What do these three women have in common?

-  One waves to an acquaintance on the other side of the street and, when she gets no response, thinks, “Well, I don’t like her that much anyway.”

-  Another, reading the bulletin board in the company cafeteria, skims past the announcement that a company softball team is forming, reminding herself that, “I’m not really good at team sports.”

- A third, who suggests a valuable new idea in a meeting at work and, when the group doesn’t immediately embrace it, falls silent, she can almost hear her mother’s voice saying, “Don’t be pushy!”

Each woman has made a decision based on incomplete or outdated information.  AND each decision supports limiting beliefs that are likely to restrict future behavior.

The first woman believes that the way someone responds to a friendly gesture shows her whether they can be friends. She is likely to act distant the next time she sees the acquaintance, and the friendship is less likely to develop. 

The second woman believes that she has to be “good at team sports” in order to enjoy or contribute to the team.  She may not even go to the softball game to cheer the team on. 

The woman on the work team believes that doing more than mentioning a new idea is “pushy” and inappropriate.  It may be a while before she suggests another new idea.

In each case, an unconscious decision or belief has closed off new possibilities.  How often does this happen to you?

Why do we do this?

If you’re like most of us, you make decisions out of habit, based on inadequate information all the time.

Part of the reason is that life today is complex, the pace is fast, and we are bombarded with information during almost every waking moment. We simply don’t have time to ask, “Is what I’ve always done still working for me?”

Plus, most of us feel safer and more centered if we feel we can explain what’s going on in our lives to ourselves — however inaccurate that explanation may be. It’s scary at first to say, “I simply don’t know enough at this point to make a decision about that.”  And so we make hasty unconscious decisions even when they limit us.

What are some other choices?

Luckily, not every choice requires deep deliberation – or we’d be drowning in a sea of unmade decisions. But each of us has areas where quick, unexamined decisions (usually based on things that happened when we were younger and less skilled) keep us from enjoying new people, new situations and new aspects of ourselves. Think for a minute – you probably know what yours are.

Luckily, the first step to moving beyond these habits isn’t complicated. It takes practice, but it’s a new habit you can develop. That is, to become aware of when you’re making a choice AND to recognize that there are other possible choices. Sounds simple, but it’s powerful.

If the woman whose acquaintance didn’t wave back did this, perhaps she would consider that the woman might simply be focused on something else and could still be a terrific person to know. If the second woman stopped to ask if that mattered to every team, she might find that THIS team was created just to relax after work and wasn’t focused on winning – or that she can have fun simply going to the game and cheering them on. And if the third woman considered the possibility that the group’s reaction didn’t necessarily mean that the idea wasn’t valuable, perhaps she might ask for feedback on how to encourage the group to consider it.

What would you discover if you spent just a couple of hours one day listening to your mind as it creates meaning out of the things that happen to and around you? Before you file them away in the same old mental compartment, ask yourself these questions: “Do I absolutely know that this is still right for me?  What other viewpoints could be true?”  If you accept this invitation, you’ll be taking a big step toward shifting from habitual thinking to exploring what’s possible. And you’ll find that more is possible than you ever dreamed.

This is such a powerful story about the unique bond – both positive and negative — between siblings. What do you think is so unique about that relationship?   

The story I wanted to tell was exactly that: the lifelong bond you have with your siblings – whether good or bad. Besides your parents, your siblings will know you in a way your partner never will. The voices I heard first when I started to tell this story were that of Amy and George.  George was everything to Amy: her protector, her teacher, her confidante and her friend.  And I’d like to think that Amy was a little of that to George.  Certainly, at least in this family, they were an island unto themselves and that continued to nurture and sustain each of them into adulthood. 

What the book represents so well is the surprising way children growing up in the same family can be so different from each other. Do you think birth order – even just because of what’s going on in the household at those various times — has a lot to do with that or is it just how the genes randomly combine? What kind of relationship do you have with your own siblings?

Oddly enough, I didn’t even consider that my brother could possibly have a different memory than me about something until he and I were talking about a specific time in our childhood.  He remembered it to be an entirely different — and, dare I say, a non-event — while I had been holding onto this as one of my more significant memories for years and years.  That did get me to thinking about how siblings raised by the same parents, in the same house, under the same circumstances, could turn out to be totally different.  I see it now in my own daughters at 15 and 19. They mostly agree on their “memories” but there are a few significant things that they definitely do not remember in the same way.  Of course, that might just come down to the basic differences in the individual: shy where one is outgoing, observant where one is breezy and carefree. Which brings me to birth order: as the oldest, do I identify with Kate Haas?  Certainly I can see why and how she tried to keep “control” of the situation at home.  But do I think it’s predetermined?  Not really.  The Haas siblings all had their roles in the family because they were reacting to the chaos around them and that is where their true personalities came through.  And for the record – my family is not any more dysfunctional than your average family, and my brother (my only sibling) and I, have a pretty great relationship.

I love the relationship between Amy and George. Why did you want to make that particular bond so special?  

Amy and George were the siblings out of that entire family that I saw as the lost souls. While Kate and Finn are struggling with their demons as well, I saw their struggle as way more external, more able to fight for themselves and take a stand — however fragile a base they had to stand on. While Amy and George were essentially these motherless fatherless children who formed an intense bond out of necessity because no one was there to feed their souls, to nurture, to guide them into adulthood.  So these two delicate human beings end up doing for each other what a parent should have done.  And, in doing that, they formed this amazing relationship that will carry them their entire lives.  I knew from the very first germ of an idea for this book that the relationship between these two siblings would be the heart of the novel.

