L. Schick Interview

A couple of weeks ago I read (as mentioned here) and loved Lizard by L Schick.I contacted her immediately to see if she’d like to be interviewed here and I was thrilled that she said yes. And I’m even more thrilled to be able to show you all what she had to say…


Welcome to the blog, Leonore – I’m delighted to have you here.

It’s a comfortable blog, I’m delighted to be here, I might stay.

 

I absolutely loved your book, Lizard. Can you tell us a little about it?

Thank-you. This makes me very happy. It is a novella – which by Wikipedia’s standards is a story under 50 000 words. It is about a metamorphosis, but never a complete one. 

 

How did it come about?

In the summer holidays in 2004, I decided to read all of Kafka’s novels (but I’ve never read Amerika) and a few of his short stories, so it started there. In literature class, we studied the Trial and I had the idea (specifically in class) of some-one with a disability – and amputated calf – and how they go about with it. I forgot about this and got on with my exams. Two years later I thought of a story about a woman with blue nipples. A couple of month later I puked out the first few thousand words or so of a first draft of Lizard and read it out at a Failed Novelist meeting.

 

How long did it take you to write?

The bulk of the first draft took four months in one block, with a three week hiatus. Then the last bit, and the next few versions, took a year. Then I did intensive editing before sending it off to the Roastbooks competition, with a schedule and help from friends. Once it was into the real-life-proper-editing-process I got really helpful comments and tracked edits from Roastbooks, and we spent time going through it over and over.

 

Of all the creatures in the world, why did you find lizards so appealing and/or right for Eliza’s story?

It came from a curious conviction from the first night of writing Lizard – that all reptiles represented in art were somehow an underhand way of pointing out a “sexual factor,” but I’ve looked this up since, when I went through my lizard-stalking phase, and only found slight confirmation in the direction of regeneration and reproduction, but nothing decisive. Regardless, I still feel that lizards are alien, rarely cute and unappealing, similar to how Eliza sees adults, and an adult version of herself, until she settles at the end. On another note, lizards are also cool because it looks like they have superpowers. I am unsure whether this applies to adults.

 

Who is Leonore Schick?

The person who typed this comma, I think.

 

What would you do if you discovered, one morning, that your calf, like Eliza’s, had become scaly like a lizard’s?

Shake and tremble. Wear thick trousers. Find a payphone or a mobile. Call my parents. Visit their doctors and dermatologists with their French health insurance cards. Paris or Bayonne depending on current location and proximity. 

Eliza acted stupidly.

 

You’re published by Roast Books, can you tell us a little about them?

They are a little publishing company, new, idealistic and realistic at the same time. On top of the information on their website, I can add that they taught me lots through helping me edit Lizard. Faye, the lead Roast booker, gave really clear guidelines but didn’t want me to change anything I didn’t want to change. I felt totally in control but also really needed their help. They were really honest about which bits were shaky and which bits they liked. It is a very lucky coincidence that I got published, and by them.

 

And a little about your writing process?

Lizard was written on computer, but I’m trying to go back to handwriting because traveling with a laptop is dodgy and tricky. I wrote it in order, writing only what was fun to write. Eliza has quirks and fillers so once I’d found those it was easier to get back to her way of speaking. There were very sharp changes in location and her fillers and attitudes change accordingly. If there’s a process, it’s write-write-write-write, edit edit edit edit edit. And then I wrote the last chapter, and then edit, edit, edit, edit… I tend to write “fragments” and group them. I wrote a book at school with a friend, and reused the method my friend and I had come up with for that – writing down a skeleton of what will happen in each chapter, and the skeleton is very vague at first, and it is completed when ideas come. Some days are only for the skeleton, some days I spent only looking at etymologies of words but most days were spent writing and once that was done, editing.

 

You’re a member of a writing group, Failed Novelistscan you talk to us about that? Did being a member of that influence your process?

Yes. What is great about our writing group is that there is no teacher or predominant voice – we’ll listen to everything and everyone who comes along, and give as much feedback as we can, all together, even if it is the first time. Everyone writes, everyone criticises. We’ve done some collaborative work, like The Amazing Failed Novel that we printed in book form, and there was a special support group for NaNoWriMo partakers. A non-FNov friend told me people often regret their first publication, but all the feedback and what learnt whilst editing means that I can’t. Funnily enough, it’s not in a very FNov spirit to say that. The Failed Novelists is basically a support group that encourages writing.

I went to a meeting in the first term of second year of University and by the third term I’d started writing Lizard. I think I’d forgotten that writing was something I did. Being around other people getting excited by a particular word or even a word count really motivated me. Lizard may have been based on a Failed Novelist suggestion, but I may have started writing it before hand and suggested it – I actually cannot remember, and I’ve asked the others, and they don’t know either. As for the process – it gave a deadline – the following Sunday at 2pm. It’s nice to turn up with something new. I remember the first few thousand words of Lizard being read out, and a couple of people wanted to hear more – it was really important to feel like I wasn’t doing something for nothing. I read out whole chapters on a Failed Novelists’ retreat week and got helpful feedback. And then when it came around to editing it before sending it to the Roastbooks competition, I made a communal FNov email, like a virtual support group, and they’d help me tweak bits and told me which bits were unclear. 

