creek I can’t see, toward the distant houses with the lighted windows, through the night, maybe flying all the way to Egypt.

~ from “The Sweet Collapse of the Feeble” in This Far Isn’t Far Enough

Letting go is never easy. We are rooted in tradition, in promises, in expectations. And yet, we inevitably reach that moment when the old, the familiar, the safe no longer serves, when we must release whatever anchors us in order to survive.

Lynn Sloan’s new collection of stories, This Far Isn’t Far Enough, is full of characters faced with the choice of letting go. For some, the choice is liberating, soothing. For others, the release is pinching, dangerous. In either case, such decisions are never simple, never so clean in consequence.

I’m honored to host Lynn Sloan today to talk about This Far Isn’t Far Enough. Her opening story, “Ollie’s Back,” will be read on NPR’s Selected Shorts in March. Here, gain insight into her work and enter the giveaway for a copy of her book (courtesy of Fomite Press & Caitlin Hamilton Marketing & Publicity). Sign up by Tuesday, February 27th. Now, welcome Lynn Sloan!

Christi Craig (CC): This Far Isn’t Far Enough brings together a myriad of stories about a young woman who wants to be a prizefighter, a widow living under the thumb of her husband even after he’s gone, and about an artist lost between fantasy and reality–just to name a few. Which was the first story you wrote, and how did this collection grow from there?

Lynn Sloan (LS): The earliest story included in this collection is “The Sweet Collapse of the Feeble,” the one about a young woman who wants to become a prizefighter. That story came to be when I had a friend who wanted to become a prizefighter. After serious training, she invited me to her first fight. “What must your mother think?” I wondered as I watched my friend get pummeled, and pummel her opponent. My friend had not invited her mother to that fight or to any that came afterward. As far I know, her mother never found out about my friend’s short, but prize-filled boxing career. I had a little baby at that time, and I must have been grappling with how one adjusts to one’s beloved child getting beat up.

You asked if my collection grew from there. In fact, this collection didn’t grow up, it collected, like filings around a magnet. I like variety. Each time I finish one story, I want to try something different with my next. After I’ve written from a middle-aged mother’s point of view, in first person, as in “The Sweet Collapse of the Feeble,” I want to try something entirely different: a naïve Army grunt, his third person point of view, and I want to try a different time frame, after WWII in Germany, before my own time. This became “The Gold Spoon.” Investigating varied characters and situations is a way of challenging what I do, and is my pleasure. A couple of years ago, I broke my ankle and was told I must keep my cast above my heart-level for a few weeks. Stuck on my couch, without the slightest urge to write, I decided to clean up my computer files. As I re-read these stories, I discovered that certain emotions link them all, even though the circumstances are different. Discovering this was an “ah hah” moment. My characters ache for love, they are compelled by regret and loss, and they can’t escape their pasts. These recurrent emotions and desires were the magnet that drew these stories together into this collection.

CC: In an interview on The Literary Fiction Book Review, you say, “Fiction reveals how we live beneath the surface of the obvious and the visible.” I’ve been ruminating on this sentence for a while now. Do you mean fiction allows us to embrace certain truths that we choose to ignore otherwise? Or do you mean fiction gives us more liberty to explore a character, a situation, a reaction to such depths that we uncover a piece of our core we hadn’t known existed?

LS: What’s below the surface is where the action is. Gestures and words can be deceptive or genuine. And isn’t everything more complicated than it appears? We read news items about a postal worker who leaves a million dollars to a medical school, and we wonder what did he deny himself to save that money? We read about a rancher who lined his driveway with Cadillacs half buried in the dirt, and we wonder if this was an expression of mockery, fury, or delight, or some impulse we haven’t thought of. You ask if writing might allow us writers to examine what we might prefer to ignore in our own lives, to “uncover a piece of our core”? I would say that writing opens us to empathy. By probing our characters’ needs and desires, we become more empathic with those unlike ourselves, and perhaps even those who are unlikeable. What makes this empathy possible is understanding ourselves and the links that connect us to others.

CC: With the last question, I’m thinking of “The Collaborator” and the protagonist, Daveen, who is caught in the politics of tenure and gender and her own version of #MeToo. I imagine this story was written well before the movement, so I wonder, when reality takes on the role of fiction and reveals how we live and think below the surface (which isn’t always pretty), does it change the way you view your work in retrospect? Do you ever think back on a character like Daveen and wonder how her story might shift if it were set in a post-#MeToo time?

LS: You are right. This story was written fifteen years ago, when feminists were regarded as scolds, hopeless bores, and pathetically retrograde. That’s how Daveen is regarded, especially since she broke off a friendship with a male colleague because of his sexual relationships with students. What was true when this story was written, what was true in the world that Daveen inhabits, and what is true today: patriarchy rules. In institutions like colleges, some men with power are attracted to younger, less powerful women, and it’s also true, some young women are attracted to men who possess power. Sex and power are two of the most elemental forces in culture. In “The Collaborator” sex, sexual politics, and power are the forces operating, but the story is about one woman, a thwarted feminist, and her response to a student whose sexual game upends her sense of self.

Each fictional character lives in a particular moment, as we all do. One of the things that interests me is how lives are lived within a historical context, and that context determines choices and possibilities. For Daveen, if she were living in this #MeToo time, she could turn to Human Resources with her complaints about sexual misconduct and she’d be taken seriously. If she were living twenty years earlier, she wouldn’t have a tenured position. Every story is set in a moment.

