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That’s My Story: Cindy Maddox

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It was our pleasure to have a virtual sit-down with Cindy Maddox, author of In the Neighborhood of Normal, to learn a little more about her writing process as well as any backstory tidbits she might want to share about her new novel.

Cindy Maddox

• Are any of the characters in your fiction based on people you know in real life?

The main character in my novel In the Neighborhood of Normal shares my grandmother’s name (Mish, short for Artemisia) and a few of her eccentricities, but she also shares some wonderful characteristics from a woman I knew named Barb. The Mish in the book is her own person but undoubtedly has been influenced by my love for these two women in real life.

• With what do you write? A computer? A pencil? A ballpoint/ biro? Rollerball? Quill and the blood of virgins (male or female is fine. We’re all about the equal opportunity at Regal)? A fountain pen (people who use a fountain pen get extra credit points)?

I’m boring. I write with a computer and the most common word processing program. But spellcheck must be turned on, the grammar tool must be turned off, and hidden formatting symbols (e.g., spaces and paragraph marks) must be visible.

• Are you fluent in any other languages? 

I like to joke that I am fluent in English, sarcasm, and profanity, but I am actually not all that fluent in profanity. I have never advanced beyond the single-word expletive, which is probably just as well since I’m a minister. My church is very liberal, but the pastor letting loose a multi-syllabic profanity-laced rant is still frowned upon.

• Do you see chocolate/wine as an intrinsic aid to writing?

Chocolate is an intrinsic aid to writing primarily because chocolate is an intrinsic aid to living. I used to get involved in the milk versus dark chocolate debate, but now that I am older and wiser, I do not discriminate. Except for white chocolate. It is an abomination.

• Who has supported you along the way?

Fearless!

I started writing this novel years ago, but I never really got going. My wife talked me in to accompanying her to a writers’ meetup, and I went as a favor to her. The accountability and feedback got me moving. Even when I feared I would never see the book in print, my wife’s faith in me kept me going. I never would have finished it without her.

• What do you read that people wouldn’t expect you to read?

In my teenage and early adult years, I read a lot of romance. At the time I needed an escape from real life and those novels filled the void. As I aged I lost interest in the genre but still sometimes want to read to get away. In those times I don’t want fluff—I want the characters to struggle with meaningful issues and events—but I don’t want to read something depressing, either. That’s what I try to write: fiction with relatable characters experiencing real-life drama, but that leave the reader with joy. Life has enough despair.

• Has your education helped you become a better writer?

I think both my undergraduate and graduate degrees have helped me become a better communicator. The best training as a novelist, however, came from my work as a freelance book editor in partnership with a more experienced editor. She performed the substantive edit on novels, and I followed with copyediting. Seeing the changes an experienced editor made in a manuscript was invaluable to me as a writer.

• What’s your process for writing: do you outline, create flow charts, fill out index cards, or just start and see where you end up?

I start with a character and a general idea, and then I see where it takes me. I need to have a general idea of where the story is going, but I don’t like to be bogged down in details up front. I like to watch the story unfold. Sometimes it goes exactly as planned, and other times I’m surprised.

Shifting my Perspective: A Conversation with Sarah Hollenbeck of Women and Children First

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by Alex Poppe

Women and Children First (WCF) is much more than a book store, it is a force for social change. In 2019, after forty years of being open, the store closed for a full day retreat and wrote their mission statement declaring that books are tools, and literature can be transformative. WCF recognizes that who is underrepresented evolves, so it focuses on centering the most oppressed voices to make sure everyone is at the table, and are curated on the front table, greeting customers as they walk into the store. Trans writers, Black female trans writers, and indigenous writers are represented in fiction, poetry, memoirs, the children’s section and as well as in non-fiction, their books’ front covers visibly facing out. Customers come into the store, see these covers, see writers or characters that look like them, and think, “Their voices matter…My voice matter.” Books are the catalyst for these watershed moments.

