Talking Pens

As you’ll no doubt be aware, I’m quite the fan of fountain pens, especially ones made by Pelikan. These were the ones I used to write Not So Perfect with.

So I thought it might be a nice idea to invite someone who knows a thing or two about Pelikan pens on here for a chat.

I give you, Ray Adams from Niche Pens

How and why did you become interested in fountain pens, Ray?
I started to use a fountain pen in my days in the police; I was a PC and had to write pages and pages of statements. I was not happy with my handwriting and the quality of the cheap ball pens I used up until then. I bought a relatively inexpensive fountain pen (I cannot recall the make) and was impressed by the writing quality it gave and how it seemed to improve my handwriting.
Let’s talk about the specific brand you sell – Pelikan (the pens that I use). Why Pelikan? What do they have that others don’t?
I was introduced to Pelikan purely by accident. My son finished his GCSE exams and when asked what he would like as a congratulations present, he asked for a Mont Blanc fountain pen. We purchased one from the internet and were both unimpressed by it. I did some research and read around some forums about Pelikan, a little know, but very established brand who were regarded as making the best pens in the world. Some have said they are the best pens you’ve never heard of. I tried to make a purchase and discovered there was no shop local to me selling them when I contacted Pelikan UK. They invited me to fill the void and sell them myself, which I accepted with the intent to set up a simple website to sell from at a slight discount from the RRP. Since then I have expanded greatly and I now have 4 million hits a year to my website.

All of the good things I read on the forums about Pelikan have proved to be true. They have great build quality, smooth nibs in a very wide range of widths to accommodate differing tastes and look timelessly elegant. I have a couple of pens which I used everyday; one is a 1940s M400 and the other is a larger M800 fountain pen which was made in 1987, both still write faultlessly.
How do they work?
Pelikan’s fountain pens have a very clever internal plunger which is used to fill the pen with ink. There is a knob at the end of the pen which is turned to move this plunger (which is geared, so the plunger moves more rotations than filler knob when it is turned. This system allows the pen to hold a very large amount of ink and means that the nib is ‘flushed’ every time the pen is refilled reducing the likelihood of it becoming blocked with old, dry ink.

Pelikan also design their nibs to be easily interchangeable, so that different sized nibs can be placed in simply by unscrewing the unit from the pen.

There is a lot of attention to detail in the pens, the clip, for example, on the Souveran and Traditional pens (Pelikan’s flagship ranges) is shaped like a Pelikan’s beak and they have a 4 start thread on their caps, so that it requires very little effort to screw the cap on and it makes an air tight seal so that the pen will start to write first time even when it has not been used for some weeks.
Could you tell me a little about their history?
Pelikan started off as a company in Hanover making inks. They have been making ink since 1832 but they started to make fountain pens around 80 years ago. They had the patent for the differentiated piston filling mechanism which I talked about earlier. The ‘100’ model was an instant success because of its quality and ease of refilling and so piston filling systems became the fountain pen standard with the manufacturers in Europe.

In 1960, Pelikan brought out the Pelikan children’s fountain pen which has been the standard school pen in Germany since, through several model generations. They have just brought out the 2010 model. I am led to believe that most school children in Germany has used a Pelikano to learn to write with since the 1960s and as such Pelikan is well known in Germany.
As well as their pens, I am also a fan of Pelikan’s inks – could you tell me about them?
As I said earlier, Pelikan have been making inks since 1838, so they have some experience of what makes a good ink for painting and use in pens. The current range is a succinct affair with a nice range of colours: black; blue; blue-black; turquoise; violet; red; green and brown. There is also a pink colour available, but only in ink cartridges, not bottles like the rest of the colours.
Whilst we only sell Pelikan pens, we do sell another make of ink – Noodler’s. The America chemist who is the designer has managed to produce an ink which reacts with an element of paper so that it irremovable when dry, he calls it bulletproof. It can be cleaned from other items, but not from paper. He has been running a competition with a $10,000 prize if the ink can be removed from a bank cheque so that it could be altered and the prize has yet to be won. He also produces a huge range of colours, although not all of them are ‘bullet proof’. The standard Bullet proof Black is a very good ink, a dark rich colour and a leaves a very smooth line.
What is your favourite pen?
My favour pen is probably the M800 which I use from 1987. It still writes very smoothly and refills without issue. It has a very nice weight due to the brass internal components and looks classically elegant. I do like the M900 Toledo fountain pen which is based on the M800, but with intricately engraved gold on the barrel, I have not yet treated myself to the upgrade.
Is there anything else new and exciting on the horizon?
Due to demand, Pelikan are going to produce an italic nib for the M800 as well as bringing out a special edition based on the M800 – the blue o’blue which is a blue marble design. This can be seen on our website on the new and forthcoming products sections. There is also a smaller, less expensive ‘demonstrator’ pen. This is transparent so that the internal mechanism can be seen working. This too, can be seen on the website at the same page.