Do you think Kate is most representative of the family’s story? Is that the reason for the gorgeous book cover?  

Kate really and truly tried to hold it together for everyone, however misguided, considering she was constantly vying for her father’s attention. I think Kate originally felt if she could show her father that she could keep the family intact when her mother had opted out — that she would in some way be rewarded with his love.  Instead, her father used her affection to manipulate and destroy everything that was good in her life — and ultimately she never recovered from that.  The cover – ah, the gorgeous cover — I am indebted to designer Robin Bilardello at Harper Collins for truly having that vision.  The lemons in Italy represented a very romantic fulfilling time in Kate’s life — the lemon tree at the house in California, rotting from the inside out — was indeed a metaphor for the Haas family. Kate knew this and she resisted Finn’s attempts to rid the property of the tree.  It had to be her choice to destroy that tree and ultimately free herself from the past.    

It’s interesting that the mom is an actress and the dad a playwright. I know this is generalizing to a degree but I would think artists do need to be more self-centered in some ways and to have more time to themselves, in order to create. How do you think being an artist affects a person’s parenting skills?  

Artists get a bad rap.  I think there is a certain truth to the stereotype that artists are these chaotic, non-conforming, non-bill paying members of society but some of the most successful artists I know are highly organized and extremely specific with an intense vision that blinds them and protects them in this wonderful cocoon.  That being said, I think people with artistic tendencies adopt the quirks of the artist and use it as some sort of get-out-of-adulthood-free card. I’d say that probably applies to Richard Haas and, to an extent, his wife Marilyn.  I also think their parenting skills speak to the times.  When I was a child and teen in the late sixties and early seventies, parents were very, very hands-off.  Add that to the artistic life style that Richard and Marilyn adopted and you have chaos.  Certainly not an environment conducive to child rearing.  

All of the characters in your book are so distinct and so real. How did you come up with them – did you know what kind of personality traits you wanted each one to have or what each sibling should in some way represent? 

I know I risk the chance of sounding mentally unbalanced but Amy, George, Kate and Finn were as real to me as my very best friends, my sibling, and the people I hold nearest to me.  When I began to write it was as if everything I had ever wanted to say, to do, to feel, to learn, came through those characters.  There were days that I felt like I was taking dictation.  That is a blessed writing day.  I didn’t set any perimeters on their personalities — they really and truly evolved. 

I don’t think I should ask you which character is your favorite because that’s almost like asking which of your children you like best! So, instead, which one can you most relate to?   

I have two daughters, and they are each my favorite for reasons that are so unique to their personalities that I could never compare.  I get this question about the characters a lot – especially when I visit book groups because everyone seems to have a distinct favorite.  It’s usually a toss-up between Kate and George – with Amy a distant third.  Poor Finn never seems to come up as a favorite but people do want to know if he is still okay.  For me, George’s story was the most rewarding.  It was a genuine love story between he, Sam and Asa, and I loved being in his head. 

Which sibling’s story was most challenging for you to write?   

I resisted Kate initially and then when I discovered the essence of her true sadness, her devastating relationship with Eli, her failed attempt at saving her brother, ultimately hers was the most heartbreaking story to write in the end. 

Why is Amy’s story written in first person and the rest in third?   

The reader is introduced to Amy when she is seventeen years old.  First person is a very me-centered voice and it seemed right to me that Amy would speak like that, that even over the course of fifteen years — the arc of the book – Amy, as the baby, would always have the first person voice. I tried her in third as I tried all the siblings in first, but essentially their personalities dictated the POV. 

I really want one of Amy’s soft-sculpture birds! I could picture them perfectly, and think you could start a great product line with them! Can you talk about their significance?  

What is more fragile and yet at the same time as free as a bird?  I think that a bird symbolizes Amy’s true essence. And the fact that she is crafting these personalized birds — giving them a story and sending them out into the world — to me is just perfect. Perfectly Amy. 

I thought it was very generous of you to give Marilyn, the mother, a chapter at the end since moms always get blamed for everything, and it was nice to be able to see through her eyes as well. Has being a mom yourself given you a new perspective on family dynamics?   

Every mom deserves her say in the end, doesn’t she? Just as I knew that Amy and George would start the book, I was certain that Marilyn would have the last word.  Non-apologetic — she knows nothing can make up for her lack of mothering of this tribe – at this stage in her life she is grateful for second chances and she recognizes what she has been given. Her adult children also have let go of some of the resentment, anger and confusion of their upbringing, so I think that helps. If being a mom has taught me anything it’s that so many of us need to be more forgiving: of ourselves and the mistakes we make. We are all doing this thing on a day-by-day sometimes hour-by-hour basis.  I’m certainly not ever saying there is an excuse for emotional or physical abuse but I am saying that you just never know until you’ve walked in someone else’s shoes where they have come from and where they are going.

You’ve written lots of short stories and non-fiction but this is your first novel. How different a writing experience was that for you?  

