Adelaide Literary Magazine No. 32. January 2020

Love Story Revista Literária Adelaide

Father’s penis Moonchild
long and low
knew just what to do Alone, a silent moonchild stepped
On darkened paths through wooded fog,
when lightning struck Away from kin at fire’s breast,
my mother’s eyes
and turned her ashes blue Neither imprinted nor impressed.
Away, to where the night is long,
He never wavered Alone, a silent moonchild stepped.
in his charge
grinding through the slog Bathed in silvery light he slept,
Beyond familial dialogue.
but spared a laugh Away from kin at fire’s breast,
like tinkling glass
for fragile sparrow’s song Beneath a nourishing moon, he rests
In fertile dreams, where soul grows strong.
He raised a troop Alone, a silent moonchild stepped
on barren soil
fledged us one by one through inner worlds, framed by death,
Where love becomes a monologue.
then shoved us off Away from kin at fire’s breast,
into a war
his penis had begun a child’s choices manifest,
a man discerns right from wrong.
And no one knew Alone, a silent moonchild stepped
among our ranks Away from kin at fire’s breast.
what joys we could enlist

We flew from childhood
armed and dead and longing
to be kissed

Mother’s trembling
feather love
fleeting
blue and blurred

Father’s penis looks at her
She moves just like a bird

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About the Author

Alfred Fournier is an entomologist in Phoenix, Arizona.
He is a graduate of Purdue and George Washington
Universities. His work has appeared in The New Verse News,
Cathexis Northwest Press and DeLuge, and is forthcoming
in Plainsongs, The Main Street Rag and elsewhere.

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OBSESSIONS

by R. Bremner

Too many obsessions for one life to carry On a midsummer Thursday
will cause a back to droop eventually in New York, July 17, 2014
Good karma like good coffee
is often hard to find When I tell you I can’t breathe
when soaked in the relative liquor of the mind it means that I can’t breathe.
Let it go, let it go, let it go, let it go
Your best chance for a life was lost long ago I don’t mean that because it’s hot and humid,
Let the play go on without changing the script the air is lousy to breathe.
so you can see it is dead where I don’t mean, “Ha ha, fooled
it lays in the crypt ya! I really can breathe!”
I don’t mean I want you to step back
Maybe one obsession will shock and bear fruit and give me my private space.
and bring with it fruit flies to help it take root
So straighten your back and walk like a man I mean I can’t breathe. As in, I’m
Calm and patience will formulate a plan gonna die soon unless I get air.
You may now snicker at the lives that you lost;
you know that you simply I know I’m a huge guy, twice your
couldn’t meet the cost weight, and towering over you.
I know I’ve done time for lots of petty crimes.
I know maybe I scare the hell out of
you with my girth and my rep.
I know I shouldn’t a been selling
loosies – it’s against the law.

But despite all that, there’s
something you forgot.

You forgot that I’m a person.
That’s right, a human being.

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To throw me down to the ground because I’m Tigers
selling cigarettes, does that sound right to you?
And to push my face into concrete, when we crash the night,
I was already down, did that make spit fire into days!
you feel proud and strong? Get that we crush shrunken heads
big black motherf***** down? under our oversize paws!
Our lives are to be lived and loved,
Would you do that to a relative who drawn and quartered,
was selling fireworks, or booze? inhaled and swallowed!
Would you do that to a friend? We tigers lie with the lambs
if only to demonstrate
So why me? the power of will,
the might of sustenance,
And why didn’t you believe me the thrill of knowledge
when I said I couldn’t breathe? that all of us can be,
Why no artificial respiration? Afraid my in peace, despite the otherness
mouth would poison you? Or disgust you? within our beings.

Y’all said I died later of a heart attack. We are the tigers,
But I know different. When I couldn’t We claw through opulent jungles
breathe, and you did nothing to outside obsidian palaces
help, that was the end right there. that segregate great souls
from the great unwashed.
Do you regret anything? Did Our teeth bring justice and freedom
you learn anything? to the one and the many
our jaws are the scourge of
What happens when the next big the winner, avenger of
black guy is out on the street doing the loser.
some victimless “crime”?
What then? Paint me in blacks and
(for Eric Garner) dark greens,
spill me
from corrupt heights
where my
sociopathic style
is bound only
by your fleeing
smile.
Surprise me with
the color of the sun
which burns so black

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in this darkest night, Revista Literária Adelaide
so quiet in this About the Author
tomblike life
I have chosen
to lead
from now until
I cannot guess.