I asked Sarah what she thought about the latest legislative rulings which block trans teens from participating in high school sports. As a trans inclusive book store in the trans inclusive neighborhood of Andersonville on the northside of Chicago, Sarah is figuring out how the store can be a resource to fight back. She is aware that she embodies a unique dichotomy: perceived as not having power as a disabled woman while having power as a white woman and small business owner. (When Sarah commented on how white women have misused power, she shifted my perspective.) As political as it is literary, WCF aims to leverage their power in the community to make substantive change which is not easily eroded. She believes in acknowledging the past harm done and works towards repairing that harm (WCF was not always trans inclusive). Her efforts were acknowledged when WCF was used as the set for an episode of season two of Showtime’s Work in Progress, which was created by two of WCF’s favorite customers, Abby McEnany and Lily Wachowski. Work in Progress captures the conversation and tension within the feminist movement right now in terms of trans inclusion and trans visibility. It is no wonder that WCF’s avatar is a gender fluid person with purple (a feminist color) hair.

Trans affirming community activation

WCF’s creation story starts with co-founders, Ann Christophersen and Linda Bubon, who met as graduate students at the University of Illinois at Chicago while studying English Literature.  Time and time again, they would come across a woman writer they wanted to study, such as Virginia Woolf, Kate Millet, or Edith Wharton, only to discover their books were not readily available. At the time, second-wave feminism was in full force, and activists around the country were starting collectives and businesses of all kinds, including feminist presses and bookstores. It was against this backdrop that Ann and Linda decided that how they would support themselves would also be their contribution to the women’s movement. 1n 1979, they opened WCF in a modest storefront on Armitage Avenue.  Over the years, WCF has been located in several locations on Chicago’s northside. In 1990, WCF moved to the Andersonville neighborhood after being recruited by a committee of Edgewater business owners. The feminist bookstore has been evolving and growing with the neighborhood ever since.

Sarah (second from the right, upper row) and a group of authors

Sarah was thirty years old when she and Lynn Mooney finalized the paperwork to co-own the bookstore. Overnight, Sarah went from being a part-time WCF bookseller to being a primary caretaker. The bookstore itself and most of its staff at the time were older than she. Beyond her youth, Sarah is a disabled woman, which means she always has to work twice as hard to be heard and earn mere scraps of credibility. Although Sarah initially approached Lynn about throwing their shared hat in the ring to buy the store, it never really felt like a decision. Women & Children First was a place that Sarah loved and wanted to survive. Having been raised by parents who were invested in community, Sarah understood the need to support small businesses from a young age. Her mother was the best customer at a tiny feminist bookstore in Sarah’s hometown of Toledo, Ohio. That store has since closed, and so the calling to own WCF was very close to her heart.

Alex Poppe is the author of Girl, World, which was named a 35 Over 35 Debut Book Award winner, First Horizon Award finalist, Montaigne Medal finalist, was short-listed for the Eric Hoffer Grand Prize, was awarded an Honorable Mention in General Fiction from the Eric Hoffer Awards and was recommended by the US Review of Books. Alex’s novella Duende will be published by Regal House Publishing in the summer of 2022.

Connect, Inspire & Explore: Commonplace Reader, Yardley, PA

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By David R. Roth  

Photos Courtesy of Cindy Fatsis

Commonplace Reader

Back in 2019, as I followed the transformation of the modest, 150-year-old Victorian house on South Main Street in Yardley Borough into a bookstore, I had no idea that its owner and I had something in common: long deferred dreams coming true that fall.

When Elizabeth (Liz) Young moved to Yardley Borough in 1991, she had never heard of the municipal designation borough. She was immediately attracted to the idea of living in a close-knit community centered around a walkable downtown that brought to mind Miss Marple’s St. Mary’s Mead. There was just one thing missing from the quaint downtown of her adopted borough: a bookstore.

The seeds of a dream were sown, but Liz was busy raising three kids and working. The bookstore idea became something she would do eventually. The dream seeds would take thirty years to sprout, benefiting from an influx of time and energy called retirement.

Liz Young

Liz began researching bookstore reality in late 2018. By early 2019 she had watched every online video she could find, built a thick 3-ring notebook of how-to resources, and attended a “Bookstore Boot Camp” on Amelia Island, Florida with thirty other aspiring booksellers. She was ready to start looking at rental properties. Guided by her English village vision, she was committed to the idea of a house downtown. She wanted the cozy factor, an environment that felt homey and inviting, especially for kids. She imagined a room where children would gather for story hour, a room where book clubs would meet, chairs so shoppers could sit and sample selections, and nooks where young readers could linger. 49 S. Main Street checked all the boxes.