Well, yes, I’ve published short stories and non-fiction – but have also written novels.  The Summer We Fell Apart is actually the third novel I attempted.  The first unpublished novel I consider “graduate school” (read: never to be published) and the second unpublished novel (which I may re-visit at some point) was how I got the attention of my wonderful agent Julie Barer.  I’d have to say the process of writing TSWFA was entirely different from either prior attempt.  Not to jinx any future novels, but I felt in my bones that it was the book I was meant to write and get published. The book groups? The Target pick? The e-mails? I am just overwhelmed and humbled by the response the book has received.

What can we look forward to next from you?

 Ahhh… the dreaded novel number two! Well, after several false starts, I am deep into the story about a family who lives on a private island off the west coast of Florida and a bereft young woman who sets out to find the family she never knew existed after her mother’s death.

The story begins in a refugee center just outside of London. We meet Little Bee there and learn that she is about to be released from the center. We yearn to find out why she is there. In the next part of the story, we meet Sarah, a woman who is dealing with the recent suicide of her husband. She also has a four-year-old son, Charlie, who she is trying to help get through the loss of his father as well. 

Little Bee shows up on Sarah’s doorstep with her late husband’s driver’s license — a very intriguing beginning to the women’s connection. We discover that two years earlier, Little Bee, Sarah and her husband met on a beach in Nigeria. The book builds up to the story of the incident in which Sarah and Little Bee cross paths on the beach. We also learn all about the oil trade in Nigeria and how dangerous areas in that country are because of the oil. I must admit that I knew nothing about Nigeria having oil and the horrible things that have happened to the people of Nigeria because of it. I also must admit that when Sarah and Little Bee recount the horrific tale of their meeting, I was reading it at night and had to put the book down for fear of having nightmares – so I read it first thing in the morning. I don’t want to give too much away here… 

Little Bee arriving on Sarah’s doorstep seems to be trouble at first but quickly turns into salvation for everyone – Sarah, Little Bee and Charlie.  

The author uses the first person narrative throughout the story and alternates chapters between Sarah’s voice and Little Bee’s. 

I found this a very easy read all the way through. I really couldn’t put it down and when I had to, I found myself still thinking of the characters. I was a little disappointed in the ending, though, and would be happy to discuss it with others who have finished the book. 

I really enjoying reading books that take me to places I have not been before. I love when books introduce me to topics that I do not know much about – in this case, Nigeria and the oil trade there. This book helps the reader become more aware of what is happening in a part of the world that we don’t know much about. It also points out how little we are doing to stop the tragedies there. We, the readers, are like Sarah in that we start off unfamiliar with Nigeria and by the end, want to learn more about how we can help the refugees from there. 

All in all, a very interesting read, and one that I am sure readers will enjoy.

This is one of the bravest, most powerful books I’ve read in a long time. How difficult was it for you to write? Why did you decide to write a book so many years later?

I love to write — and re-write. When I teach creative writing, I talk to my students about words being like paint for painters, music for musicians and movement for dancers. So the writing itself, in terms of language and learning about plot, character, suspense, especially after being a poet for so many years, was exciting and challenging. I played with language — added adjectives, changed point of view, added active verbs. I did research — I interviewed my family. However, even though I wrote many poems about the accident, writing the memoir was, emotionally, terribly hard because I relived that period of time even after so many years. I relived the separation from my parents and the horror of the burns. I found out more about what my parents went through as burn survivors. I wanted this to be all of our stories. I probably could not have written this book much earlier in my life. I needed to be able to talk openly about the accident with my parents. I needed to be a stronger person to delve into that material. I had a lot of help along the way that got me to that very place. I also found the right agent and the right publishing house. That is all part of the journey, too!

The actual event happened in 1954 yet the amazing details about everyday activities, your feelings and clothing/house descriptions are so raw, they make it seem like it happened yesterday. How much were you able to remember so vividly and how much was filled in by others?

Thank you for your kind words about my book. I was a poet for many years, focused on sensory detail in my writing. It’s how I naturally experience the world. Also, when a traumatic event happens, memory intensifies. I have few memories before 1954. My parents, sister and cousins also helped me with details. Cape Cod is filled with such wonderful salty sea smells and shades of light that it was not hard to capture all that. I enjoyed seeing the world as I did as a child — the seaweed that wound around my ankles and the froth from the sea. The farm also had such amazing scenery — cows, the one bull and the chickens–as well as the humid summer and freezing winter. Of course, New York City is home turf. I can feel the air — the cooking smells from my apartment building — and the humidity rising from the concrete. The memory of vivid details is part of being a writer.

Why did you want to write this book at all? Was it a form of catharsis and closure for you? Was there a specific message you wanted to share with others?

In some ways, my desire to write the book was not a conscious one. The material kept rearing its head — I had panic attacks triggered by an “anniversary reaction” when I reached 42, the age at which my mother was burned. As a writer, this was my material that I had to get out before I could move on. At times, I felt I should stop writing as it was affecting me and my family since the panic attacks got worse. But it was cathartic to plumb those depths and come out still whole. I don’t really believe in closure. This event will stay with me. It’s how I transform it that’s important. Now that this book is out, I can finally move on to a new project and the story of the accident is out in the world, shared by many others. Perhaps that is a form of closure. I don’t know if I have an actual message except that it’s important to talk about what’s hard, to share that with others, as it helps them to be able to open up as well.