I was told about the competition by Selena, a sort of FNov founder. It’s pretty safe to say that Lizard wouldn’t have been written, let alone published, if the Oxford Art Movement stall (that I was manning) hadn’t been the Failed Novelist’s neighbour at the Fresher’s fair at the beginning of my second year. 

 

Did you have a reader in mind when you wrote Lizard. If you did, what do they look like?

It varied, but the first person who read it was my sister, and when she did, I felt like it had been published. This makes me think I wrote it for her.

 

Which authors do you admire the most?

This is tough. I’m not sure what admiration entails. I know loads of writers from Failed Novelists, many of them are amazing. I’m just reeling out of a Coetzee phase – I like how he doesn’t need a plot because his style is so perfect. Some of my favourite books used to be the Just William series, but I don’t know if I admired the author. I like Angela Carter’s Wise Children, and most of Kafka.

 

What advice would you give to any, so far, unpublished writers reading this?

From the one thing I’ve had published I’d say, join a writing group and/or keep an eye out for competitions, they are often put in literary magazines, but are also all over the internet. 

 

Tell us a secret.

My sisters and I used to have this doll called Micheline, she had red hair like Eliza, and she was really chubby. She would giggle and sometimes she’d say, “can I tell you a secret? My favourite ice-cream is strawberry.” According to Micheline, that qualifies as “a secret”. 

Thus.

Here is my secret:

My favourite ice-cream is not strawberry flavour.

 

When you’re not writing, where are you most likely to be found?

I’m very hard to find. I am without a fixed home – not exactly homeless, but I haven’t lived anywhere for more than three weeks, maximum, since I finished University in June. But I like films and music and graphic novels.


What’s next for you?

I wish I knew.


Anything you’d like to add?

Thank-you-thank-you-thank-you for letting me write my first ever interview, ever, in my life, it has been tricky and fun.

 

L. Schick: DOB, January 1988 / British citizen / POB, Paris – I’ve lived in Kent and Paris and Oxford and Belgium, I’m a film junky and in my second year of trying to learn to play the guitar. I’ve just finished University, so I’m B.A for now.

***

Thanks so much for coming on, Leonore, and for such interesting answers. You have been a wonderful guest. I’m looking forward to reading whatever you publish next.

A Great Little Read


I decided to read Lizard, by L. Schick (her debut) after reading what Scott Pack and Caroline Smailes had to say about it, (especially about it apparently winking towards Kafka) and I’m glad I did. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

In short, it’s about a young girl, Eliza Young, who discovers one day that her leg has developed scales, yes, the sort lizards have. She goes to work as an au pair for a family on a sunny island where she come across a lizard civilisation. The story is about Eliza’s struggle to understand and cope with her new leg, this new civilisation and, ultimately, herself.
Now, as a novella, it isn’t perfect. It is, in parts, a little confusing – but I must say that I think that’s a big part of its charm in that it reflects Eliza’s own confusion – so it’s a small critisism. What I liked most about it though was the voice: new, fresh, intelligent, convincing and not at all self conscious. And it’s fun.
In short: I loved it, and I’d have happily spent a good deal more time in the company of Eliza. (I gave it 5 stars over at http://www.goodreads.com/.)
I think L Schick is definitely one to watch and I’m excited to read more of her stuff.

Not Funny Ha Ha

It’s been a funny few days, and not the sort of funny that makes a person laugh. A couple of, shall we say, crappy things have happened which, though they’ve been utterly non-writing related, have knocked me sideways to a point where precious little writing has been done. And that’s frustrated me because I’ve wanted to get lots of writing done. Grumble, grumble. But the number of lovely people who’ve been lovely to me far outnumbers those who aren’t so great and haven’t been so nice, which I suppose is something. Thank you, lovely people.

But have I been sat at home being sad and grumpy? Not all the time, no. I have started jogging. Not very far. And aching limbs (and probably looking like the least likely jogger in the world) aside it’s been fun and a relief – it’s been well over a year since I’d been able to do anything like that level of physical activity due to a nasty infection I had * which has taken, clearly, an age to get over.
I have also been doing a fair amount of reading – more on that soon because one of the books I’ve read I want to dedicate a post to because I loved it. THIS is for the more curious among you.
Right. I am going to try to write something now. Wish me luck.
*and no, the ‘beloved’ as mentioned in that post in not my beloved any longer. Nice to be reminded of what was. Hmm. 

Tim Atkinson Virtual Tour

It’s my turn, and pleasure, to be the host of today’s leg of Tim Atkinson’s virtual tour.




So, Writing Therapy, who’s it for and what’s it about?

Writing Therapy explores the use of language and the way it helps to shape both memory and experience. There’s something in it for almost everyone – authors, teenagers, readers looking for something just a little bit different – the lot. It explores the relationship between fiction and reality, and the extent to which we’re all the authors of our destiny.