Grinding eyes in a rubber room R. Bremner writes of incense, peppermints,
and the color of time. in such venues as
A job. International Poetry Review, Paterson Literary
A job that is a life that is a job Review, Passaic Review, Poets Online, Jerry
pushes its unclean hand Jazz, and Sigmund Freud in Poetry. Ron’s
up through your rectum and rips out recent books are Hungry Words (Alien
pieces and particles of you, casting Buddha Press), Absurd (Absurdist poetry
them to the wind. from Cajun Mutt Press), Pencil Sketches (Clare
A job that slices your head at the neck Songbirds), and Ektomorphic (ekphrasis, from
then defecates down the hole it’s made, Presa Press). He has thrice won Honorable
then reaches down to pull your hiding Mention in the Allen Ginsberg awards, and
soul loose from its moorings he invites you to visit his Instagram poetry at
straight up and out the headhole beat_poet1.
where it can spit on and suckle
all of the
creativity, chew it and swallow.
A job that ridicules the mess of a man
it has made, and waggles the waffling
corpse for co-workers to chuckle at.

But behind their shield of laughter
is a terribly itching fear that no
scratching can ease, the fear that
the same fate has already
claimed their bodies, with their souls
already retched out in the rotting
sun.

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ARMS
OUTSTRETCHED

by John Tustin

Arms Outstretched Gone, so gone.

Me with But I had waited for you,
Arms outstretched
As if on the cross I had waited for you for
But really waiting So very long!
For you to come
And be enveloped You, who is all the forests of the world.
And protected and You, whose tears are mixed in the rain
Encumbered by me. As the rain falls upon my sullen windows.
You, whose heart is broken upon this
I have been waiting for you. Death strewn copper-colored landscape.
You, for whom I waited below the clouds
I have been waiting for you With my arms outstretched as if I was
For so very long! Hanging from a rugged cross on Golgotha.

Stepping You, for whom I had waited so long.
Out of shadows You, for whom I had waited so long!
It was you, love, So long
You who came to For you.
My arms and you
Who kissed me O Father!
And you who it Why has she forsaken me?
Was to accept
My embrace and 204
You who is now

Revista Literária Adelaide
From Friday Night Into Saturday Morning

Late Friday evening and the air is thick My weight forcing her to me.
As smoke. “I love you, too, kid,” says she,
Valerie sitting across from me Her voice soft, unsteady, resigned
In the kitchen. But certain.
Valerie putting the beer bottle The words breathing on me,
To her lips. Lofting over me in purple arcs,
Valerie’s voice fluttering My hands on her hands,
Around my ears. I try to go deeper.
I reach out for her
And she holds me We move faster,
And we stand like that. We go harder,
There is a determination to it.
Valerie’s mouth on mine. Valerie on top,
Valerie’s hands I’m all the way in,
And Valerie’s sighs. It’s just enough.
Valerie on my bed. There lies a comingled pool on me,
Valerie removing my shirt. Beneath me.
Valerie beneath me, the heat of her,
The warmth of her body, It’s Saturday morning
My fingers along the tabernacle entrance And we breathe together,
Of her exposed thighs. The room in sticky haze.
Valerie’s moan, Attached at the waist and the thigh,
Valerie’s tremble. Attached at the mouth,
No colors, no voices, just small movement,
Valerie’s hand Our hands exploring the other
And Valerie’s mouth As the light of the morning
Between me, Tries to battle its way into
Down the center of me. This wet and supple space
Valerie’s spit But cannot
And Valerie’s tears. Penetrate
In her mouth, in her hands, Just yet.
Her subtle magic.

“Valerie, Valerie,”
I whisper it. I kiss her ear.
My teeth love the flesh of her neck.
“I love you, I love you,
All you, only you.”
I move slowly inside her,

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Sorrow Adelaide Literary Magazine

i put my sorrow that it festers,
underneath your pillow that it rots,
and it poisoned you with the sadism,
as you slept. with the poetry,

chilled little dagger with the madness,
burrowing like an earwig the waves
into every orifice of the ocean
of the head and the weakness

except the mouth. of the will.
your tongue The soupcon
was already paralyzed of tenderness.
by my silence. and

i put my sorrow the touch of
in a box regret,
like buried treasure for faithlessness,
for you to find. for transgressions

you found it. real or fantastic.
it killed us i could’ve been better
with its incapacitating and i should’ve
numbness. been better

i found you but the sorrow
gasping for breath was like the roots
in the snow and debris of an omnipresent weed.
of our dim twilight. choking.

i stepped over you self-aggrandizing.
with a hackneyed self-flagellating.
glance self-important.
backward. selfish.

i put my sorrow the night is halfway
in my own skull over and
when you were gone. the porch light
and it is there is flickering down,

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but if you knock Revista Literária Adelaide
anyway, despite all,
i will Swarm
answer.
Here come the Mullahs
yes, Here come the Mystics
of course. Here come the Pundits
of course Here come the Priests
i will. With their papers
With their potions
i put the sorrow With the words crooked
in a place In the corners of their mouths
so deep,
so far Here comes the Armada
To bottleneck the harbor
that Here comes the Panzer division
maybe To bury you in the sand
it won’t Here come the soldiers
this time. To swarm over you
Like ants on a dead locust

Here come the vultures
Here come the carrion-crawlers
Here come the beetles
To bury their eggs
In your desiccating flesh
Here come the earwigs
To bury their pincers
In your desiccating brain

Here come the Commanders
Here come the Colonels
Here come the Premiers
To bury their bullets

Here come the Purveyors
Here come the Provisioners
Here come the parasites
To inhabit you
To exude from you
To buy you
To sell you
To rent you

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Thanks?