Next, she needed a name. She was attracted to the concept of the commonplace book that was widely used back in the days when the Yardley family was farming the land and the town was called Yardleyville. A commonplace book is devoted to capturing those day-to-day things its keeper finds remarkable, whether a revealing bit of conversation, an inspiring poem, or the clever design of a building. It is not intended to be used for mundane things, such as to-do lists or keeping a chronological diary.

A reading nook for young readers

Liz, an educator at heart, loved that such books were reference tools for personal enrichment, for remembering the remarkable. She also liked that common suggests that anyone can be such a reader. She wanted to create a space where the entire community would feel welcome to explore new ideas and activities. Commonplace Reader would be that place.

A logo was next and, in another nod to the rich history of the borough, Commonplace Reader’s logo features Franki the barge mule pulling a load of books along the Delaware Canal, a major transportation artery for regional commerce and connection for almost one hundred years. The combination of the mule barge, the commonplace book, and Liz’s curated inventory perfectly captures the themes she has established for her enterprise: Connect, Inspire & Explore.

 Liz’s nine-month journey from dream to launch required a great deal of research and planning. She is particularly proud that the realization of her vision for a community meeting house has been such a local undertaking. “My carpenter, lawyer, accountant, landlord, the ship and print shop, the guys who installed my security system, even the bakery that provided the pastries for my opening are all within a block of our front door.”  Even so, there was one aspect of the undertaking that took her by surprise: the tremendous outpouring of unsolicited support she received from the community.

One of the first people to reach out was literary agent, Mackenzie Brady Watson (SK Agency). A ten-year publishing industry veteran, Watson knows how special indie booksellers are to authors and to the health of the industry. When she read about what Liz was up to, she immediately contacted her to offer support.

“I’ve been so impressed by all that she’s accomplished,” Watson said. “She’s made the store such a welcoming place; my daughter loves the puppy dog pillows and train set upstairs. The thing about Liz, she always takes time to speak with her customers, she remembers their family members’ names and book tastes, and always has some news to share.”

Yardley-based marketer Lisa Gage (Hue Entertainment), reached out to Liz to hold a virtual book launch for local area author Lise Deguire’s memoir Flashback Girl. The event was so successful they did a second one. “I admire Liz’s mission to be a resource for the community,” Gage said. “Her store quickly became a place where people get together to share common interests.”

Deguire added, “Liz has been a terrific supporter of Flashback Girl and the works of other local writers. She has created a home for book lovers that is warm and welcoming, and where the staff is present and helpful.”

Another local writer, Marc Kaye, hosts monthly writing workshops in the store. “The emergence of the wealth of local talent has been something,” Kaye said. “A community of writers has come together all thanks to this great business.”

Staffer Amy DeLeo is delighted that the store has enjoyed such positive, enthusiastic support, but is not surprised. “Liz always finds a way to create an inclusive atmosphere, for us and our customers. Particularly during this rough pandemic year, we hope we’ve helped lift folks’ spirits.”

Meanwhile, in a parallel universe, I had deferred my dream of being an author for thirty years while my wife and I also raised three kids and worked. My dream, too, would become a reality only after I retired.

When I walked into Commonplace Reader this year, I told Liz my first novel, The Femme Fatale Hypothesis, had been scheduled for release by Regal House Publishing, an independent, traditional publisher with a love of intimate, independent bookstores. I asked if she would be interested in a BookBound profile. She responded with all the qualities her fans describe: warmth, enthusiasm, and a genuine interest in me, both what I’m writing and, naturally, what I’m reading. In an era dominated by online bookstores and anonymous “influencers,” Yardley Borough’s Commonplace Reader and its passionate owner are refreshingly uncommon.

David R. Roth, author of The Femme Fatale Hypothesis, is a graduate of the Cedar Crest College’s Pan-European MFA program. He placed second in the inaugural Bucks County Short Fiction Contest judged by Janet Benton (Lilli de Jong) and was a quarter-finalist in Driftwood Press’s Adrift Short Story Contest. His short stories have been published by Passenger Journal and Moss.

The Book Cellar: A Chicago Literary Haven Since 2004

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By Alex Poppe

When I asked Suzy Takacs, the owner of Lincoln Square’s The Book Cellar, an independent bookstore on Chicago’s northwest side, what TV series would use her space as a recurring location, she didn’t hesitate with her one-word answer: Cheers. After sitting down to talk with her, it is easy to see why. In our pre-Covid-19 days, not only did this beloved neighborhood fixture serve up some of the best wines by the glass and small plates in the city to accompany its exceptionally well-curated book collection, but more important, it was a home away from home for many of its clients. In fact, when one customer’s son ran away from home, he ran to The Book Cellar, where his mom waited for him to cool down under the staff’s watchful, caring eye.