On a narrative level it’s about a girl who’s read so many novels she becomes convinced that she’s a character in one. So it’s a book within a book, two books for the price of one! And that’s part of the fun. Because – just as many writing courses refer to great works of literature, so does the central character. She takes her cue from the books she’s read and – in taking them apart – constructs a novel of her own.

But Frances Nolan is a patient in a psychiatric hospital, too. So writing a book is her therapy as well. Her nurse takes the role of tutor, I suppose: feeding her exercises, getting her creative juices flowing and developing her writing.

 

 

Why did you write it?

Two things got me started: one, teenage mental illness and the stigma attached. A book in with a protagonist who struggles with depression and triumphs (writing a novel) might help someone, somewhere (so I thought). 10% of the book’s royalties are going to the charity Young Minds (www.youngminds.org.uk) though, so someone’s benefitting. Second, the way we all (especially bloggers, twitterers and so on) make fiction of our lives, if only in the editing. Where does fact end and fiction begin? That’s the central question in Writing Therapy.

 

A third element – which emerged powerfully as I started writing – was a desire to do something different. What’s the point of writing something someone else might easily have written (and written better)? Rightly or wrongly, I really wanted to do something just that little bit different. A book within a book, a book about how books get written, meta-fiction, seemed an ideal vehicle for taking things apart and putting them together in a slightly different way.

 

What do you hope readers will get from it?

Judging by the responses I’ve been getting, the book seems to work on at least three different levels. I’m fascinated by the way we all, to some extent, actively create the story of our own lives, shaping both the outside world’s and our own view of ourselves. That’s a theme I wanted to examine closely. Authors have referred to it as a ‘self-help book for writers cunningly disguised as an innocent novel’, while to a teenage audience it deals, as Richard Coles puts it, with ‘growing up and breaking down’ and offers some insights into teenage mental illness. In this respect the book deals with issues I’d experienced first-hand as a teacher. In one of my roles I was responsible for pupil welfare and I was seeing a rise each year in the number of pupils suffering mental and emotional trauma. Young Minds exists specifically to support young people suffering from mental health-related problems. It also supports parents and other adults involved in the care of such young people. As a teacher I’d found Young Minds invaluable; as a writer I’m keen to do anything I can to help.

 

How long did it take you to write?

Writing Therapy too the best part of five years from first ideas to completed manuscript. It was very stop-start at the beginning, because I knew what I wanted to do but didn’t have the confidence or skill to see it through. I actually signed up for a Creative Writing course with the OU mid-way through the novel. That helped enormously.

 

Did you use a fountain pen to write it?

Almost everything was written either direct onto computer or else in pencil on a plain white sheet of paper. Being left-handed I find fountain-pens very hard to use, although I do own a very fine (and under-used) Mont Blanc!

Tell us something about you.

I cut my teeth writing for the Yorkshire Post as a contributor on the old ‘This World of Ours’ column. I’ve also written stuff for ‘The Dalesman’ and ‘Railway Modeller’ magazines, and the Times Educational Supplement.

I was a teacher for over twenty years, teaching RE, history and geography in secondary schools in the north of England. For the last five years I was Assistant Headteacher at Boston Grammar School, Lincolnshire. I left in July 2008 to be a stay-at-home dad to my young son, Charlie, and to write full-time. My progress changing nappies and keeping a toddler entertained is being recorded on the blog, http://bringingupcharlie.blogspot.com.


What’s next for you?

I’ve recently completed a two-book commission for Wayland (part of the Hachette children’s group) as part of their ‘Countries of the World’ series. I’ve written their titles on India and the UK, both published next year.

Two further novels – Marriage Guidance, and Set in Stone – are slowly nearing completion. The former follows a group of thirty-something’s on the threshold of tying the knot adjusting to the demands of monogamy in the twenty-first century; the latter is a book for young adult readers and concerns a boy-runaway, searching for his family.

Future plans include a senior school philosophy manual, and a book revealing the pagan origins of many Christian festivals and rituals. 


Anything you’d like to add?

Only my thanks, Nik, for hosting this leg of the blog book-tour!

 

 



Links to Things I Agree With

The ever lovely and clever Caroline Smailes talking about Twitter here.

The also lovely and talented Annie Clarkson talking about Waterstone’s and short fiction here.
And the also, also lovely and talented Sara Crowley, taking about Olive Kitteridge here. (I think this is my favourite because she says I’m right.)
***
And did anyone else stay up late to watch the shooting starts over the past couple of nights? I did. Last night. And what I saw, while not spectacular, was pretty special and rather lovely. Seeing the unnusual’s brilliant, I reckon.

Me, reading

http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=6087742&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1

Nik Perring, reading from Nik Perring on Vimeo.

I met Paul and Claire last night (they are a seriously good team) to have a look at and edit (or watch them edit) the video Claire shot of the launch night of the photo book back in May. Thank you both, very much.

And here’s me reading my contribution to the book (a piece of flash fiction inspired by the projected photograph).