Here come the mothers I’m reading the book of Pablo Neruda poetry
The fathers, the husbands She sent me a few years ago
The wives And I’m listening to music.
To tell you how you are wrong The book sits open like the Bible used to
To break you Sit beside me
As they fix you And I read it with the same slow
and deliberate reverence.
Here come the poets
Here come the artists I read a few lines like taking hits from a hookah.
Here come the playwrights I write a poem.
With their papers I read more lines,
With their potions I write more poems.
With the words flailing falling helplessly The book is a well where I am replenished.
From their fingers and tongues The music plays and I write, oblivious to time
Or the position of the sun.

I write my Psalms, my Sutras,
My paeans, my odes
As the music goes on and on.

She gave me this book
And she helped to give me my worldview
Concerning the demeaning and degrading
Reality of looking for love,
Believing I have found it.
She had a little help there
But she did it best.

Still, I wrote three poems tonight
And more than thirty last month
Reading this one book
And thinking about her,
More often than not.
Here’s another poem on the ledger,
So…

Thanks?

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THE CHAIN IN THE SKY

by Uko Tyrawn Okon

The Chain in the Sky There are those who bear the flower
As they walk on the chain
Flowers are spreading a virus When you look at the sky
That is what the experts call it Try not to look at the chains
It makes people walk on a chain You’ll want to gaze upon mountains
That is one hundred feet in the sky But you must not look straight up
Who put the chain up at a slight acclivity? The trick is to look at the world perfect
People look up from below That is how you put the solid rock
Yellow pollen skitters in the air The earth’s defects and bulges
A young blade falls in love Its hideous needs and vagrant lust
It drives him to seek the flower At the bottom of your vision
Its petals smell like chocolate This is not a cure for a Chocolate Cosmos
Its darkest part is where the heart would be But it gives you something to think about
If the cosmos were human When you walk on the chain in the sky
His impetus drawn from the flower
His rustic innocence shuffled off

About the Author

My name is Uko Tyrawn Okon. I studied English Literature as an undergraduate student at
Arizona State University. I self-published one fiction novel in 2008, Racist Infatuation, and
one book of poems, The Love Mindset. I host a podcast every Monday called the writing
junky podcast at www.anchor.fm/thewritingjunkypodcast. I also host a YouTube channel
that reviews novels, poetry, and short fiction. It can be found by searching U2OKON on
YouTube. My blog has the same theme as my podcast, but with a focus on Shakespeare
and classic novels. It can be found at www.thewritingjunky.com. I describe my fiction as
bordering between Urban Fantasy and Magical Realism. I enjoy using magic to make readers
think while entertaining them.

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THIS IS THE LIGHT

by Scott Waters

Leaving the Cove This is the Light

City lights flicker like candles I fumble out the front door
burning the hem of 5 a.m. two dogs and a snarl of leashes

I finish my bowl of cereal a woman at the corner
lace up my shoes stands and stares
and wrap my hand around at a red-leafed maple
the door knob dowsed in lemon light

like a fly fisherman wading into the sky is a grey lid of clouds
a cold green mountain stream. with a crack in the East

I want to tell the woman
this is the light
that drew John Lennon and Yoko Ono
to San Francisco
for frequent visits

but the woman
has already moved on

so has the light

and so has John.

About the Author

Scott Waters lives in Oakland, California with his wife and son. He graduated with a Master’s
Degree in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University. Scott has published previously
in A New Ulster, The Pangolin Review, Amethyst, Poetica Review, Ink in Thirds, Praxis, The
Santa Clara Review, and other journals.

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Other Lives Revista Literária Adelaide
Bay Bridge

Red bicycle Dead at dawn
someone left you
flung into yellow leaves sleepless at
dew drops glistening on rusty spokes the kitchen table
a cobweb strung from seat to handlebars hopes pinned
vibrating in the breeze to an underachieving
cup of coffee
you are a tune fallen on deaf ears
a whirlwind corkscrewed through the window
into soft ground tops of blue clouds
frosted with yellow
I pick you up and beneath them
shake off the dew a faraway hillside
wrap the cobweb around my wrist dusted in gold
and pedal carefully through damp leaves
I think of the poem
into someone else’s karma. I will write
about some
A Bus is a River middle-aged man
sitting at his
gurgling through city neighborhoods kitchen table
scraping paint from the banks on the opposite
of stucco houses and side of the bay
brick apartment buildings with heavy lids
sweeping up walking branches kids snoring in their beds
twigs of arms, trunks of legs dog curled at his feet
depositing them downtown
at the eastern bend of nowhere wondering how he will
get through
sleeping at night in a lagoon another day
misnamed a parking lot on 2 hours’ sleep
asphalt flecked with bright reflections
of the undulating stars and as he gazes
out his window
a bus at the light
you might say chasing shadows
from the East Bay hills
is a river
he thinks
of the poem
he will write

about me.