Another regular used The Book Cellar as a refuge when got locked out of his own home. Older clients who have moved out of the neighborhood to enter assisted living facilities have had their children bring them to The Book Cellar when their children came to visit. One long time regular had the unofficial job of turning the OPEN sign on when he came in. But perhaps the biggest testament to the importance of The Book Cellar in the local community is the $40,000 fans donated through a GoFundMe page last April to help The Book Cellar stay afloat while many businesses in the city capsized due to Covid-19. I asked Suzy what her secret was for inspiring such loyalty. She credited hard work, participating in the local chamber of commerce and in schools, and her commitment to the community, but I have another idea. I think the secret weapon is Suzy. Here’s why.

Suzy wants The Book Cellar to convey a “homey, cozy feel.” She accomplishes this by treating people as if they are coming to her home when they come to her store. She explained that the customer’s experience is personal for her, meaning if someone has a bad experience, she takes it personally. Her concern for the personal, Susy’s heart, is why The Book Cellar is a singular space, a gathering place, a place for conversation, and why it has been with us since 2004. No wonder The Book Cellar team dropped a customer’s purchase off to the customer when pick-up hours conflicted with the customer’s work schedule.

Suzy’s heart extends to her staff. My mouth fell open when she told me she had been practicing appointment only shopping because her staff didn’t feel comfortable with public browsing when Chicago’s positivity rates were above 9%. I was so impressed that her concern for her staff’s and their families’ well-being is more important to her than making money. That is true leadership.

The Book Cellar, 4736 N Lincoln Ave, Chicago, IL 60625

https://www.bookcellarinc.com/

Alex Poppe is the author of Girl, World, which was named a 35 Over 35 Debut Book Award winner, First Horizon Award finalist, Montaigne Medal finalist, was short-listed for the Eric Hoffer Grand Prize, was awarded an Honorable Mention in General Fiction from the Eric Hoffer Awards and was recommended by the US Review of Books. Alex’s novella Duende will be published by Regal House Publishing in the summer of 2022.

My line to writing was not a straight one

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By Lisa Cupolo, winner of the 2020 W.S. Porter Prize for Short Story Collections

I was not a voracious reader from childhood, nor did I come from a bookish or scholarly family. I wandered in creative circles and it took ages for me to uncork my truth, that I wanted to write.  Winning the prestigious 2020 W.S. Porter Prize for short story collections was nothing short of thrilling, and a happy confirmation that I had finally arrived at the right place.

As it turned out, my gateway to writing began when I was thirty-one, and working as a server at the River Café in Calgary. I love to tell this story as a tale of assurance, that your destiny will indeed find you.  I was figuring out my next move, having returned from a year volunteering at an orphanage in Kisumu, near the border of Uganda. My friends were all established in their lives, buying houses and getting married and I was waiting tables and writing scripts with my roommate. I desperately wanted to get into publishing but felt that the bloom was definitely off my rose and that I was too old to start from scratch.

One night, I had a large table of middle-aged businessmen speaking Latin languages, the kind of men who snapped their fingers at me and ordered things like Kir Royale and Negronis. Luckily, I speak French and could just about handle their rudeness. But I noticed that one man stood out, he was kindly and younger than the rest, and he was buying $600 bottles of wine for the table. It became clear that this smiling man was in charge. He was the big cheese.

Pillars of Faith Orphanage in Kisumu

When I decanted another bottle of our cellar’s finest red, the kindly man touched my arm while I poured. “Listen,” he said, in his perfect Parisian accent, “I’m just a small town Canadian boy.” He looked me in the eye; he was flirting.

“I’m from Niagara Falls,” he said.

“Quoi?” I shrieked. “Qui êtes-vous?”  I couldn’t believe it. Call it divine timing, but I also come from that strange and wonderful tourist town. I recognized his surname; his mother had been an alderman when I was a kid.

When I told him my name, he jumped out of his seat. “Is your father Jerry Cupolo?”  Yes, I said. My parents owned the mom-and-pop sporting goods store in our small city. “I idolized your dad,” he said, “Your father gave me my first break. He loaned me a bike to start my own business.”