***

And talking of Noodler’s – how cool is this!


Amazing

Big thanks to the very lovely Keris (whose book, ‘Della Says: OMG’ can be seen here) for reviewing Not So Perfect.

She says ‘My favourite was Two Old Women Birdwatching in My Garden, which just made me happy. In fact, many of the stories made me smile. And many of them just left me kind of stunned. I kept wanting to tweet @nikperring with “Your book is amazing.” ‘ which makes me happy, of course.

Full review here.

***

And I’ve been taking things easy over the past few days. Recharging a bit, getting back to reading and writing. Thinking about new projects and what’s next for me and, interestingly (but perhaps not so healthily) wondering where exactly I (or my work) fit into the literary/short story scene – I’m not too sure.

***

I’ve also watched a couple of films. 2001 – A Space Odyssey, and An Education. I loved the 2001 book when I read it and thought the film was superb. And An Education was just brilliant – I really loved it (and not only because the delightful and, of course, talented Carey Mulligan was in it). I’d highly recommend it – touching, great fun and real.

What Makes You Smile?

I was asked, earlier, if I’d mind mentioning The Science Museum’s latest project, Who Am I?, and, as I thought it was a really interesting project I agreed.

You can see all the details here, or on their Facebook page, and they’re on Twitter here.

So what do you need to do? Either leave a comment here, on my blog, or send them a tweet (@sciencemuseum – the hashtag is: #smwhoami) telling them what makes you smile, or, if you’d like, your earliest memory.

I’ll tell you what makes me smile: the smell of wood smoke.

Over to you!

One Of Those Days

So, today’s been my birthday. Twenty-nine. Wow. And I’m left wondering where all that time went, who took it, and what I’ve done and/or not done and what I should do now. I think I’m going to set some goals, or something.

And what I’ve been thinking about, more than anything, is that I’d rather be wiser than older, and before I’m too old to be wise. I know there’s a while yet, but this is the oldest I’ve been and it feels a little strange. I might have to grow up soon.

Aimee Bender Interview

So. How do you write an introduction for an interview you’ve done with someone who you regard as the best writer alive today?

Maybe you say something like, this person’s books are my favourite. Or, this person’s stories are the ones I’ve re-read the most often and enjoyed a huge amount every time. Maybe you say that reading this person’s books changed you as a writer, that they made you realise what can be done with the short form and that, actually, you CAN write the stories you wanted to write in the way you wanted to write them.

All of the above is true.

So, I guess, all that’s left to say is: here’s my interview with magnificent, the wondrous, the lovely and the brilliant Aimee Bender. Enjoy. I certainly did.


Welcome to the blog, Aimee. It’s a huge honour to have you here. To be honest, there are so many things I’d like to ask you I’m not too sure where to start. But I’ll go for here…
Thanks for having me, Nik.  It’s really a pleasure to talk to you about fiction!
You’ve just published your fifth book, ‘The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake’. Could you tell us a little about it? What’s it about? Who’s it for?
So, it’s a novel about a family, really, with some strange twists along the way.  It begins with Rose, a character who discovers she can taste people’s feelings, usually their unknown feelings, in the food they make, something she does not really want to deal with.  But then it starts to also be about the other members of the family, in particular her brother, and how his secrets mirror or stretch  hers.  I feel like it’s about all four members of the family, and how they impact one another.  But presented in a strange way, which is the only way I knew how to talk about it all.  Who’s it for? I guess people who are interested in reading about a family from a really skewed perspective?
How do you think it compares to your previous books?
It’s hard for me to tell.  It’s magical, but it’s also set in Los Angeles, grounded in more reality, too.  But the strange parts are really strange– though for me, they’re the way I’m trying to figure out how to talk about who we are, with ourselves, in families, on our own, all of it.  I feel happiest when people seem to go for both the real and the not-real—they go for the strangeness, and in the strangeness they find something familiar.  
I know I’ve said it many times before, but reading Willful Creatures changed me as a writer; after reading it I realised that I could write about what I wanted to write about in the way that I wanted to write – I wonder, was there ever a moment in your writing career where you said to yourself: Ah ha! Yes! I can do this! I know where I’m going now!