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INTERVIEWS



CINDY STOCKLER

author of the
CALLIOPE: THE SLAVE FROM ATHENS

1. Tell us a bit about yourself – something that we will not find in the official author’s bio?

I knew that I was going to be a writer since I was 3 years old. Perhaps the influence of my
family, for my parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles were always with a book in their
hands, or were always talking about this or that latest one they were reading. I still didn´t
know how to read and write, and I would play on my own, sitting on a corner, getting one of
my dad´s books, open it, and pretend that I was reading it. I still didn´t know that my grand-
mother on my father´s side had been a writer herself: she used to write articles for some
magazines in the 1930´s and 40´s. One day, I was around 15 years old and had just finished
reading a novel that had much impressed me for the pleasure of the reading and how good
was the author´s style. I immediately told my dad this: I had loved that reading so much that
I decided that that was what I wanted to do in my life: to be a novel writer. My dad was quiet,
and said to me: “Wait here a minute”, and turned on his heels and went to his bedroom. I
could hear him opening some doors and drawers, and then he comes back carrying an old,
thick black paper folder. He said, handing it to me: “Here, take this, it´s yours! Go to see it
on your own!”. I took the old, dusty thick thing with some loose leaves of paper coming out
of it, and went to my room. As I opened it, on the first yellowed page I saw that incredibly
elegant handwriting that read: “Here is the collection of all my articles that were published
in the magazines …. and … , that my dear husband carefully and proudly collected all these
years. I leave it to my only son as my legacy, and ask him to pass it as a legacy to that of kids
who demonstrates to possess the penchant for writing”. You can only imagine the impact
that the reading of that message had on me! It was as if it was sealed in that very moment:
now I owe myself, my dad and my grandmother to really pursue the writing destiny!

2. D o you remember what was your first story
(article, essay, or poem) about and when did you write it?

As early as a pre-teen, at 12 or 13, I would handwrite little short stories to my classmates,
in episodes, for them to read at home and then come back to me with their impressions.
We were normally the characters in these little stories which were meant to be funny. My
friends would eagerly wait for each next episode and their enthusiasm filled me with joy for

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writing more. That went on until I left school for studying Law. My first work in fiction, say,
‘semi-professionally’, was a script for a movie in a contest by some TV channel back in the
90´s. It told a fantasy story of a man in his late 30´s who had broken up with his girlfriend
and for some days had to take care and try to find the parents of a little girl of 7 who had
appeared at his office – it was precisely his ex-girlfriend, child-mode, and in those days she
showed him how much we all keep inside of us the child we once were. In the end he dis-
covers it was all a daydream he had by looking at a pic of his girlfriend at 7 which she had
sent him, in an attempt to sweeten his heart back to her, which of course ends up happening.
Turned out I had no idea that a movie script should follow some specific format other than
merely being in dialogues. My story was immediately disqualified from the contest, and it
lies in my drawer since then. It could have made a lovely movie, I guess…

3. What is the title of your latest book and what inspired it?

It is called ‘Alma Mater’, Volume 1: The Arrival. It´s the first volume of a trilogy, a fiction
novel in whose background I tell the story of the foundation of the Academy of Law of Sao
Paulo, in 1827, the first graduation course in Brazil - soon after Prince Regent Pedro, the son
of Portugal King Joao VI, declared Brazil an independent country. As you know, Brazil had
been a colony from Portugal for more than 300 years, but the Prince, a young man who had
been brought up in Brazil (where the royal family temporarily took refuge as of Napoleon´s
invasion of Portugal), the prince simply fell in love with Brazil and wouldn´t rest until its in-
dependence was finally achieved. ‘Alma Mater’ is set in 1914, at the charming Belle Epoque
in Sao Paulo, and here and there goes back in time in order to tell about the Law Academy
foundation and its stories, anecdotes, funny passages and important people who studied
there. The inspiration to write it was the Law Academy itself, now called Law School of the
University of Sao Paulo, where I graduated, and which, as we put it, gets in our veins and
becomes a part of us!

4.  How long did it take you to write your latest work and
how fast do you write (how many words daily)?

As I still maintain part of my work as a lawyer, I have to divide my time and find a way to be
free and un-stressed to sit and write. I have to leave Sao Paulo, where I live, in order to do
that: I go once a month for 4 or 5 days to this small town in the countryside where I stay on
my own at my place by a lake, cell phone off, and that´s where I let inspiration flow and then
I write, like, 3 or 4 pages each day, sometimes more. I will normally manage to take a whole
month off to stay there so that the novel will get a stronger impulse. My latest novel took
8 months to be finished, and I had to write the last chapters in Sao Paulo: I would go to the
Law School Central Library (very inspirational, since I was precisely talking about it), so that
my concentration wouldn´t get spoiled!