It breaks my heart how young you and your sister, Anne ,were to have to go through something like that without being able to really understand what was going on or express yourself. How much did your parents talk to you about the accident and their feelings – and yours – once you were older?

Before the Accident

There were clinical talks, of course, since my parents were both in the medical profession and my mother went through many operations after my sister and I returned to them. However, how we felt — the trauma, the separation and all that enveloped us — was wrapped in a code of silence. It wasn’t until I was in my forties that I had any real dialogue with my parents. Even though my parents’ scars were clearly visible, the attempt at “normalcy” and perhaps the culture of the 1950’s cancelled out open communication. Plus, my mother was a stoical kind of person even before the accident. That was part of her strength but that was also very difficult. Yes, it was heartbreaking not to be able to talk about our deepest feelings. Early intervention is the best — even to be able to say to a child, “It wasn’t your fault.”

One thing that’s so frightening about the accident is that it shows how life can change drastically in an instant. Yet, the truth is that the faulty valve was going to cause an explosion one way or the other, and you touch upon the fact that, even if your mother hadn’t acted impulsively and lit the match that night, the whole house would have blown up the next morning. Did that fact become more meaningful to you as you grew up?

I didn’t find out about that fact until much later in my life. My mother wrote to me that the only saving grace was that “we took the brunt and not you children.” Anne and I were extremely fortunate not to have been burned. Now, however, all members of the family are called “burn survivors.” That was a relief to me when I heard that. There is always survivor’s guilt in situations like this. I can’t imagine, though, how difficult it would be to have your child burned. My parents were spared that anguish at least—and my sister and I spared that physical pain and disfigurement.

Right after the accident, I kept hoping your parents would bring you home – even though they were so disfigured. Looking back, do you think it was a mistake for them to try to shield you from the pain for so long? How do you think things would have been different if you’d been able to see them immediately?

That’s a very difficult question to answer. On the one hand, I’d want to say, yes, we should have seen them right away. But the horror of the burns — the bandages, the smells — all might have been too terrifying for a child. We would need to have been prepared and even then seeing them in  that state might have been more traumatizing than not seeing them at all. I don’t know when in the process it would have been the right time –but definitely earlier than nine months. It would be interesting to find out how it would be done today.

Your mother was an incredibly strong woman – for better or worse, as you point out, but I think most people would give up after an accident like that, and the fact that she pushed herself and your father to get up and lead a somewhat normal life again is remarkable. What do you think readers can learn from her?

I think readers can learn that ordinary people are capable of amazing feats of strength. My mother was a highly motivated person. She almost got a Ph.D. at a time when few women went to college. She put herself through school. Her mother was a suffragette. She came from a legacy of strong women.  She wanted a life — with a career, a family, adventure and enough money to realize all her dreams. She believed “education is the ticket.” She wasn’t going to let the accident change all her dreams even if people stared at her for the rest of her life.  She was curious about others, constantly learning, and had a great community of colleagues and friends. She wanted her marriage to work and she wanted to raise her children. She ended up doing all of that even after what she went through. What readers can learn is it is possible to recover and face the world — even after going through something so grueling.  She had to learn to cope with the disfigurement and not let it stop her from constantly going into new places and situations. She was bold. “Hi, I’m Dorothy Nayer,” she would say when she entered a room. People quickly forgot about how she looked and remembered the clothes she wore. Even with such scarred hands, she sewed many of her own clothes!

What really stands out about your mother’s strength – and what continues to move me — is that it seemed to come straight out of her love for you and your sister. That mama bear protectiveness is a force to be reckoned with. Is that something that’s resonated more deeply with you since having children of your own?

I believe my mother’s strength was part of her personality before the accident. Her father left the family when she was nine and she never saw him again. That must have wounded her deeply and also armored her. So this was who she was pre-accident. However, I know she loved us deeply and was in anguish over being separated from us.  I know a big part of her desire to recover was to take care of us. We were still such little girls and needed her. We needed to be picked up. She wanted us home and pushed my father to get us. It’s difficult enough raising children without a major trauma such as the one my family suffered through. So, yes, the enormity of all she did and had to do has resonated more deeply with me since raising my own daughters. My parents lived until they were 91 and 93. Sometimes I think they lived so long because they wanted to make sure my sister and I were fine. They called us every time we returned from a trip to make sure we were okay. I remember my father and mother standing outside of their apartment building in Oakland, watching me drive away after I visited them. When I got home to San Francisco, they always called to make sure I arrived home safely. I didn’t like that when I was in my twenties and thirties but then I got to expect that and cherished their concern. Yes, my mother was a Mama Bear — and her recovery from the burns meant she would get her children back. Now, as a parent, I’m in awe of how she managed so much.

Did you learn anything new or surprising about the accident and its after-effects while writing the book? Were the people close to your family eager to share what they remembered or were they wary?

Louise and cousin Jean on the farm

Mainly what I learned is how deeply the accident affected all of us. Since I led a privileged life, I think I didn’t feel a right to express the pain of the separation and the horror of the burns. I also couldn’t express the pain of leaving my aunt, uncle and cousins when we left the farm. They were wonderful to us — loving and kind. There were so many leavings — and my feelings were often buried.  I teach a class at City College of San Francisco called “Trauma and the Arts,” and we talk about generational trauma –trauma passed down from parents to children. What is unspoken often carries the most weight. We had little to no intervention except for the wonderful psychiatrist who counseled my parents. If we had had someone to talk with, I believe my sister and I could have coped much better as adults.