CC: What are you reading these days?

LS: I’ve just finished reading Joan Silber’s wonderful novel Improvement. Right now, I’m reading Patrick Modiano’s Such Fine Boys, a marvelous, moving novel that follows a group of school friends who are thrown into adult situations for which they were unprepared. Both novels include many characters, many stories braided together. Multiple stories—that’s what I like about story collections, too.

CC: What fuels your writing…coffee, tea, a certain view from the window, or a favorite pen? 

LS: My desk. It’s a small desk in a small room that’s really a hallway, but sitting at my desk focuses me. Sometimes I want to write somewhere else, like in a comfy chair by a window, or in nice weather, I’ll want to write outside, but as soon as my thoughts and words start to flow, I need to get to my desk.

~

Lynn Sloan is a writer and photographer. Her stories have appeared in Ploughshares, Shenandoah, and American Literary Review, among other publications, and been nominated for the Pushcart Prize. She is the author of the novel Principles of Navigation (2015 Fomite). Her fine art photographs have been exhibited nationally and internationally. For many years she taught photography at Columbia College Chicago, where she founded the journal Occasional Readings in Photography, and contributed to Afterimage, Art Week, and Exposure. She lives in Evanston, Illinois with her husband.

Don’t forget: Enter the book giveaway by Tuesday, February 27th,
for a chance to win a copy of This Far Isn’t Far Enough.

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Remington Roundup:
Upcoming Events, an Online Course, & Giveaways

1960's photo of woman at Remington typewriterSeptember rolls in with a new season in the air, a new perspective as the sun shifts its angle in the sky, and a new Remington Roundup. This month, find information on a few upcoming events (where we might see each other in person), my next online course (where I hope to get to read your great writing), and two upcoming author interviews and book giveaways!

Upcoming Events

DOORS OPEN MILWAUKEE
When: September 23-24, 2017
Where: Metropolitan Milwaukee

Doors Open Milwaukee is an annual event during which buildings all over the city make their spaces free and open to the public. Explore architecture, the arts, and the outdoors (this year, you can visit 170 buildings…if you have the stamina!).

Inspiration Studios (pictured above and located at 1500 S. 73rd St., West Allis, WI), the creative space that houses my tiny writing space, is open from 12-5pm each day.

Stop by, hear about a bit about the building’s history, check out the theater and the gallery, and be sure to head to my studio on the 2nd floor to say hello! There’ll be treats to nibble on, raffles to enter, and no-pressure writing sprints (F.U.N.). The sprints are scheduled for Saturday @ 1pm & 4pm and Sunday @ 12:30pm & 2pm. So if you stop by and see people scribbling furiously, know you are witnessing stories in the making.

WISCONSIN WRITERS ASSOCIATION FALL CONFERENCE 2017
When: October 6-7, 2017
Where: Riverwalk Hotel in Neenah, WI

If you’re in or near central Wisconsin at the start of October, join me and a host of other writers and authors for a weekend of craft and creativity at the Wisconsin Writers Association Fall Conference.

I’m presenting on Flash Nonfiction: the art of the short essay, but there is a long list of excellent workshops where you might uncover new ideas, critique a few pages, or craft a new poem.

Check out the full list, pack up your pen and paper, and meet me at the Riverwalk!

Online Course

Drawing of online connectionSeptember also kicks off registration for one of my favorite online courses: Principles & Prompts.

I’ve taught this 6-week class for a while now, and I love it every time. It’s a low-stakes learning experience that promises to keep you inspired and connected with writing during a time when holiday planning (and, who are we kidding…eating) takes precedence. You know how it is: you turn your calendar to November, start planning a family festivity (or twenty) and suddenly that writing journal becomes a book of to-do’s.

Each week in Principles & Prompts, you’ll find a link to an inspiring video or text, a tiny lesson on creativity & craft,  and a writing prompt. We also share our work with others, which means this course also connects you to a greater community of writers. In other words, your inspiration and encouragement doesn’t end with the last day of class.

Principles & Prompts runs from November 5th to December 16th. Join us!  REGISTRATION IS OPEN.

#Giveaways

This month, I’m hosting Patricia Ann McNair for a Q&A and giveaway about her new collection of essays, And These Are The Good Times (Side Street Press). I already have her interview in the queue, and you don’t want to miss her thoughts on writing–the questions, the reflections, how we respond–and her love of a city where connection and story are everywhere. Never mind the fact that if you stop by the interview, you could win a copy of her book (but not my copy…I’m not letting this one go!).

In October, Michael Shou-Yung Shum will talk about his debut novel, Queen of Spades (Forest Avenue Press), a book that Frederick Barthelme (Bob the Gambler) calls, “a lovely and complex gambling fairy tale that twists and turns in intriguing ways on its way to a most satisfying conclusion.” I’m loving this read so far. And when you stop by for the giveaway–where you eye up what’s available to win, drop your name into the hat, and cross your fingers your number pops up–it will be *almost* like playing the tables.

These two upcoming interviews mark both the 58th and 59th author Q&A I’ve posted on the blog. That’s an average of 9 books a year since my first Q&A with Beth Hoffman. Maybe that doesn’t sound like much to you, but considering what a sloooow reader I am, it’s a thrill to see that number grow and think of the stacks of stories I’ve had the chance to share.

But none of this happens without you. If you’re a subscriber, thanks for reading. If you found this via some internet search or social media, thanks for making that extra click to get here.