David Klein's Blog, page 69

Appropriation and AMERICAN DIRT

The fervor over AMERICAN DIRT continues to flame on. I wrote an early review of the novel, which I enjoyed, but found problematic, and then I came across this takedown by the writer Myriam Gurba, who scorched both the book and its author, Jeanine Cummins.

Here’s a quote from Gurba’s review:

Cummins plops overly-ripe Mexican stereotypes, among them the Latin lover, the suffering mother, and the stoic manchild, into her wannabe realist prose. Toxic heteroromanticism gives the sludge an arc and because the white gaze taints her prose, Cummins positions the United States of America as a magnetic sanctuary, a beacon toward which the story’s chronology chugs.

For me, the controversy around American Dirt revolves around three points:

AppropriationMarketingEnvy



Appropriation

As an author, I’m disturbed by the treatment Cummins is getting from what is widely referred to as the “cancel culture,” which tends to attack any work of art they deem is appropriated. Cummins’ book tour was canceled, allegedly over threats to her.

Appropriation means to take something for one’s own use,
without the owner’s permission. In this case, a white author is taking the
migrant experience, which belongs to migrants, and writing about it for her own
use.

I remain in the camp that a writer can write anything she wants, and there are no rules, especially in an imaginative work of fiction, about who is allowed to write what. But if you’re a white author writing about the migrant experience; or a straight author writing an LGBTQ character; or a male author writing from a women’s point of view—you’d better get it right. What about adult authors who write children’s books from a child’s point of view? Is that appropriation?

No matter who your characters or point of view are, you have
to pull off the authenticity test, and it’s going to be hard. But go ahead,
that’s what writers do: they research, imagine, invent and write all kinds of
things they have not directly experienced.

I know first-hand how hard that can be. In my novel STASH, there is only one character who is black: he’s a secondary character, a former NFL player turned drug-dealer and villain. At the time I was writing the novel, I hadn’t considered what hole I might be digging for myself.

After the novel was published, I was doing a book talk in my town and afterward a reader (who was black) came up to me and told me how much he liked the book. So it still hadn’t registered on me what mistake I might have made.

Only after some online reviews mentioned “racist undertones” in the novel did I wake up. And what did I do? I panicked. I didn’t want to be that author. I had made writing decisions that seemed to fit the story without considering what other impacts those decisions might have. That was definitely a mistake on my part.

Will I only write about middle-aged suburban white people now? Absolutely not. I want to expand, not contract, as a writer, but I’ll be more aware of the decisions I make and their potential ramifications to what I hope is a diverse reading audience.

Marketing

For multiple reasons, I’m largely disappointed in the publishing industry. Flatiron made serious missteps in publishing American Dirt. A seven-figure advance for what is essentially a road thriller? A huge marketing campaign for what was positioned as a culturally significant novel that authentically portrays the migrant experience?

I can see why Gurba, and many others, are pissed off.

In a letter from Bob Miller, president and publisher of Flatiron books, he stated he was surprised about the backlash (because other literary lights and Oprah had given it pre-pub praise) and confessed to a number of publishing mistakes:

“We should never have claimed that it was a novel that defined the migrant experience; we should not have said that Jeanine’s husband was an undocumented immigrant while not specifying that he was from Ireland; we should not have had a centerpiece at our bookseller dinner last May that replicated the book jacket so tastelessly.”

They would have been better off marketing the book as a road
thriller, but the temptation to cash in on the migrant experience was just too
great.

You could make the case that the market should decide the fate of the book, and in this case the market declares American Dirt a winner: Oprah pick, bestseller, ubiquitous media coverage.

But leaving the definition of quality or success to the market is largely leaving it to white people to decide the book’s worth, since they make up the large majority of publishers and readers in the United States. The white world has to embrace the book in order for it to be a success, which means it has to please the novel-reading audience, not provoke it by challenging their views.

Envy

I’m about to step into a trap, because the complaints about
American Dirt are legitimate. Marginalized and underrepresented voices have
been snuffed out in favor of the white perspective.