5. Do you have any unusual writing habits?

Yes, I do! You see, as the most interesting passages of a story will simply ‘pop up’ in my
mind out of nowhere, at any moment, any place and any circumstance, I have to keep some

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message papers and pen at hand all the time, so that I stop whatever I´m doing and write
down those inspiration words. Sometimes it´s just a phrase, or just an expression, a name,
and sometimes it´s whole long passages. If I don´t write them down immediately, if I leave
to do it later, the thing will simply disappear from my mind! And it can be when I´m taking a
walk, when I´m shopping for groceries, when I´m arranging the flat, etc. Sometimes there´s
nowhere to lean, it doesn´t matter, I stop there, get whatever paper I find and my pen, and
clumsily write down as I can. I keep a folder with all of these ‘scratches’: paper napkins,
street leaflets, empty envelopes, pages from magazines, etc. The best passages of my novels
are in those pieces of paper all messed up in that folder! But the very, very best inspiration
moments are in the middle of the night: I will wake up at 3 in the morning with the most
interesting passages, whole dialogues, heart-throbbing conversations or narratives in my
mind: I always leave a blank page and pencil by my bedside to write them down, sometimes
I don´t even turn the light on to do it (and that´s why at night it has to be a pencil: once I
didn´t turn the light on the wrote things by pen – only to find the next morning that half of
it had been written on the bedsheet…).

6. I s writing the only form of artistic expression that you utilize,
or is there more to your creativity than just writing?

Yes, unfortunately, writing is all I can do… Wish I could paint, or do embroidery, or do some
kind of hand craft – people are so talented and do such wonderful things! But I´m absolutely
devoid of any talent there.

7. Authors and books that have influenced your writings?

I was very much influenced as a teenager by a novel for young people that I read in my
teens (I mentioned above in the first question), called “Cazuza”, by Brazilian author Viriato
Correa. The story of this boy called Cazuza and his family in the late XIX century in the north
of Brazil. I remember I was so touched by the story, but mostly, by the pleasant way the
author wrote, the pleasure it was reading his style, that it was there I decided I wanted to
be a novelist.

Later I became an avid reader of classics, Brazilian ones, like Machado de Assis, but mostly
French, British and American classics. I loved Zola, Maupassant, Flaubert, Henry Troyat. And
the Brontë Sisters, and Jane Austen. But if I have to pick up one name, it will definitely be
Dostoievsky, and if I have to pick up one of his novels, it will be Brothers Karamazov!

8. W hat are you working on right now?
Anything new cooking in the wordsmith’s kitchen?

Yes, I´m thrilled because I´m writing my first thriller! As usual, I have the whole story on my
mind: beginning, middle, some details, thrilling passages, and climax and end! But what I
love is that, as I begin to write a new novel, I don´t know myself where exactly it is going
to go, so it´s a surprise to me, too! It´s, as you can expect, a story happening in today´s Sao
Paulo, going about in cemeteries, with dark and unusual situations…. And yet also meddling
with the top luxury and celebrities and good-looking people of the day…

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9.  Did you ever think about the profile of your readers?
What do you think – who reads and who should read your books?

I´m normally very happy because my readers vary from all ages, all styles, gender, profiles,
etc. From teenagers to their grandparents, people will equally enjoy my novels, my kind of
writing, the things I write about, and the way I tell my stories. I don´t shock anyone with any
dubious descriptions or situations, and yet my characters are not saints, they go through ev-
eryday common circumstances, like anyone does. And I don´t have any pretension for deep
psychological or philosophical approaches, nor any literature expertise. My aim is that the
reader has a good, pleasant time reading my stories!

10. Do you have any advice for new writers/authors?

I will always tell people who tell me they would like to write: just sit and write! Don´t
worry whether you write well, if people will read it or enjoy it, whether you´ll get pub-
lished, whether you´ll make money out of it. If you have the feeling for writing, enjoy
the pleasure of it, first of all! Find your time and your place, go saving your writings in
a folder you can reach easily in your computer: each line you write is precious, and you
don´t know what´s going to become of it, but it is there! The rest, is your work´s destiny,
not yours!

11. What is the best advice (about writing) you have ever heard?

Follow your instinct, let your inspiration flow!

12.  How many books you read annually and what are you reading now?
What is your favorite literary genre?

I will normally read one book a month, so it will be around twelve books a year, depending
on the year: when I´m working on my own novels, the research it normally requires is so
intense, that I will dedicate to it 100%. But when not, it´s more than a book a month. I´m
now reading ‘D. Pedro II, the Untold Story’, by Brazilian author Paulo Rezzutti. It´s about the
last monarch of Brazil, Pedro II, who was taken down from power in 1889 and Republic took
place. He is considered by many people one of the most magnificent Brazilians of all time,
a very simple man, much ahead of his time. He spoke 23 languages, 17 of them fluently.
He travelled the world in order to learn more, and was an enthusiast of new technologies
and inventions. He met Graham Bell in the USA and was one of first people to believe and
encourage him with the telephone. In his trip to the USA, he was so popular, so friendly, so
simple and charismatic, that he got 14 thousand votes for President of the US in Philadelphia
– as the people at the time could vote in anyone for President. A millionaire lady from the
south of the United States, very much unhappy with the defeat of the South in the Civil War,
asked D. Pedro II that he would annex the south of the USA to Brazil, to which he responded
with a double emphatic: “Never! Never!”