For the next hour, the two of us sat at a tiny table, captivated by the coincidence, and how many people we knew in common, much to the dismay of his snooty colleagues and the floor manager of the restaurant, who was steaming. At the end of the night the gentle hometown boy left me a $900 tip.  Yowza. That was very near the amount of money for a six-week publishing course in Vancouver that I thought I couldn’t afford. I quit that night, and signed up for the course.  Probably I would have been fired anyway.

Sometimes it’s hard not to believe that the universe is conspiring in your favor, as Paulo Coelho, famously said. One thing leads to another.  I was offered an entry level job at HarperCollins from a teacher at the course, and in March I drove across freezing cold Canada to take an entry level job at one of the big five publishers in Toronto.

In the past, I had worked as an editor in corporate photography and I’d just returned from that year in Kenya so I was hardly a wallflower when I started at HarperCollins. And yet.  I gophered for the vice president, who sent me home with stacks of books on weekends assuring me of a quiz on Monday morning.  He also sent me to Starbucks and to get his wife a Christmas present, and he pawned me off to the president to fetch his A&W root beer and burger every Friday lunch. 

Working as a publicist at Brick Magazine

My big secret, of course, was that once I got into publishing I had to acknowledge that I’d been writing for years. Why else put in the exhausting hours and take on the patriarchal bullshit. First, I loved being around books and writers, and second, I needed a job to survive.  I would begin writing at 5am every morning and then catch the subway downtown for work by 8. I barely covered my rent and subway fare with my take home wage and I was expected to eat and sleep publishing, which I did. It was an exhilarating time and I ended up working as a publicist with many of my favorite writers, Elmore Leonard, Neil Gaiman, Helen Humphries, Ann Patchett and many more.

Still, when my students ask me if going into publishing is a good transition to being a writer, I say no, absolutely not. I’ll never speak to you again if you do it.

But then, I smile.

With an MFA in fiction from the University of Memphis, Lisa’s stories have been published in Ploughshares, the Virginia Quarterly Review, Narrative, The Idaho Review, and others. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and was a Tennessee Williams Scholar at the Sewanee Writers Conference.  She now lives in Southern California and is at work on a memoir. She teaches creative writing at Chapman University.

Mark Cladis: That’s My Story

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Regal House staff are delighted to have the opportunity for a virtual sit-down with Mark Cladis in advance of the release of his book In Search of a Course, available in bookstores January 8, 2021.

How did you handle the balance between truth and ‘doing no harm’?  

In Search of a Course is about finding a course for your life and a course for “the University.” The two courses interweave on almost every page of the book. In my search for a course for my life, I recount my failed marriage, my loss of faith in things spiritual and academic, and the strength of a friendship that got me through it all. Finding a course for the University entails a narration about how I got into academia, what it’s like to work in a university, and, most importantly, what higher education is all about—and what it should be.

Given the subject matter of the book—the failure of a marriage and, to some extent, of higher education—you can imagine how it could be a tell-all book, revealing scandalous secrets about my marriage and about life inside the University. I’d probably sell more copies it were a tell-all book, but sadly it isn’t. Indeed, more than one editor pushed me to reveal more personal truths. Where I wanted to stick with general, abstract reflection I was told to offer more of myself and of the people in my life. And so the book evolved, it changed, it became more personal, and I found the need to keep asking myself, “How do I write a personal, honest narrative while doing no harm to those I’m portraying?” After all, I’m writing (in part) about an ex-spouse and University colleagues. What to tell, what to hold back?

In the end, I fashioned a narrative that was honest and intimate but not wounding or gratuitous. Complexities and limitations of the main characters are revealed, but especially my own.

What social issue or problem does your work address? What difference do you hope your book will make?

As noted above, In Search of a Course is about two, related courses: a course for your life and a course for the University. The “problems” or “issues” that my book addresses are both public and private in nature. On the one hand, I address what it is to have the ground beneath you give away in an instant, such that you suddenly lose all sense of who you are, what’s important to you, and what can sustain you in an onslaught of chaos. That’s the private side of the book. The public side addresses such issues as what education is really all about, and how can education, broadly understood, address anomic lifestyles, destructive consumerism, and the toll of a rapacious economy on the social and natural world. And as the two courses are related, so are the public and private problems and the ways forward—ways to greater public and private flourishing. My hope is that readers will see themselves in the pages of the book, find some solace in that identification, and discover helpful, practical reflections as they forge their own paths to meaningful lives.