I’m so glad to hear that.  Really, really nice to hear. 

I have had that same feeling, often, when reading, and writing.  That, ‘really? This is allowed?’ feeling.  So it’s particularly gratifying to hear you felt that reading my book!  I had always felt very boxed in with what might make a story ‘work’—it had to be realistic, and about adult issues, and told in a straightforward way—I thought all that even while I was reading plays by Ionesco, and seeing dances by crazy modern dancers wearing bear costumes, and seeing paintings by Magritte.  It was shocking, and thrilling to me, to remember that fiction is expansive, and can do a lot more than we sometimes think.   In fact, I think fiction is one of the most flexible art forms there is—we can jump time/place/interior/exterior/build buildings/explode buildings/be a building/talk as a building/morph into a butterfly-building, in a paragraph.  Unbelievable!

In graduate school, I felt suddenly encouraged to write the more magical/stranger/more abstract work because my peers and teachers were wonderfully encouraging.  I didn’t expect that—I was turning in two stories at a time, because my stories were short, and one was designed to impress, and was realistic, and the second was usually one I liked more but didn’t think would ‘count’; I thought they’d prefer the ‘real’ story, but to my shock, they far preferred the one that felt more my own.  That was a huge gateway for me.
In terms of shape and, to some degree, content, your short stories regularly remind me of Fairy Tales – what would you say to that?
I love fairy tales—I teach a class on them at USC, in downtown L.A., the classics and some contemporary take-offs.  I read them a ton as a kid, and there’s something in their shape and style that is incredibly contagious and inviting.  Recently, I wrote a story for Kate Bernheimer (who does all sorts of great stuff with fairy tales) and my assignment was to retell a story of my choice, and I chose Perrault’s “Donkeyskin” [this was the only version I could find on the net – Nik] because I loved how in that the king’s daughter has three dresses made for her—one the color of sky, one the color of the sun, and one the color of the moon.  How that enchanted me as a kid! And still does!

Anyway, back to shape.  Calvino talks about the economy of fairy tales, and how they move fast without getting into much detail and we go into the movement happily.  I love that about reading them, and with contemporary versions, it’s fun for me to step into that form and then tweak it a little, see what happens next.  To use a familiar shape but hopefully in an unfamiliar way.  And I like the freedom of not naming, of the mythic words like king and castle, alongside our regular daily selves.  I really like just about everything about fairy tales.

And sticking with shape – how do you think the shapes of shorter stories compare to those of novels?
I’ve heard Rick Moody talk about this a bit—how with stories you can experiment more easily because there’s just a smaller commitment to what you’re doing.  And I can see that—I love JD Salinger’s Nine Stories so much because of the shapes of those stories.  They’re going along and then they end and suddenly as a reader I have to think about what just happened.  I didn’t see any of it coming.   Everything has changed.  So your question really hits at the heart of what I often love in stories: unusual shape.  Unexpected shapes.  One my greatest pleasures as a reader is going along in a story and not knowing where I’m going but wholly trusting the writing to take me somewhere new.
 