But my favourite literary genre are fiction novels, more precisely period novels.

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13. W hat do you deem the most relevant about your writing?

What is the most important to be remembered by readers?
What I would like most to be remembered about is the style of writing: that my writing is
pleasant to read, that the language is a little sophisticated but at the same time, soft and
easy to follow. That one begins to read my novel and won´t feel like stopping it. That it´s as
if I was there, telling them the story through my own lips.
14. W hat is your opinion about the publishing industry today and

about the ways authors can best fit into the new trends?
I think that story-telling is an all-time favourite with peoples. Whether books, movies, audio
books, paper books or e-books, people of all ages will always enjoy hearing-seeing-reading
some story, whether fiction, fantasy, biography, etc. So, no matter what new technologies
may appear, story-tellers will always be there. And as for books specifically, I think that the
real reader, the orthodox and addict reader, will still prefer the book in paper, to feel it in
his or her hands, the smell of the book, the touch of the pages, the form of the fonts. That
said, I think that other trends are marvelous: audio book, depending on the circumstance, is
a delicious way of getting to know a story; and the substitution of the paper by a screen can
be a fantastic solution, depending on the case.

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CAROL LAHINES

author of SOMEDAY EVERYTHING
WILL ALL MAKE SENSE

1. T ell us a bit about yourself – something that we
will not find in the official author’s bio?

I am a lawyer by training and thus accustomed to evaluating competing narratives and ar-
riving at the truth by assembling various and contradictory accounts. This type of mental
exercise has helped me immensely as a writer; there’s a useful cross-pollination. A few of my
stories were based on actual court cases.

2.  Do you remember what was your first story
(article, essay, or poem) about and when did you write it?

My first published story, “Cosmos,” appeared in The Nebraska Review over fifteen years ago.
It was a farcical story about a sixty-five-year-old lawyer who finds himself living in his ninety-
nine-year-old mother’s basement after he is disbarred.

3. What is the title of your latest book and what inspired it?
Someday Everything Will All Make Sense, my first novel, was published in February 2019 by
Adelaide Books. In the novel, we follow Luther van der Loon, a harpsichord player and pro-
fessor of early music (needless to say, an eccentric!), as he navigates the stages of grief after
his mother’s untimely death. The title comes from a fortune tucked inside a fortune cookie.
I wanted a fortune that reflected the narrator’s conundrum. Is it possible to go on after the
death of a loved one? How to go on then. What is the meaning of life? As I like to say, the
title is both ironic and aspirational.

4.  How long did it take you to write your latest work and how
fast do you write (how many words daily)?

I write 1-2 pages daily, rereading the previous day’s work before I continue and mulling over
the WIP throughout the day. It took me a year to write the first draft of Someday Everything
Will All Make Sense; now, it takes me about 6 months to write a 60,000 word draft.

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5. Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I write in a very ritualistic fashion. I complete my prewriting phase (rereading the previous
day’s work, mapping out a path in general terms) in silence, but listen to music while I’m
actually writing. I listen to string quartets (late Beethoven and Shostakovich are my favorites;
also Janacek, Borodin, Schubert’s Death and the Maiden). I try to write continuously so I do
not have a chance to overanalyze and overornament.

6. I s writing the only form of artistic expression that you utilize, or
is there more to your creativity than just writing?

I am a musician as well. I play classical piano and various styles of guitar. Right now, I’m
learning flamenco.

7. Authors and books that have influenced your writings?
My earliest and greatest influences were Woolf and Nabakov. I was also very enamored
with David Foster Wallace in my twenties. Thomas Pynchon, Don DeLillo, and Cormac Mc-
Carthy are also favorites. The Russians, particularly Tolstoy and Chekhov and Gogol, and
their wisdom regarding the human condition. Melville’s Moby Dick and Bartleby were also
influential for me. Recently, I have been enamored of W.S. Sebald, impressed with his
elegant and rhythmically balanced lines and the themes he evokes. His method is that
of an archivist and his digressive flights are wonderful. Also Calvino, whose imagination
astounds me.

8. W hat are you working on right now?
Anything new cooking in the wordsmith’s kitchen?

I’m always working on something. There’s a queue! I have 2-3 other manuscripts completed
and I am finishing another. There are a couple more pinging around in my head. Things live
in my head for a while as I mull over the right narrator(s) and structure(s) for the work.

9. D id you ever think about the profile of your readers?
What do you think – who reads and who should read your books?

I write literary fiction, so I think the work appeals to that kind of reader. I am in love with
language and wordsmithery. Voice is a principal consideration of mine. I tend toward a dark
and absurdist kind of humor that I think would appeal to fans of, for example, Confederacy
of Dunces or Stanley Elkin or even Kafka’s The Trial.