But there’s not one author out there, myself included, who doesn’t wish we’d been given a seven-figure advance and enormous marketing support for a novel that we wrote, whatever its potential for controversy. Would I trade that kind of money to be the center of a cultural firestorm? Show me where to sign.

Jeanine Cummins I’m sure is experiencing some negative effects for the reaction to her novel. I feel bad that she wrote a book she wanted to write and is now becoming the blame target for problems within the publishing industry. On the other hand, she can afford all the therapy she needs and almost anything else that will assuage her.

The post Appropriation and AMERICAN DIRT appeared first on by David Klein.

Six-Word Memoirs

There is a legend about Ernest Hemingway responding to a challenge to write a six-word story with this: “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.”

That’s about as devastating and definitive as a story can be–whatever its length. And it has inspired many writers to construct six-word stories and memoirs.

Here’s another one, unlikely written as a six-word memoir, but perfectly fitting the form: “I came, I saw, I conquered.”

Here are some I’ve come up with that fall into the “memoir” category:

Fourth of five kids. Mostly ignored.

Shy as kid, introverted as adult.

Not quite according to expected outcome.

Found a partner, things got better.

One kid, then two. Meaningful life.

Years keep passing, hanging in there.

If I didn’t write, then nothing.

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A No-News Day?

Still dark and frozen when I padded in my slippers down the driveway to retrieve my New York Times this morning. I haven’t opened it yet. I’ve watched the Australian Open. I’ve read about my lowly Buffalo Sabres. But the real news is getting me upset. I can’t read it. I don’t want to see it.

I wish the Times wasn’t delivered in a plastic bag. I had a paper route, in the 1970s in Buffalo, when there were no individual bags. We delivered to a sheltered spot on the porch or inside a storm door or milk box. I don’t remember looking much at the headlines.

A Short While Later . . .

Of course, I looked at the Times. I told myself it was my duty to be informed and to understand the state of my country and the world. The current state sucks.

The first front-page item I focus on is a photo of Mitch McConnell. The awful corruption of his Merrick Garland block makes me sick. I turn the page, already anxious and angry, but I pull back from the cliff. In the “Here to Help” section, the Times offers ways to make smart donations to combat climate change. I can really use these suggestions. Here’s the online version.

In the paper version, the mini-crossword puzzle is right next to the climate change tip. I zip through the puzzle, daring to use a pen. The first clue is so easy, about maple syrup. Reminds me that soon I’ll be tapping my tree. Could be something sweet in my future.

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A Manly Duo: 1917 the Movie; and REVENANT, the Novel

Mostly by coincidence, this week I read a novel and watched a film, both of them by men, about men, and for men. There is a lot of traditional masculinity on display in these stories. They are about courageous men driven by a singular mission, battling external forces.

I missed Michael Punke’s The Revenant when it was published in 2002, and passed on the Leonardo DiCaprio film by the same name in 2016. So this work wasn’t on my radar until I saw the novel on my friend’s bookcase and got intrigued by the revenge story. (Side note: I love going to someone’s house and seeing books shelved in bookcases–I never would have noticed an eBook, not that there’s anything wrong with them, I respect them, they have many advantages, and I want people to read my novels in any format they desire, but I personally like books and bookshelves.)

Back to the theme of by men and for men. The Revenant wins the prize for not including a single scene with a female character. There is some backstory, about a page or so, of protagonist Hugh Glass having once been engaged to marry, but the rest of the novel is all 1823 wilderness adventure: Glass is with a fur-trading company, and while on an expedition he is attacked by a bear and suffers apparently mortal wounds. The two men from the group are left behind to bury him after he dies, but they instead rob him and leave, fearing for their own safety with Indians nearby. Glass survives and vows revenge. (Can I use the word ‘Indians’? The novel uses it freely.)

The survival sequences are epic: he eats raw rattlesnake, competes with wolves for an animal carcass, traps mice to eat, confronts Indians, and is severely wounded and cold and on the edge of death. But he is smart, skillful, and motivated. Battle scenes with musket rifles and arrows. The story propels along and is satisfying if you like this kind of thing, and I do. I was a little disappointed in how the revenge lust played out, and the book felt longer than its 250 pages.