I also love strangely shaped novels—Wind-up Bird Chronicle, My Happy Life, by Lydia Millet, So Long, See you Tomorrow, by William Maxwell, which is so gently shaped but also unusual.  That’s a book that hinges on one quiet moment/memory and the way it has changed the narrator.
What do you think a story (of any length) needs to have for it to be great?
Nice question.  I think it needs to move a reader somewhere, to lift us up from wherever we are, and to move us, and therefore we might call it ‘moving’—really.  I don’t care if the character changes if there’s a classic beginning middle and end, if there’s denouement, if it’s happy or sad—what I want is to feel like I am sitting in a slightly different world than I was when I began.
What’s the Aimee Bender Writing Process?
Get up in the morning, check email, write for two hours.  Stop usually right around the minute—sometimes I’ll go a few minutes over but rarely more than that.  I like structure a lot—the more structured the writing time, the freer I feel to write whatever I want.
What do you think is the most difficult, or the scariest, thing about writing or being a writer?
Seems like being a writer runs a true parallel to being a person, and the same things are hard in both!  Pushing for growth, trying to explore, sitting with hard feelings, concentration, patience, faith in the process.
And the most joyous?
The discovery!  The discovery is almost always the best part, I think.  Finding something unexpected, in a sentence, or scene, or whole book.
Who is Aimee Bender? Can she tell us a secret?
I often take the long route just to avoid backtracking.
As well as being a wonderful author, you also teach writing. I’m curious: to what extent do you think that writing can be taught? And what tips would you give to someone hoping to be published?
I don’t think the core act can be taught, but I strongly believe that we can all get a little more open, and take down some of the obstacles that get in the way.  And a writing teacher can help with that.  Writing exercises help with that.  A sense of play can help a lot!  For someone hoping to be published—I think the act of writing is the main reason to do it.  If the person is valuing publication over writing itself, then it can be a real drag of a ride—the rewards are thinner there.  But if the writer wants to do the work, and work at the work, and push on the work, and open up the work, then I think at a certain point sending it out is an important step, too. 
What’s the best piece of writing advice that you’ve been given?
My friend Phil said something very key to me, when I was in workshop with him in graduate school.  He said, “just write what you feel like writing every day, and then the language will never be dutiful.”  It was so clear, once he said it, and yet I had spent day after day writing what I felt I should be writing, (not necessarily what I wanted to write) and his permission there was wonderfully freeing.
How do you think the short story’s doing at the moment? Healthy? Popular?
Okay.  People still don’t read as many stories as novels and that’s too bad.  But there are new collections still coming out regularly, and that is comforting!  Lots of good stories floating around.
What’s next for you?
Not sure!  Probably stories though I’m sniffing around some other ideas too.  I was just asked to try to do a picture book (the word part), which sounds incredibly fun.
Anything you’d like to add?
Thank you!!
***
Aimee Bender is the author of two collections of stories and two novels– the most recent is The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, called “oddly beautiful” by the Washington Post.  Her short fiction has been published in Granta, GQ, Harper’s, The Paris Review, Tin House and more, as well as heard on “This American Life”.  She lives in Los Angeles and teaches creative writing at USC.

Photo courtesy of Max S. Gerber

Foxy. And my 5 Favourite Stories

I’m delighted to be over at the fabulous Vulpes Libris today, talking about short stories and about my book. It’s, perhaps, the meatiest interview I’ve given and I thoroughly enjoyed doing it – even though Rosy’s questions, occasionally, made my brain hurt.

I’ve also listed my five favourite short stories. One of them’s the wonderful ‘Temp’ by the brilliant Mary Miller (I interviewed her here).

Also in there is ‘The Meeting’ by the super-brilliant Aimee Bender.

And talking of Aimee. You might be interested to know that, despite my borderline fanatical love of her work, she’s let me interview her. And let me tell you what she’s had to say is just brilliant. It’s a real gem and it’ll be up here shortly. I’m just glad I haven’t freaked her out. Too much.

A Whole Load of Amy Spurling Goodness

So, the last book that the wonderful Roast Books released was a pretty brilliant one. I know. I would say that because it’s mine.

But what have they followed it up with is the question?

And the answer is ‘My Soviet Kitchen’ which is described as Neo-ckicklit. With a darker side, a vodka twist and a generous slice of post-Soviet living.

Interesting stuff, no?

And when you buy it, you don’t just get a book. Oh no. It comes in a bag. And you also get an accompanying ‘Guide To Life – post soviet style’.

Once again Roast Books have produced something exceptional and beautiful.