Yes, my parent’s friends were quite willing to share what they knew. I realized, though, how difficult the accident was for everyone involved. They gave me a lot of information but also shared their own trauma. Sometimes they hardly had words for how my mother looked or what they felt when seeing her and my father. But they freely shared what they remembered. The scene of my mother going to the movies for the first time with a friend is partially taken from a letter that one of her friends wrote to me.

I think in the book you mention a letter your mother wrote when you told her you were writing a book. How did your parents feel about you writing this? How did your sister feel?

My parents and sister have always supported my writing — first my poetry and then this book. I never felt they tried to stop the process, though when I was having severe panic attacks, my mother suggested I stop writing the book. She had a point since my children were quite young and I was getting triggered by the material.

My mother even edited the beginning of the book. She wrote down the facts about the night of the accident and the time before and after — however she rarely talked about how she felt except through an article that she wrote for the American Journal of Nursing. My father, however, read an upsetting part of the book and said, “enough.” He really didn’t want to read more though I know he was proud that I was writing the story. My sister has always cheered me on but twice when she read different versions of the book, she became very depressed. That just happened recently. It was a hard story to live and to re-live. It happened 56 years ago but there is still residual pain.

Have you seen or heard from your childhood babysitter, Della, after writing the book? I would think she would get in touch after reading how important she was to you.

We never saw Della after she left the family. I tried looking her up on the internet but to no avail. I don’t even know if she’s alive. I would love to get in touch with her and have her read the book.  It must have been terribly hard for her. She found my burned parents calling for help the night of the accident. My parents were her whole world — and then they were so damaged. I would love to find her again.

I understand you recently went back to the house on Cape Cod where the accident occurred. Why did you want to do that? What kind of experience did it turn out to be for you?

I love Cape Cod — the salty smells and the ocean. Driving into the Cape was thrilling this time. I was also going back as an author. I had readings, an NPR radio show – later, a write-up in two papers, one on the front page. I was not the wounded little girl. People were wonderful to me, mainly connections through my sister — college friends — who gave me wonderful support as well as the librarian at the Wellfleet Library. At first, looking for the house was like a treasure hunt. I was with a reporter and a photographer from The Cape Cod Times. However, when we found what we assumed to be the house (the pole where my father’s burned bathrobe hung from was still on the front lawn!), I had a different reaction. I wasn’t so sure I wanted to take a picture — even though I did. I learned the next day through someone who came to a reading that in fact it was the house. My husband and I went back but I decided not to knock on the door and go in. I didn’t want the image of the inside of the house in my mind. Maybe I will go back, though, another time.

One night on the Cape I had trouble falling asleep because of the image. I had suffered from panic attacks and had seen images of fire in my mind in my forties. I’m aware of protecting myself. In the end, though, I’m glad I saw the house and could be there in an entirely new way. I haven’t put up the image yet on Facebook — which I said I would do. So being at the Cape was thrilling but not entirely joyful. There was also a sadness there — my parents’ hopes and dreams of a wonderful family summer were dashed. Looking at the house, I also remember that. I also missed my sister (who decided not to come to the Cape this time) and parents, especially the day that I walked on the beach across the street from the house. We all had such wonderful memories of that time — clam digging and searching for shells — and the beautiful water. But I know they were all with me.   My husband, Jim, traveled East with me and came to all my readings and events. That was a great comfort — to have him with me.

Can you tell us a little about what you’re working on now?

I am now writing a novel.  It is still in very rough form but starts in the 1920′s in New York. The main character –a mother, wife and social worker — overcomes many obstacles and fights for a better world but when her only daughter joins a group that promotes violence and ends up in prison she is challenged almost beyond what she can bear. I grew up during the turbulent sixties and went to the University of Wisconsin in Madison and knew of people who were in prison for political crimes. It is my way of asking the question of how could this have happened.

I learned so much about structure while writing the memoir that this book has been a lot easier to write. Also, I am enjoying the freedom of doing what I want. I wanted to add a dog to one of the scenes and I could do it! Of course, I need to research the times just as I did research for the memoir. I am thrilled, though, to move on to a new project. Burned: A Memoir is now out in the world. I can move on from that story.

Layers

On the surface you express your Style

Underlying that pizzazz is your Substance

At the core is your Soul

How do you express yourself to the world?
What’s trying to emerge?

Navigate your Style

What’s under the surface?

What brings meaning to your life?

Explore your Substance

What type of energy do you exude and attract?

What’s your internal compass?

Anchor with your Soul

I was really moved by your book. Since it’s based loosely on your mother’s life, why did you decide to write it as fiction rather than as a memoir?

If I’d written it as memoir, I would have had to imagine my mother’s life anyway, or told her life from my point of view.  This way, I could instead imagine myself as her and fictionalize the plot. It also allowed a bit of distance.

You start Shoko’s story with, “I had always been a disobedient girl,” and Sue’s story with, “I had always been an obedient girl.” Was that true for you and your mother? How were you two similar – or different — to those characters?

Probably it’s true to a degree.  I think I was raised to be fairly passive, and every time I asserted myself it was met with such quashing that I only rebelled secretly.  I don’t know how disobedient my mother was, but in her younger life she certainly seemed to be an independent woman.  She didn’t marry until she was 26 and worked prior to that.