Overall, the story felt authentic, well-researched, and I was there right in that dangerous world. This is why men like me embrace these stories: we experience the fear and the thrill, and we wonder about our own decision-making and behavior in extreme circumstances. Can we do what these men do?

This is why men like me embrace these stories: we experience the fear and the thrill, and we wonder about our own decision-making and behavior in extreme circumstances. Can we do what these men do?

Which brings me to 1917, directed by Sam Mendes, who also directed two movies that I love: American Beauty and Revolutionary Road.

I’ve always liked war movies for the reasons stated above. 1917 is a powerful entry into the genre. Technically, it is superior filmmaking, and mimicks a continuous single shot that adds immediacy and pace. The sets, particularly the trenches of the World War I battlefield and its soldiers, are devastating, almost sickening, in their visceral, visual power over the viewer. I was there with them–I didn’t want to be, but I had to be.

The story itself is a classic mission impossible: two soldiers must cross the front lines to deliver a message to another troop to prevent thousands of soldiers from getting massacred in a German trap.

The strengths of this kind of film are the visuals and action, the incredible unfolding on the screen. But with so much urgent and tense action taking place, developing character is more challenging. There are a few stilted bonding scenes between the two soldiers and a sidebar about one of them having a brother in the imperiled division they are sent to save from doom.

There were incredible scenes of soldiers living in trenches: wet, battle-fatigued, and resigned. Burned out and barren landscapes, death and destruction. All the tragedy of the battlefield.

It was a compelling film except for one serious misstep: unlike The Revenant, which included no scenes with women, 1917 forced an awful scene into the last third of the film, in which the soldier, while escaping German fire in an already overly baked scene, happens upon a beautiful young woman with an infant daughter holed up in the middle of the war zone. They have a meaningful moment. What?! For whom was that scene added? It felt completely unrealistic and uncalled for, an attempt at pleasing a broader crowd or checking some boxes for awards season.

The Revenant: 4 out of 5 stars

1917: 4 out of 5 stars

The post A Manly Duo: 1917 the Movie; and REVENANT, the Novel appeared first on by David Klein.

What to Write Next?

I’ve handed my novel THE SUITOR over to a trusted reader. I spent most of the past year writing little else. I wrote some posts to this blog. I scribbled a note or two on stray ideas. But the vast majority of my writing time was devoted to THE SUITOR.

Now I’m waiting.

With waiting comes new and unstructured writing time. My first thought is always what novel I’m going to write next. It’s always the novel I think of first. Since 2007, when I started writing STASH, I’ve almost exclusively written novels: CLEAN BREAK (2012), THE FINISH LINE, A SERIOUS LAPSE, THE CULLING.

I’ve written two or three short stories across that time. No poems. No scripts. But I have penned a number of love cards to my family, and I’ve written and presented several Pecha Kuchas.

So almost all my writing time is given over novels. Which makes me a novelist, for better and worse.

I don’t have any new ideas at the moment (otherwise I’d be writing them at this moment). But I’m still intrigued by A SERIOUS LAPSE, about a married, successful businessman and father who survives a plane crash only to suffer from a dissociative fugue state and is forced to confront his identity. It has a great first chapter, and a surprise yet meaningful ending, but . . . something still ain’t right, as my agent and I discovered.

Then I have those novels that I’ve started and stopped. The one with the teenagers playing a prank that turns out wrong and messes up a bunch of people’s lives. The one with Sara Montez, NYPD detective from CLEAN BREAK, now a private investigator conflicted over a domestic surveillance case. The Alzheimer’s novel. The friend asking a friend for an alibi novel.

I’ll consider them all to see if there is something fresh to capture my interest. And I’ll get out my notebook and start writing. Maybe I will write a short story. They’re certainly shorter than a novel so I should be able to finish one without investing a year or two of writing time.

Just like my remaining reading time is limited, so too is my writing time.

Choose wisely. Write well.