So, to celebrate its release I’ve invited My Soviet Kitchen’s author, the lovely Amy Spurling here for a chat.

But you’re not only getting a chat. Oh no. You’re getting a recipe for Georgian kebabs. There’s a cake contest where you can win a signed copy of the book. AND a vodka challenge.

So sit back and enjoy:

THE INTERVIEW

Hello and welcome! It’s lovely to have you here. So, first of all, could you tell us a little about your debut novel, ‘My Soviet Kitchen’, published by the most wonderful Roast Books? Who’s it for? What’s it about?

Well thank you for having me. I guess the pink cover might be a bit of a giveaway! Although really I’d say the book is for anyone who likes finding out about other countries (namely Soviet bloc ones), laughing, cooking and the odd romance.
It’s about a PhD student who is researching the Colorado Potato Beetle in the former Soviet Union and gets led astray…mainly by vodka and two very different men.
Why did you write it?
Because I loved the places I visited (Russia, Uzbekistan and Georgia) and I thought they suffered from bad PR. Most people didn’t realise that there’s a lot more to the ex-USSR than snow and hard liquor. Most people also didn’t realise that the other 14 ex-Soviet republics are very different from Russia. When I was in Tbilisi (which has quite a Mediterranean lifestyle), people kept asking me: “How’s Russia?” 
You spent some time living in Russia – could you tell us a little about that and about what influence that had on you and on your writing of the book?
I went to Russia when I was 19 – an impressionable age, and I was duly impressed. By the way people helped and supported each other – I made friends for life. I was also impressed by the lack of pretention. And the lack of health warnings everywhere (i.e. on shampoo bottles) – in the ex-USSR they believe in Fate.
People in the former Soviet Union have often had very hard lives – but they still manage to rise above it, joke about life and have a good drink! So I have tried to show this in the book.
Food and vodka. How important are they to the story? (I should point out that each review copy of My Soviet Kitchen came with a miniature bottle of the latter).
Well Ivy does wake up with a hangover on the very first page. A lot of the novel’s action happens in the kitchen, so there is a certain amount of drinking and vodka snacking that goes on. And at the end of the book, a dish cooked for her wins her over…
As well as the vodka, a small ‘Companion Guide to Life’ comes with the book, containing, among many other things, recipes (I was rather taken with Nana’s Walnuty Aubergine Slices). Could you talk to us about that? How did it come about?
I thought that instead of bogging the story down with explanatory details of this unique place – I’d put it all in a glossary. And a picture is supposedly worth loads of words – so the illustrated lifestyle Companion guide was born!
I included a few recipes because I think you can learn a lot about any culture from its food, drink and way of drinking. It’s a shortcut to the place. So when you eat a sweet ‘n’ sour Uzbek pilaf or a Georgian kebab (see Kebab recipe) marinated in wine and cooked on an open fire – you’re halfway to the place itself… Drinking happens quite a lot in the former USSR – both as entertainment and escapism. And since there’s no Health and Safety, quantities can be robust!
‘My Soviet Kitchen’ has been described as ‘Neo-chicklit’ – how does that compare to traditional chicklit?
Perhaps it’s a little more grown-up and slightly darker. Instead of handbags, shoes and shopping there is more irony and culture (and in this particular example – there’s also a bit of entomology!). Still some romance, farce and humour though.
It’s also been described as having a ‘vodka twist’ – any sort of vodka in particular?
The precise vodka drunk in the book is Pshenichnaya. Which was the reasonably-priced preferred vodka in early-nineties Moscow amongst my friends… I remember that it had a little picture of a wheat field on the label. But here and now in London – I’d say try Russki Standart (see the Vodka Challenge).
Describe Russia in three words.
Spontaneous. Hedonistic. Intense.
When you’re not writing, you’re most likely to be found…
In a nice family-friendly historic pub, at a gallery, or in a vintage clothes shop.
What would you say is the biggest difference is between Soviet and Post-Soviet? Have the cakes changed?
Well I wasn’t actually in Russia during the Soviet period, but of course the biggest difference is now the ability to travel and more or less speak one’s mind. Though this hasn’t meant much to the poorest social strata – they lost a lot with Perestroika (savings, state benefits).
Have the cakes changed? Well the Napoleon hasn’t (see Cake Challenge), but there’s probably a wider choice now and perhaps more cream!
What book would you recommend to someone who enjoyed ‘My Soviet Kitchen’?
Good question. Probably A Russian Journal by John Steinbeck – because it’s hilarious and surreal. He went there in the 40s with Robert Capa taking the photos and, let’s just say, the interplay between the two of them and the country is priceless. Also, I’d have to say, Bridget Jones, because that too is funny. And it’s a clever satire on the time it was written.
What’s next for you?
A cake book, funnily enough. And something completely different – the true story of an Englishman killed in the former Soviet Union. This will be a memoir of me getting to know him after his death.
Anything you’d like to add?
Thanks for reading. And keep exploring other worlds!