This is, at its core, a universal story about mothers and daughters to which we can all relate. What was the relationship like between you and your mother?

It was complicated, competitive, and adversarial for the most part, from when I was quite young.  But when I was older, it smoothed out.  Then of course, it was truncated because she passed away when I was 20.

Your details are so vivid, I felt like I learned a great deal about the culture in which your mother was raised, and how different it was from ours. How did those differences affect you when you were growing up? Did you ever wish your mother was just a “regular” American mother?

No, I didn’t. I got more accolades for having a different mother. Everyone thought it was incredibly fascinating that my mother was from Japan but she could still make the best pizza they’d ever had.

It’s fascinating that a book like “How to Be an American Housewife” actually existed, and that women really used it as a guide. What did you learn about that, and how did your mother use the book?

My mother had been a housekeeper for various military officers, so she already knew how to keep house. My dad got the book for her because he thought it was intended as some sort of cultural guidebook for housewives, which it was not. My mother didn’t need it, but I understand they did use the meatloaf recipe.

Ronin was such a stand-out character but is forbidden to Shoko because he is an “Eta,” a term I had never heard before. Can you explain a little about the Untouchables and whether that caste system still exists today, and what your mother may have told you about it?

My mother never mentioned it. I read something about the caste system while I was doing other research about Japan, and thought it was interesting, so I invented an Eta character. I didn’t want to present Japan as this wholly lovely place, and this sort of provides a parallel to America’s feelings toward the Japanese.

The Eta were basically people who dealt with animals, like leather tanners, and considered unclean even if people used their products. The official recognition was banned a number of years ago, but I understand even today, when some people marry, they look into the prospect’s background to make sure there is no Eta blood.

What did you think of the fact that your grandfather actually picked your mother’s husband – your father! – from a bunch of photos? Did that color the way you viewed marriage? How did your parents react to your own boyfriends?

No, it didn’t bother me at all.  I never thought anyone would pick someone for me.  My parents did not influence me about boyfriends.

Have you been to Japan? Does your mother still have family back there?

I went when I was three, to see my grandfather before he died.  I remember seeing him and doing certain things, like going to see Mt. Aso-san.  My mother does still have all her family back there and I would like to visit.

What surprising things did you learn either personally or historically while researching the book?

The caste system was surprising.  My parents didn’t offer a Japanese history course, nor did I take one in school, so I didn’t know about it.

Personally, what was surprising came when I was writing it and looking at the theme that introduced itself.  If you look at it one way, it could be an incredibly depressing novel, but it comes out rather hopeful.  So I guess it helped me see things in my own life differently.  I tend to be a bit of a, well, not exactly chipper and optimistic person, so I think if I wrote that way I’d lend to my problems.

What was your dad’s reaction to the fact that you decided to write this book? What has he said about the book itself?

My dad tremendously enjoyed the novel.  He said it’s very well-written and he liked the story.

You grew up in San Diego but live in Hawaii now. What’s that like? Has it inspired any new subjects for you to write about?

Hawaii is a lot different than San Diego.  It’s inspired me to write a novel with ghosts in it, because there are ghosts on pretty much every corner in Hawaii.  Ask someone who grew up on the islands for a ghost story and they’ll tell you.

How did you ever manage to write this book with three young children at home?!

I pretty much decided I was going to write it and just did it. Even if I had to work on it sporadically when I had a newborn, or give up Saturdays or evenings, I made small progress. You just have to do it and not give yourself excuses why not; if you NEED to write something, then you will. My husband is supportive and would take over with childcare. My other relatives helped, too. And not once did anyone say I was wasting my time.

We’re looking forward to your next book. What are you working on?

I’m working on a ghost story set in Hawaii and in Julian, California. It’s called The Cupcake Queen, and it’s about a cupcake baker whose dead husband is haunting her.

American Taliban opens with the reader embarking on a journey through a normal Americanized Lilly Pulitzer pink and green town with a surfer/skateboarder/future Brown University student from a wealthy upper middle class family seeking out the meaning of life through novel quotes from Taoism to Dylan. Summering in a typical East Coast beach town is a positively popular eighteen-year-old rightly named John Jude Parish. Surfing in his safe corner of the world, the passport of John Jude’s life is stamped with typical full-blooded American male travels, spending his days on the beach and nights surfing the virtual waves.

It is through Parish’s web surfing that the reader sees the first mapping of possible foreign lands of travel with companions carrying international passport names such as Naim, Tajh, Ahmed and Ibrahim. In Parish’s innocent online travels, the reader’s own compass begins to point to red flag territories of worry for many including Parish’s translucent mother, Barbara.

Parish’s dreamy existence changes course when a skateboarding accident leaves him with more time to surf the net instead of the waves. His fictional vision quest steers him from his parent’s safety net into a world rarely traveled or imagined by American males. With legs cast into non-use and boredom packed tightly with curiosity, Parish takes to chatting online into the worlds of Sufism, the Koran and other Arabic lands. Along the globe of internet travel, female persuasion leads Parish to a possibly unexpected though foreshadowed trip to the Sharia school in Brooklyn. With American movie logos packed lightly into the luggage of Parish’s surreal vision quest, the reader sees Parish’s naivete as possibly needed though not truly heroic. (“I think of a hero as someone who understands the degree of responsibility that comes with his freedom.” – Bob Dylan)

Parish travels between the world of American childhood games in white shalwar kameez to Pakistan, where he can not pretend to just be playing dress up any longer. It is in Abraham’s literary talent for packing modernism into the unfamiliar suitcase of terrorism that readers will find a worthwhile destination. “The first time he shoots a rifle while visiting a training camp, he dreams of Richard Burton doing the same thing a century before,” writes Abraham.