How did you work to avoid writing a book or characters that feel “preachy” or self-righteous?

I’ll skip this question and take the next one, please. What’s that? I need to answer this one? Well, OK.

I’m a professor. My job is to profess. I can’t afford to worry too much about being sententious. (Did I just say sententious? Perhaps I should worry more about sounding pompous and moralizing.)  I’m certainly more comfortable with being “preachy” (to advocate for something of fundamental importance) than with being “self-righteous” (to be complacent and smug in my own moral standing). In Search of a Course, almost by definition, “professes” and “advocates” insofar as it seeks to help people on their way—their way to greater self-knowledge and joy. But it is an honest narrative. The characters—mainly myself—have more than enough flaws revealed to defeat any moral smugness.

But is it preachy? I’ll have to let my readers answer that.

What was your process like writing In Search of a Course?

The “process”—if it can be called that—was a long, rambling, fractured journey that kept pulling me along. I first starting writing In Search of a Course as a form of therapy. I was emotionally and spiritually crushed. I was writing for myself, and myself alone. Then, my friend Paul Kane and I went on an adventure—a road trip. We were searching for material, teachers, and life for a new course we wanted to teach at Vassar College—”It’s Only Natural: Contemplation in the American Landscape.” So we traveled through landscapes, met extraordinary teachers (including Native American teachers and the land itself), confronted various obstacles, and dipped into some contemplative practices. And as we journeyed through the deserts of the Southwest, I started to come back to life—both personally and professionally as an educator. I was making contact with the social and natural world around me.

Paul Kane, Mark’s friend and travel companion

That’s when the writing changed. I was no longer writing just for me. I imagined writing for a broader audience. My friends. My students. Strangers. All those seeking contact with life—a life with purpose and love.

There was a problem, however. I was soon to be hired by Brown University to rejuvenate a doctoral program in philosophy and religion that had been decimated by several faculty retirements. Brown was bringing me in to rebuild the program. Would it be prudent to craft and publish a trade book for a general audience at the very same time that I was trying to signal to the academic world that Brown is committed to relaunching a “serious”—that is, rigorous, academically acclaimed—doctoral program? Publishing a trade book can ruin a professor’s reputation. What would that do to the reputation of the new doctoral program?

 So I waited. And waited. After about 15 years I decided: to hell with reputation.

Mark Cladis is the Brooke Russell Astor Professor of the Humanities and Chair of his department at Brown University. He was named a Carnegie Scholar and has received research awards from the Fulbright Foundation, the National Endowments for the Humanities, and the Rockefeller Foundation. Cladis lives in Barrington, Rhode Island, with his wife, Mina, and his three children, Sabine, Olive, and Luke.

Kat Meads: That’s My Story

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On the release of Kat’s new work, Dear DeeDee, we were delighted to have a virtual sit down with her to discuss her writing process.

Who has supported you/your writing along the way?

I’ve been lucky. Over the years, I’ve had boosts and buck-ups from many folks. I’m especially grateful for a phenomenal group of women who, in the early going, helped me enormously in terms of support, inspiration and craft. We connected through UNCG’s MFA program and got together outside of class in each other’s houses for evenings of wine, food and rigorous, in-depth critiquing sessions. We called ourselves “Ladies Lit” for multiple reasons, one being, within our group, we treated what others dismissed as “women stories”—meaning stories that prioritized women characters and sensibilities—as serious, worthy fiction. In that group, I was very fortunate to learn from, among others, Lynne Barrett, Candy Flynt and Lee Zacharias. Still learning from their work today—but, alas, we’re too spread about the country to continue those great get-togethers on a regular basis.

How do you research your work?

Researching St. Petersburg

For historical fiction, I start by reading: history, cultural studies, biographies and autobiographies connected to the period and specific events. After that, I try mightily to visit the terrain. For my novel For You, Madam Lenin (Livingston Press/University of West Alabama) I managed to get to Russia. Despite the vast number of years between when I gazed upon the Neva River and my character Nadya Krupskaya did likewise, it was important to my process to experience St. Petersburg, her city—its air and light and atmosphere. My approach is similar when writing nonfiction. Although I’d finished the background research for an Estelle Faulkner essay published in “Full Stop,” before writing the piece, I badly wanted to lay eyes on Estelle’s Rowan Oak bedroom. And despite its “cleaned up” appearance and the thousands of visitors who’d traipsed through the Faulkners’ one-time home before me, that bedroom viewing was definitely worth the trip. Place—actual landscapes and physical structures—are a key component for me in any genre.