A GEORGIAN RECIPE
*
This is a Georgian recipe from the Companion guide to My Soviet Kitchen. It is for kebabs in the open air – preferably cooked on an open fire.
GIORGI’S WHITE-WINE MTSWADI (KEBABS)
400g boneless lean pork (i.e. leg escalopes)
1 small onion
small glass of red or white table wine
salt and pepper
an open fire
bunch fresh parsley, coriander
pomegranate seeds
  1. Chop the meat into big chunks and bundle them into a large jar or airtight container. Now make the marinade – slice the onion into thin rings and add three-quarters of it to the jar, sprinkle salt and pepper over the meat and pour over the wine (Giorgi prefers to use white, but either colour will do).
  2.        Leave in a cool place for about three hours, then thread the meat pieces onto a long skewer. You will need an open fire, says Giorgi, otherwise, it’s not mtswadi. However, he does concede that some restaurants use a frying pan to roast the meat and juices instead.
  3.        When the meat is browned and slightly underdone it is ready – probably after five to ten minutes on a high heat (but check there’s no pink inside), unless you prefer your meat well-cooked.
  4.        Tease the meat chunks off their stick (or out of their frying pan) and tumble them onto a plate. Sprinkle with more raw chopped onion, fresh parsley and coriander leaves, and pomegranate seeds.
  5.        Eat with pitta and salad or chips. Wash down with the opposite colour of wine you used for the marinade (preferably red).


A CAKE COMPETITION (you could win a signed copy of the book)
TAKE THE NAPOLEON CAKE CHALLENGE!
This is a Mille-feuille cake – literally ‘thousand-leaf’. This means layers.  And this is where the ‘challenge’ part comes in (though this recipe is quite a few short of 1,000 layers). In Moscow, big trays of Napoleon were made for birthdays. I had the impression they took about two days to make.
This is a French creamy-layer cake that the Russians have made their own. The stunning Napoleon featured here has been made by Zhenya, a competent cook and also an engineer – the perfect combination for assembling this cake.
To take the Cake Challenge check out Zhenya’s recipe below and then make your own! Send a photo of your creation, plus a short commentary on the making process, to [email protected] by Wednesday 18th August.
The best wins a Most Perfect Napoleon Prize – a signed copy of My Soviet Kitchen and a cake recipe book of your choice from Amazon!
**
NAPOLEON RECIPE
For the pastry:
1 egg
250g butter or marg
540g flour
juice of 1/2 lemon
1/2 teaspoon salt
125 ml water (cold)

For the cream:
300g of butter
405g tin condensed milk


  • Mix flour and fat with fingertips, till they form breadcrumbs. 
  •  Mix the water, egg, lemon juice and salt.
  •  Pour into the breadcrumbs and mix again.
  •  Form the mixture into 7 balls and leave in the fridge for an hour.
  •  Flatten every ball into a thin circle (or square or rectangle, depending on what shape you want your finished cake to be).
  • Bake at 250 C for 20 minutes – until your shapes are lightly browned.
  •  Once they are cooked, take the least perfect circle, crumble it and set aside.

  •  Spread the tops and sides of the other 6 with your cream mix and assemble in layers.

  •  Sprinkle the top and sides of the cake with the crumbs you set aside, and leave to stand for half an hour or so.
  •  Serve with tea or liqueur.

Good luck and enjoy!