American Taliban may lead readers down a path mistakenly parallel to the reality of John Walker Lindh’s life. Upon closer review, though, they will discover that Abraham’s convincing writing style provides proof of how polar opposite Lindh and Parish’s truly are. Parish lives in a dreamy bubble with wealthy parental support holding him up while affording him the right to choose any destiny he desires. Lindh’s true reality proves to be the stuff of nightmares.

The only disengaging part of American Taliban is found at the journey’s end. Abraham’s decision to detour in the final pages of the book may leave the reader questioning her original literary travel plans. Parish is left in Taliban land with no clear destination stopping point as the story line parachutes down with Parish’s mother pulling the cord with her guilt, landing the reader frustratingly to the ending drop zone. Abraham’s decision to pack the final destination with an almost trite mother’s guilt over her lost son is one to which readers will have to adjust before the premise of the entire novel comes crashing down. Regardless, American Taliban provides passport-worthy travel.

Cakewalk, a memoir by Kate Moses, transports the reader on a frosted yet roughly-chopped mixture of her baked goods, sugar-filled, candy-lane life. Written with recipes purposefully hidden in the mix, Moses uses her personal ingredients to sift the reader through her concoction of life’s hidden spices pressed into her mother’s bizarre baked-goods hoarding rituals while scooping out her family’s caravans to her father’s promotions, leaving behind dollies of finely-diced chapters spread thick with layers of her escapes into scrumptious sugar highs and lows among cookies made with only the finest “chocolate chips for weirdos.”

With Kate’s highs spiked generously with slices of her mother’s erratic need for a playmate and her lows boiled over her father’s inaccessible approach to his family of strangers, readers will melt into Kate’s memories baked forever in a hypoglycemic state of despair. Kate serves up her life, peeking through oven windows as she whisks through the rises and falls of her adolescence, and finally coming out clean from her parents own selfish cookie-cutter needs to cool completely on her wired family’s legacy.

With Cakewalk, the author whips together her personal strifes with well-folded fluff, leaving the reader intoxicated into forgetting the bitter after-taste of a childhood firmly packed in a need for sugar intoxication with understandable vindication.

Though rising slowly at times, Kate’s memoir frosts her family’s own cake crumbs into remnants of memories with sheer glossiness for the reader to savor long after Cakewalk is devoured. Moses’ well-blended mixture of cooled imagery sprinkled throughout Cakewalk leaves the reader with a fresh hunger for even the most common German Chocolate cake as her life’s dough is rolled into ecstasy not ever before kneaded.

I was captivated by 31 Bond Street from the first page, and was intrigued by the fact that it was based on a true incident. How did you originally hear about the murder of Dr. Harvey Burdell, and why did you think it would make a great piece of fiction rather than covering the event as non-fiction?

I discovered this in an old newspaper clipping in a print shop and became curious. I went to the microfilm of newspapers for 1857 to follow up. (See my essay, “The Story Behind the Book,” on my website  for more detail of that exploration.) I discovered that the coverage of this case was extensive, spanning many months of front-page treatment. I was captivated by the amount of detail that about the people, the townhouse at 31 Bond Street, and also politics and world affairs, as glimpsed through a daily newspaper.

I originally thought I would do a narrative non-fiction, by stringing together the case and including quotes and snippets from the actual newspaper accounts and court testimony. I really got bogged down and found myself going in circles. The case itself went around in many different circles. Then, I began trying to get behind the real character’s motives and personalities, pondering “what made them tick.” That is the stuff of fiction — so that was a turning point. I shifted gears, which allowed me to be more expressive, and use more literary devices and language to try and capture the mood and flavor of the times.

Dr. Burdell’s murder has been called “the most celebrated crime of the 19^th century.” What specific aspects do you think make it so compelling?

This murder case was certainly called the “The Crime of the Century” at the time it was happening. There are many reasons: it occurred in a prominent part of town, and became a peek into the upstairs/downstairs world of the upper middle class. The murder took place in a closed house, at night, and the investigations were recorded in the newspapers from the now defunct “coroner’s house arrest” of the witnesses and suspects, all of which captivated the citizens of the city. Then there was a sex scandal — or romance — as well as three attractive women: Emma Cunningham and her two daughters. So you had a brewing sensation from the very start.

But, remember, this case was largely forgotten by the 20^th century. Imagine if a hundred years from now, no one was aware that Nicole Brown was murdered in a similarly brutal fashion. The reason it was forgotten, I believe, is that very shortly afterward, the Civil War consumed the country, and local crime was eclipsed by a flood of war reporting. Also, the archiving of the news in those early days was not very efficient, and there were very few indexes that survived that listed the breadth of this case. The only way to get the scope of what was written about this trial was to review the newspapers one by one.

Were there questions about the case that you felt needed answers or at least more discussion? How much of your story is based on fact?