In a few days I’ll have all kinds of things to fix in THE SUITOR. I hope I’m up for that writing.

The post What to Write Next? appeared first on by David Klein.

Winter is Painting Time

During the winter I start painting rooms in my house. Every year, at least one room gets the treatment. This year it was the entrance breezeway and the adjoining den, where I have my desk.

I just finished and I’m still not sure what color I painted. Two colors, actually: one called Greyhound (breezeway) and one called Iced Marble (den), plus a trim color, called Snowbound.

The wall colors are supposed to be variations on gray, but you could convince me that they are green, or blue, or gray-blue, or green-gray. A lot depends on the light, which is constantly changing, and my mood, which also varies.

One thing, though, I paint with colorful abandon. I live in a three-bedroom, two-bath house and I count thirteen different wall colors, plus four more in the finished part of the basement. Some rooms are two colors. Hallways get their own colors. Somehow it all works, or most of it.

Part of the success may have to do with my painting skills. I do the necessary prep work: filling holes, caulking cracks, sanding and priming as needed. I use good brushes and quality paint. I know how to set up and execute the job. I have a steady hand for cutting in, trim work, and windows. A deft touch with the roller. I don’t spill much paint.

Most of all, I enjoy the job, even the ones that seem overwhelming at first. Painting is repetitive with some variation, requiring just enough skill and artistry, and the results are immediate. There are no loud machines or tools running. I can listen to music or my own thoughts.

I’m not done yet. There are a hallway and doors next, then I might go after the living room and kitchen again. Those rooms still look good, but the color was never perfect. Who can tell from a little paint chip, or even a sample on your wall? You never know what the finished product will look like, but I’m usually willing to accept it for a while. I can always repaint, and most likely will.

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My Sauce is Comfort Food

I learned to make sauce from my mother, who learned from her mother, two women of Italian descent who knew how to cook without looking in a book.

We’d have sauce at least twice a week growing up: spaghetti and meatballs, usually, often with garlicky braciole rolled with twine and simmered right in the pot. A variation used penne or rigatoni instead of spaghetti. A special occasion called for lasagna.

Sauce wasn’t just comfort food, it was a mainstay menu item, on good days and bad days, weeknights or weekends. When we learned my mother was dying, we had sauce that night, my father and my siblings and I defrosting a supply my mother had made and frozen, preparing a meal in efficient silence, the familiar sustenance helping us navigate our long journey of grief and pain.

These days, I make sauce for my own family. I always make meatballs to go along with it. I make sauce when someone I love is in need. Last week, when making sauce for friends who’d experience a terrible loss, I had my son by my side performing the steps. Now he can make sauce, too, a skill that will come in handy when he moves into his first apartment in a few months. Sauce = Home.

My recipe uses meat, but for a vegetarian version you can sautee onions and peppers instead of the pork, and use that for the base.

Ingredients:



One clove garlic choppedOne Italian sausage link removed from the casing or a piece of pork or a pork chop with some fat on itThree 28 oz cans of tomato pureeOne 28 oz can of crushed tomatoesOne large can of tomato pasteLarge bunch of parsley chopped (about one cup)One tsp of dried basil and one of oregano, or other herbs to tasteOne tsp sugarA few splashes of red wineSalt and pepper



Method:



Fry the pork in a little oil and add the garlic; drain the fat when pork is cookedAdd all the tomato products and rinse out the cans with hot water, adding about two large cans worth to the sauceBring to boil, then reduce to a low simmer and cook, partially covered, for at least one hour or up to two hours, stirring occasionally to prevent stickingPrepare the pasta of your choice or use the sauce in eggplant or chicken parmigiana, lasagna, or any other recipe that calls for tomato sauceEat and be comforted

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NORMAL PEOPLE, Sally Rooney

After several people whose opinions I respect said they found NORMAL PEOPLE “okay” and “pretty good,” I started the novel with low expectations. But I found the book much more than just okay or pretty good.

Sally Rooney is a talented young writer. Where most of her talent resides is in the writing itself, as opposed to character motivation, plot, pacing or other elements.