THE VODKA CHALLENGE 

***
RUSSIAN VODKA COCKTAIL
Here is a Russian cocktail, taken from the Companion guide to My Soviet Kitchen:
BELI MEDVED’ (lit. polar bear) – is champagne and vodka mixed. Particularly popular and traditional on New Year’s Eve; the combination of spirit and bubbles is lethal, since the latter go straight to your head whilst the former ensures the effect is long-lasting. Patsy and Edwina also drank this cocktail in Absolutely Fabulous, they called it “Stoli Bolli”.
HOW DO YOU DRINK YOURS?
Usually, however, Russians prefer to drink their vodka neat. So fill up your shot glass, then cut up some vodka snacks – gherkins, salami and black bread. Now drain your glass and chase with a snack.
      
I would recommend a Petersburg vodka – ‘Russki Standart’ (Russian Standard) as a good one to drink neat because it has a smooth flavour. However, a slightly less hardcore way to drink it is to fill up a tall glass with ice, slide in half-moons of lemon and lime and top with a measure of RS. Swill the glass until the chill has permeated the vodka and drink!
TAKE THE VODKA CHALLENGE
Tell us what your favourite vodka is and why. Then tell us how you like to drink it.
The best entries will be published on this site and on amyspurling.com 
***
Amy Spurling lived for 10 years in the ex-USSR as a writer and journalist. She likes kitchen tables and wine everywhere.


***

* The kebab photo is courtesy of David Jennings
** Cake pics by Andriy Bychay
*** Vodka art by Ivy Stone

Congratulations and Winners and The Universe and Stuff

Big congratulations to Clare Wallais, who won the signed copy of Andy Duggan’s Scars Beneath the Skin.

And to Valerie O’Riordan, for winning this year’s Bristol Short Story Prize.

All pretty wonderful stuff, I’d say. It’s good to see good people getting what they deserve.

***

As for me, I’ve had a weekend of not doing all that much. I watched some documentaries on the universe. My brain was quite muddled by it all at first and then started to kind of understand things and ended up being excited at the things it almost understood.

And I watched a couple of documentaries on the SAS. Which was an odd thing for me, not being a fan of war and suchlike. But it, again, was fascinating and the people on it likeable. Just shows that the old cliché of books and covers can be very true. And also that behind everything I might approve or disapprove of, there are people.

***

Err, what else? I’m rather happy with the way The Story Corrective has started – I’ve really enjoyed helping other people with their stories – and shall be going back to doing just that just as soon as I’ve put this post up.

I have also set myself some writing goals. More of that later, though.

Oh yeah. And I’m impossibly excited about an interview that’ll be up on the blog soon. Seriously. You have no idea.

Mary Miller Interview

I read ‘Big World’ around about this time last year and I utterly loved it. It’s up there with my favourite short story collections of all time. It’s one of The Incredibles. When I listed, in an interview for the terrific Vulpes Libris, my five favourite short stories ‘Temp’ from ‘Big World’ was one of the first that came to mind. (The interview’s due to go live on Friday, so you’ll have to wait until then to see the others.) It’s that good. And look – it’s little, like mine!

And so I am utterly delighted to welcome ‘Big World’s’ author, the lovely Mary Miller here for a chat. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!


Welcome to the blog, Mary. It is a huge pleasure to have you here. I utterly loved ‘Big World’ and have even mentioned that one of its stories, ‘Temp’ made in onto the list of my five favourites from living writers. So yes, it’s a real pleasure to have you here.

Yay!  Thanks for having me, Nik.

So, on to the questions! First of all, could you tell us a little about ‘Big World’ – how would you describe it and who would you say it’s for?

I’m terrible at these sorts of descriptions.  I love what Sean Lovelace wrote on his blog (his blog is amazing, btw): “The characters would not bowl. They would watch others, disinterestedly, like observing flies on a windowpane. They would sip from those little crinkly bowling alley cups…they would watch, watch so closely (as in exactly) the pain of others (that they don’t [can’t?] express), that pain a moiling presence, or a caught truth, like hangover sweat seeping through pores…” 

I thought the book would mainly be for girls like me: vain, insecure women who have never stopped thinking of themselves as girls, women who would fail a personality test at Applebee’s (I was proud).  But a lot of men seem to like it, too, which has been nice.    