Estelle’s Faulkner’s Rowan Oak bedroom

How do you develop your characters?

Dear DeeDee

One of the reasons I was intrigued to try the epistolary form in Dear DeeDee directly relates to that question. How to exclusively address one specific recipient, reveal my own narrator self, and simultaneously have that “private” communication be universal enough in reach and content to interest an unrelated third party? That was the challenge. Eventually I settled on the “huh?” test. Whenever I wigged off on something too insular—a family tidbit that required knowing the entire backstory of all involved to appreciate its significance—that passage failed the huh? test and got nixed. For fiction, typically, I start with a visual of the character, then fast forward to the question: What’s troubling this character? That one-two usually dumps me into a narrative thicket fairly quickly. In Dear DeeDee, what’s troubling Aunt K is a bundle of stuff: time passing, where (now) to call home, were the life choices she’s made right or wrong or just inevitable—those kinds of probes. Fundamentally, it’s a book about identity, questions of identity.

What are the nuances differentiating memoir and autobiography?

I’m partial to Gore Vidal’s interpretation of those terms: autobiography requires fact checking; memoir is how one remembers one’s life. And “memoir,” Vidal went on to say, “is apt to get right what matters most.” It’s been my experience that I often discover “what matters most” during the writing process. You’d think I’d know beforehand—and sometimes do—but very often I find it’s the writing out that clarifies and confirms what’s what for me.

Where/when do you get your best writing ideas?

Cleaning house. I have no idea why—but there it is. Dust a lamp, sprint back to the desk, scribble notes; vacuum half a room, sprint back, scribble notes, etc. Needless to say, it takes me longer than it should to clean my house. Even so: side benefits.  

Kat Meads is the award-winning author of 20 books and chapbooks of prose and poetry, including: 2:12 a.m.; Not Waving; For You, Madam Lenin; Little Pockets of Alarm; The Invented Life of Kitty Duncan; Sleep; and a mystery novel written under the pseudonym Z.K. Burrus, set on the Outer Banks. Dear DeeDee, released by Regal House Publishing, is in stores December 4, 2020.

These are a few of my favorite things: Amherst, MA, public libraries

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by Shirley Reva Vernick

The Jones Library

Back when I was checking out towns in which to raise my children, one of the first local stops was always the public library. The Jones Library in Amherst, MA clinched it for me. Nestled in a stately stone building right off the main street, the library bustled with patrons of all ages that day—people reading, learning, enjoying group activities, installing exhibits, and generally creating an energized atmosphere of community. My family moved to town within a few months of that visit.

Originally housed in a local hotel, the 102-year-old Amherst library system now includes the main Jones branch and two satellites to serve the town’s 40,000 residents. Through the years, the library has loaned millions of books and digital media; hosted thousands of meetings, book talks and musical events; and continually applied new technology to the service of patrons. Need to borrow a ukulele, an air quality monitor, a museum pass, or a wireless hotspot? Incredibly, it’s just a library card away.

Literal—and literary—riches

Linda Wentworth, head of adult collections, says she has her dream job at the Jones. “I get to work with a community that’s insane about reading, and I have the privilege of managing a 300,000-item collection, some of it in multiple foreign languages.”

The Jones is now teaming up with another library in town, the national Yiddish Book Center, to (remotely) celebrate Coming to America. With the financial and intellectual support of the Yiddish Book Center, the Jones has arranged a reading group to discuss three books of Yiddish literature in translation, plus a fourth book related to one of Amherst’s larger immigrant communities: the Chinese. 

The discussion series, facilitated by Wentworth, will use these books to explore the ways in which immigrants change our country, and the ways in which our country changes those who immigrate here. Through these discussions, participants will explore the range of immigrant experiences and how these experiences are portrayed in literature. 

Another project on the drawing board is an ongoing book concierge service. Patrons will be invited to specify what kinds of books they like, and the staff will put two relevant selections on hold for them each month. Now, that’s my kind of book-of-the-month club!