Basically, the novel is a love story between Marianne and Connell, both from the western side of Ireland, she from a wealthy but abusive family, he from the working class, raised by a single mother.

They begin a secret relationship in high school, where he is popular and she is socially shunned. He ends up betraying her, but the relationship continues on and off over the next four years when they both head off to Trinity College, although now she’s the popular one and he’s socially marginalized.

Like all love stories, the central question is: Will they end up together? There isn’t a lot of plot; most of the action happens inside the characters’ heads, which I don’t have a problem with, because it results in passages like this, from Marianne’s point of view, regarding her mother, Denise:

Denise decided a long time ago that it is acceptable for men to use aggression toward Marianne as a way of expressing themselves . . . She believes Marianne lacks “warmth,” by which she means the ability to beg for love from people who hate her.

No surprise that Marianne turns out to be a masochist and seeks out debasement at the hands of men.

Or this passage, with Marianne considering a young man she was dating and to whom she admitted she was submissive:

When she thinks about how little she respects him, she feels disgusting and begins to hate herself, and these feelings trigger in her an overwhelming desire to be subjugated and in a way broken. When it happens her brain simply goes empty, like a room with a light turned off, and she shudders into orgasm without any perceptible joy.

Insightful, incisive writing like this helps keep the momentum going when there are no other real surprises.

Connell, who suffers a major bout of depression–a plot point that is raised and suddenly dropped–isn’t a good fit for a woman who gravitates toward abuse:

He’s wholesome like a big baby tooth. Probably never in his life has he thought of inflicting pain on someone for sexual purposes.

So there’s the heart of the conflict: they love each other, but seem to be mismatched, so mostly they stay friends. But this actually drags the book down a bit: you know they want to be together, so can’t they figure out some kind of relationship compromise–or at least attempt one?

Overall, an impressive read. I expect great novels from this author.

4/5 stars

.

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This is Called Doubt

I started thinking about the novel and got anxious that the characters are stupid and unappealing, or stock, or boring. They are duds and the story is a dud and the language is ugly and the writing forced.  The voice is wrought or annoying or soundless. The plot is vapid. The pace dull.

This is called doubt. Crushing, debilitating, self-loathing doubt. I take full responsibility. I am disparaged and ridiculed for my obvious failure. This is doubt. It has bitten me and the venom swims in my heart. Quick, I must have the antidote. There isn’t much time. I have work to do.

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Pitching a Novel in 250 Words

I’m getting near the end of my novel, THE SUITOR. Now comes one of the hardest parts: writing a pitch for it that will attract agents, editors, and readers. You write a book that runs around 100,000 words and then you have to explain its essence and build excitement in about 250 words.

It’s kind of a sucky task, but writing a good pitch helps:

Crystalize for me what the novel is aboutShape and direct the final editsServe as the foundation for the eventual jacket copy

Here’s Draft 1 of the pitch (you can read Chapter 1 here):

It’s been a tough year for Anna. She barely escaped a murderous shooting and has faced relentless academic pressure in order to be accepted to a prestigious law school. Following graduation, to do something totally different she moves up to her family’s lake house and takes a summer job at a resort restaurant, but her adventure goes awry when she is seduced by the party life and falls in love with her boss, the ambitious and scheming Kyle.

Kyle has risen from a miserable childhood and is on the
lookout for any opportunity to further advance. While he tells himself he loves
Anna, he also sees in her a path to his own success. He will do what it takes
to keep her, including encouraging her destructive behaviors and manipulating
her feelings.

Soon, Anna realizes she doesn’t want to go to law school—she wants to marry Kyle and open a restaurant with him, which she will help finance from her inheritance. Anna’s father, Art, senses the trap his vulnerable daughter is falling into. Faced with personal health issues, he must also battle against Anna and Kyle’s relationship, and prevent the marriage without alienating his daughter.

At first, Art offers to pay Kyle to disappear, and when that doesn’t work he resorts to blackmail and threats. But he doesn’t anticipate Kyle’s response or the impact his maneuvers will have on Anna, and all three of them end up facing life or death consequences.  

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