The main question I kept asking myself, once I became immersed in reading the daily newspapers, was the question “Where was the Civil War?” It was looming just three years away. 1857 started out as a boom year, and people were very preoccupied with all that comes with that: fashion, entertainment, real estate and financial speculation. But I pondered the deeper and more divisive issues at the heart of the war — and wondered how much the average citizen was aware of this impending catastrophe that was about to erupt.  I read some recent historians on the Civil War years in New York City, and I found that many of the attitudes in the North and South were not as black and white as we now assume. Life was more ambiguous — slavery had been an accepted norm for over a century. It appears that in the pre-Civil War period, there were pro-Slavery and pro-Southern factions in New York City politics. And I built some of these racial and political tensions into the story of the book.

I love books where the setting is so authentic, you feel like you’re right in the middle of that place. Reading 31 Bond Street, I forgot I was sitting on my couch in San Diego; in my mind, I was firmly entrenched in 19^th century New York and could almost feel the stormy weather and hear the horses clopping down the street and the newsboy announcing the day’s headlines. How did you capture that so vividly? What kind of sources did you use for reference?

I love to hear that a reader loses their sense of time and place. In a way, all fiction takes us to another reality, and lets us live in it for a while. My goal was to achieve a feeling of verisimilitude, so that 1857 felt “contemporary.” I strove to be true to the details of life in that specific year by using descriptions of fashions, household, cultural practices and other details of contemporary life in 1857. I tried to put blinders on, and be precise to that particular year, finding references as to how people lived then. I found details in the daily newspapers and popular fiction written at exactly that time. One example is that in reading popular fiction, I picked up on how widespread drug use was: drugs like opium and morphine were widely available as over-the-counter pharmaceuticals (there were no legal restrictions) and were used and dispensed for any number of household remedies. Laudanum is an “opium tincture,” and is highly addictive, and was used commonly in middle class households for “nervous disorders” in women.

I also read classic writers of that time, i.e: Walt Whitman, Stephen Crane, and their biographies. The lawyer, Henry Clinton, wrote books about his trial cases, and they became an important source. A lot of dialogue was captured in the trial transcripts so it was fascinating to hear some of the characters’ own words—the maids and daughters for instance, when they testified.

Emma is a fascinating character. Tell me a little bit about your feelings toward her.

Emma Cunningham appeared as an ambiguous character from the beginning and there was huge debate about her character. I found that the most persistent theme in her actions was her desperate need to keep a roof over her head, and her maternal drive to set her daughters up for an economically stable future. For a woman, this was almost exclusively done through marriage, and as a middle-aged woman, she knew that her time was running out. Without a financially secure husband or family, the descent from the middle class was rapid and very real. And poverty was the norm for unprotected women. It was a descent that must have terrified her, and there were very few social protections or comforts at the poverty level. Life was quite cruel at the bottom.

Were there other characters that were particularly interesting to you, for better or worse?

Henry Clinton fascinated me because his actual strategies in this case seemed so intelligent and forward thinking. He wrote two books about his cases: Extraordinary Cases and Celebrated Trials. They are rather dense and legal reads, but a sense of his strong intelligence and ambitious drive comes through. Early on, I was very inspired by his real life character, and he is a main narrative voice in the book.

Edith Wharton is one of my favorite authors, nailing the manners and morals (or lack of) of New York society during pretty much this same period in history. With this book, you definitely join her ranks. What surprised you about the different classes then?

Thank you for the comparison! It is very flattering. But one thing to keep in mind is that Wharton wrote about New York society a full half century later. (She didn’t die until 1937.) Her New York is late-Victorian, and of course we all love the stratified social dramas in her novels. But a lot changed in that half century. I found that this earlier period was a bit looser, not quite as stilted — New York was a smaller town then, the rich weren’t quite as immensely wealthy or as insulated as they became during the later Gilded Age. There were certainly dramatic economic differences then (as there are today) but there was still an exuberant street culture that seemed to be enjoyed by all. People of all types seemed to mingle quite a bit, and as the city was growing rapidly, it had a very colorful, vibrant and fast paced feeling.

The book is so rich in bringing to life huge issues like racial conflict, sexism, political corruption (which are all still going on today in a variety of ways). Was there a specific message you really wanted to get across about any of these subjects?

Once they popped up in my narrative, I was particularly fond of the characters that were least represented by traditional history: the little servant boy, John; the ex-slave Samuel; and the Native-American Lenape, New York born, Katuma. As a novelist, I wouldn’t want to state any message — a fiction writer should be careful not to sermonize, as it would no longer feel like a smooth narrative.  But I do think you noticed what I did – that in many ways, the same issues and conflicts are still with us today. We haven’t truly solved many of these social conflicts; we have often only inherited their outgrowths. And I do believe that by looking backwards, we can listen more closely to some of the overlooked voices of the past to find new directions. In that way, history has an enormous amount left to show us.

Are there any other cases you’d like to explore in a book? What can we look forward to next from you?

There is another case that I mention in the postscript to the book, involving Henry Clinton and Abraham Oakey Hall. The time period is 15 years later, and the fictional narrative would focus more centrally on the couple Henry Clinton and his wife Elisabeth.

I like to think of 31 Bond Street as an archeological dig. Digging into the past history of a lost house is much like the work physical archeologists do. I have several ideas beyond those that are based in 19^th century New York, but who knows what will take root? I hope to have to the opportunity to write many more!