Start ’em young

The library’s youth services have enjoyed increased attendance over the last five years, thanks to a trifecta of new children’s programs, the creation of a young-adult librarian position, and a focus on inclusivity.

A captivated audience

“Public libraries used to expect teens to act like adults and use the adult spaces,” notes library director Sharon Sharry. “Now that the Jones has given teens a dedicated space, their own programming, and a specialized librarian, we’ve become a cool place for YAs to hang out.”

The children’s room is continuously finding ways to embrace diversity. For instance, the library used to host an annual American Girl doll party, where girls could bring their American Girl dolls and participate in related activities. “But American Girl dolls are expensive,” says Mia Cabana, youth services director, “and are traditionally only for girls. So now we do a teddy bear/doll tea party, where both boys and girls are welcome, and the toy you bring doesn’t need to be fancy.”

Some children have adopted this party as a way to explore their sexual identity. Whether it’s a boy bringing a doll or a girl dressing up in a bowtie, all are welcome.

Something special

Many times over the years, I’ve lost myself in the library’s special collections. What a treasure—especially, in my opinion, the manuscript collections of local icons Emily Dickinson and Robert Frost. I was so delighted to find a handwritten rough draft of Frost’s “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” I was afraid I’d stare the ink right off the page. I’m also partial to the Amherst authors collection, which showcases books and articles written by Amherst residents from 1730 to today. You can find Noah Webster’s lexicographical studies, Robert Francis’s poetry, Norton Juster’s The Phantom Tollbooth (my personal childhood favorite), and much more.

“The special collections allow people to bridge Amherst’s past to its present,” says Cyndi Harbeson, head of special collections. “Whether I’m sharing famous historical manuscripts or tracking the provenance of local buildings, I love working with school children, high school and college students, genealogists, international scholars, and general Amherst residents.”

Harbeson points out that the collections also highlight non-celebrity residents, including “regular” people’s historic photos, scrapbooks, store records, maps and legal deeds. “We serve as a repository for local Cambodian refugees’ records too,” she adds. “My hope is to expand this initiative and make the special collections more representative of our community.”

When we’re apart

Quarantine, unfortunately, has closed the buildings. Nevertheless, the library services persist. The award-winning ESL and citizenship programs have thrived remotely. Dungeons & Dragons tournaments, wee sing-alongs, bilingual story times, tech support for personal computers—all these are thriving virtually, as are author interviews, art instruction, and music lessons.

In addition to keeping its digital materials and research tools available, the Jones has developed an effective protocol for socially distanced book borrowing. The main branch is offering home delivery, as well as weather-dependent outdoor pickup. Meanwhile, the South Amherst branch has taken a page from the “wine windows” that dotted Florence, Italy, during the 17th-century bubonic plague scourge. Wine merchants during that time built tiny windows through which they could pass wine flasks, thus avoiding direct contact with customers. In just this way, the South Amherst branch is passing bagged books to patrons.

Love ya, tomorrow

In 2021, the Jones is hoping to begin a significant building renovation, updating existing structures and adding new space. The library has already been offered a state grant to help support the renovation. Now the staff is awaiting a town council vote on whether to underwrite the balance. “I’m very optimistic,” says Sharry.

The library also plans to rev up its nascent anti-racism movement. “We want every person who crosses our threshold to feel at home,” Sharry says. Indeed, one highly visible example of this initiative greets patrons as soon as they walk through the Jones’ front door. The large painting in the entryway titled “English Nobleman” (often mistaken for Lord Jeffrey Amherst, the man purported to have sent smallpox-infected blankets to Native Americans in the 18th century) has been replaced with a landscape.

Jorge Luis Borges imagined paradise as a kind of library. It seems to me that the Jones is, if not a literal paradise, then certainly a warm and welcoming place for exploration and self-expansion. I can’t wait to be able to pop back in for a browse, and I’m grateful for the staff’s creative and technical expertise that keeps me connected in the meantime.

Shirley Reva Vernick is the author of The Blood Lie, Remembering Dippy, and The Black Butterfly. Her work has garnered innumerable awards and recognition, some of which include: the American Library Association Best Fiction Books for Young Readers List, Simon Wiesenthal Once Upon A World Book Award, Dolly Gray Literature Award from the Council for Exceptional Children, Langum Prize for American Historical Fiction. Fitzroy Books is proud to publish Ripped Away in 2022.