How would you describe a typical Mary Miller story?

I seem to be best at disintegrating male/female relationship stories.  These are always my best stories.  People ask me to write stories set in the year 2050, funny letters to the editor, etc., but I can’t do these sorts of things well.  I wish I could.

How and why did you start writing?

I was 27, lonely, and unemployed.  It was a way to be someone other than who I was.  It was awesome, actually.  I started writing at a time in my life when I didn’t feel like I had much of anything and it made me feel good about myself, gave me a sense of purpose. 

As a child, were you a big reader? What kinds of books did you like and what sort of stories were you exposed to at school?

I read a lot of Stephen King (I loved The Talisman, which he co-authored with Peter Straub).  And I’d read what I was assigned in school, but I didn’t like any of it.  We were pretty much just memorizing Frost poems, stuff like that.  It was terrible.  I hope schools are doing better jobs of making children into readers now, but somehow I doubt it. 

Was there ever a moment in your writing career where you thought: Yes, I can do this ?

Sure.  There’s a lot of ‘Yes, I can do this,’ but then it can quickly turn into ‘There’s no way I can do this.’  When I sit down to write, I can feel both of these things in a span of ten minutes.  It’s really hard.  There’s a lot of time and energy put into writing hundreds and hundreds of pages of stories that go nowhere and failed novels. 

Your stories are mostly realist. Is that a conscious decision or is that the kind of thing that comes naturally?

I just started reading Blake Butler’s Scorch Atlas (I’m late, I know), and I’m so impressed with what he’s able to do.  It’s like he has an actual imagination—an ability to see beyond what’s there and make it real.  I don’t have this ability.  I write about the things I know and see and hear and feel.
   
As I mentioned, ‘Temp’ is one of my all time favourite stories. Could you tell us a little about how it came about? The story behind the story?

Thanks!  That’s really cool, especially since this story is never mentioned as one of the “best” in the collection.  I worked as a temp at a financial office one summer and I was a disaster.  I really would disconnect everyone and jam copiers and give myself paper cuts.  There was also a guy like Jason, who was a bouncer at night.  I didn’t go home with him, though.  And my mother is still alive and I never dated a bad drunk (only medium-bad drunks).  Everything is just pieces of things I’d gathered, some fiction, some non-fiction, and put together. 

My favorite paragraph in the story is the one that starts: “The two of us together can’t even keep small animals alive.”  I remember the dog at the pound that was “old and mangy with a bad hip,” how he looked at me.  I still think about that dog.  

What’s your writing process?

I write as much as possible, which isn’t that terribly much, usually in bed.  I’m trying to write faster, just get things down, and then go back and edit.  The way I’m used to writing, trying to perfect a sentence before moving on, doesn’t work well for longer pieces.

Who is Mary Miller?

A perfectionist, too judgmental, a Mississippian.  Who knows?  I like myself more and more every day. 

What do you think a story needs for it to be great?

Great stories are inexplicable.  There’s no model, no explanation for how to write them.

And advice to any aspiring short story writers who may be reading this?

Read short stories, poetry, novels, everything you can get your hands on.  Don’t try to start at the top.  I know people who have never published who will only send to the very top tier magazines—this is preposterous.  If you consider networking a dirty word, think of it as supporting and being nice to the people you like.  Don’t ever burn bridges because you will always be forced to repair them (it’s a small community).  Support independent bookstores and presses.  Publish online.  When bad things happen to you, remember that at least you can turn your misery and humiliation into a story.  Non-writers, the sorry bastards, don’t have this pleasure.

If you could recommend one book to me, what would it be?

City of Boys by Beth Nugent.  I would like for everyone to read this collection.

What’s next for you?

I’m moving to Austin soon.  I have three years to write and the support the Michener Center at the University of Texas.  If I don’t make something of this, please track me down and knock me over the head.   

Mary Miller is the author of a story collection, Big World, and a chapbook of flash fiction, Less Shiny.  Her stories have appeared in McSweeney’s Quarterly, Black Clock, Indiana Review, Oxford American, Mississippi Review, and others. 
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And, finally, you can buy Big World here. And you should, you know. Because it’s excellent.