10. Do you have any advice for new writers/authors?
Read, read, read, read some more. Study how a writer chooses to tell the story. Who is the
narrator? What is the narrative voice like? How is the story structured? I just completed
Ties, by Domenico Starnone, a writer whom I very much admire. Ties is the story of a man’s
affair and of its ripple effects on the family. The novel is divided into three sections. The first

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section is an epistolary rant from the wife about the husband’s infidelity. The second and
longest section is narrated by the husband at a time thirty-five years in the future. So, first
off, we know they are still together. We are curious as to why they have stayed together,
what type of arrangement they’ve worked out, what has become of the mistress. The cou-
ple returns from a vacation to find their apartment ransacked, which provides the opportu-
nity for further puzzling out of the past. There are leitmotifs throughout, like a cube of the
husband’s and various containers. Containers give shape but they also imprison, underscor-
ing the themes of the book. In the third section, narrated by the daughter, we learn of the
effects of the affair on the children. The son is a kind of lothario; the daughter never mar-
ried. This interlocking structure provides much more depth than a simple, straight-through
narration.

11  What is the best advice (about writing) you have ever heard?

I tend to shun writing bromides like “show don’t tell,” etc. Every rule can be broken under
the right circumstances.

Writing should be analyzed according to its own rules; that is, it should be evaluated as to
how well it succeeds in accomplishing the objectives it sets forth within the four corners of
the page.

You should be willing to depart from any outline. The writer has to balance a fine line be-
tween knowing, in general terms, the arc or theme of the story, but not knowing too much,
else the work feels overdetermined and unsurprising.

Recently, I saw a quote from Lydia Davis that “you do not want a steady diet of contemporary
literature. You already belong to your time,” a sentiment with which I agree.

12.  How many books you read annually and what are you reading now?
What is your favorite literary genre?

I read about 20-30 books a year. My favorite genre is perhaps unsurprisingly literary fiction.
Most recently, I’ve read The Beginning of Spring, by Penelope Fitzgerald; Embers, by Sandor
Marai; Days of Abandonment, by Elena Ferrante; The Leopard, by Lampedusa, The Secret
Agent, by Joseph Conrad; and If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler, by Italo Calvino.

13.  What do you deem the most relevant about your writing?
What is the most important to be remembered by readers?

Calvino, especially, speaks of how sadness and profundity and humor are entwined; how
seriousness is best expressed in a lighter register. I think humor and an ironic stance only
serve to underscore the tragic.

I think in musical terms, still, and tend to rely on musical structures or concepts in my writing
– for instance, recursion, leitmotif, theme and variations, or riffing off words or sentences as
in jazz.

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14. W hat is your opinion about the publishing industry today and

about the ways authors can best fit into the new trends?
The publishing industry is diffuse; it is opaque and can be difficult to navigate, particularly
for a first-time writer. Everything seems geared toward pub date, with increasing freneticism,
which seems to diminish in a few weeks as we’re on to the new writer. I intensely dislike the
idea of “trends,” which are inherently fickle. Work that stands the test of time often defies
trends and is unappreciated in its time.

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JOHN BALLAM

author of the MARY’S HOUSE

1. Tell us a bit about yourself – something that we will not find in the official author’s bio?

I am probably the most avid reader you will ever encounter. Long books and short ones, over
the course of a year I read on average one new book every 36 hours. The longest thing I’ve
ever read is the Mahabharata, which is apparently about the same size as the complete
works of Shakespeare six times over. That one ruined my average for a while. I also love mu-
sic and have a particular fondness for jazz, Baroque and Early Music; but also folk, bluegrass,
early country western, pop 50s-70s… I’m a pescatarian who loves to cook. I’ve never enjoyed
sports and can’t swim at all. For exercise, I like hiking – up to 20 miles is a good day’s work. I
studied Latin fervently and have now forgotten almost all of it. My spoken Italian produces
some blank looks and indulgent smiles, but generally speaking, accomplishes its aims.

2.  Do you remember what was your first story
(article, essay, or poem) about and when did you write it?

Yes. When I was fifteen I wrote a scathing satirical poem about my Algebra teacher. Friends
got hold of it and I was made to read it out in class. From there I went on to replace the lyrics
of all the songs I’d ever heard. After that I wrote something like 300+ sonnets to all the girls
I successively had crushes on. Probably 300 each, in fact.

3. What is the title of your latest book and what inspired it?
The most recent thing I’ve done is a novel called The Mary House. I grew up in the Appala-
chian Mountains, where storytelling is as much a part of living as eating and drinking. There
are, I think, quite a lot of books set in Appalachia nowadays, but the characters in these
books are seldom people I’d recognize and their stories seem to follow certain predictable
patterns. For me, the people I knew there were more like people everywhere else – a little
lazy, a little selfish, a little lusty etc, but fundamentally decent, hard-working, generous folks,
with a good sense of humour, confused by the world and their own feelings about it. For me,
what is different about the Appalachian experience is the abiding sense of personal isolation:
from oneself, from friends and family, from community and from the world beyond the hills.
This is what I wanted to capture – mostly ordinary people of different races, genders and
economic strata whose experiences across three centuries are marked by a culture of deep
alienation.

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4. H ow long did it take you to write your latest work and how
fast do you write (how many words daily)?

No one ever really knows where the beginning of an idea is. For me, once this one became
irresistible, I was sure there were things I didn’t know and wanted to. I spent a year in re-
searching the details for the project – folklore, forgotten historical facts. I read thousands of
pages of indigenous American and African-American narratives trying to gain insights, per-
spectives and information that had fallen out of the mainstream. I then spent another year
in making very systematic plans of how the whole thing would work, what would go where,
how it would knit together. Once those notes were all in order I got down to it and wrote the
first draft in about nine months. As an experienced writer, and as a teacher of writing, I know
that it is too easy to get bogged down, creatively frozen or self-indulgent on a manuscript of
this size, and my way out of this was never to have a daily minimum of ‘words to write’, time
to spend writing or similar, but instead, to have a maximum of 1000 words a day. When it
all is going well – and all the planning upped my odds on this, as I never had to sit and think
‘What shall I write today?’ – 1000 words is not hard to do. The hard part is stopping there
regardless of where the axe falls, and the hunger to just do ‘the next bit’ will keep it growing
in the mind until the next irresistible session at the desk.

5. Do you have any unusual writing habits?

See above. As Hemingway reputedly said, ‘Write drunk but edit sober.’ I don’t write drunk,
but I do frequently write while listening to indigenous American instrumental music, as it is
so profoundly uplifting. As for editing, any piece that has not by its last sentence moved me
in some way – ideally to actual tears or actual laughter – feels second-rate somehow.

6. I s writing the only form of artistic expression that you utilize, or
is there more to your creativity than just writing?

I tried singing – until everyone who loves me offered me the same advice… My only other
real artistic talent is to be a super-enthusiastic audience-member for anyone else’s art: the-
atre, literature, painting, sculpture, dance…

7. Authors and books that have influenced your writings?

Everybody. For this book, my most earnest thanks would be to Anton Chekhov, Alice Munro,
Marilynne Robinson, Lorrie Moore and Ron Rash. All of these writers share with Tolstoy a
heart that is open to everyone, no matter how wise or how foolish.

8.  What are you working on right now?
Anything new cooking in the wordsmith’s kitchen?

Two things are ruining my sleep. One is a novel about four homeless boys in Appalachia
during the Great Depression. The other is a collection of stories about more ordinary folks
who can still laugh a little, in spite of the pain, in spite of the bewilderment.

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9. D id you ever think about the profile of your readers?
What do you think – who reads and who should read your books?

To borrow a thought from Oscar Wilde, people enjoy literature in which they absolutely
see themselves, or in which they absolutely don’t see themselves. I’ve always tried to write
about people getting by – trying to make their ideas work, trying somehow to gain a little
security, a little joy, a little relief. Most people can identify with that, so they are likely to see
themselves here – their moods and regrets and fantasies are all displayed. For others, this
novel (and the stories inside it) will be a world away from anything they are likely ever to
have known. I have done my best to write with as much authenticity as I can muster. The
result is a portrayal of lives that can seem very curious indeed – plausible, and yet remote.

10. Do you have any advice for new writers/authors?

My day job is giving advice to new writers and authors. The main thing is: Love Your Work. If
it is not giving you joy (and in art, there can be a kind of joy in the representation of suffering,
if the result is to show that that suffering has not been ignored or denied or experienced
alone) then do something else. If you love your work, doing it will always be satisfying. Never
envy others. They have their stories to tell and the voice for that will be their own. If you try
to borrow it, you will ruin your story and your pleasure in that story. Write honestly and give
it to others to read honestly. That will be the truth that will connect you.

11. What is the best advice you have ever heard?

It’s a paraphrase of Stephen King, I think: ‘Never stop at a good stopping point.’ That’s advice
for life as well as writing.

12.  How many books you read annually and what are you reading now?
What is your favorite literary genre?

See above. At this particular time I am reading a lot of 20th-21st-century Russian and conti-
nental European writing in translations. Though I can get excited about anything from specu-
lative fiction to post-structuralism, romance to horror, my favourite genre remains Realism
– typical people who, when scrutinized show what an extraordinary thing Life is.

13.  What do you deem the most relevant about your writing?
What is the most important to be remembered by readers?

The thing that makes this book different is its stance on ‘culture’. We talk a lot nowadays
about ‘cultural appropriation’ and its relationship to various injustices. This is a discussion
that needs to occur and which will continue to develop. What I’ve tried to do here – and I
am aware that this may be courting controversy – is to represent a single geographical area
across a period of time in which cultural verisimilitude is readily apparent, yet which when
explored from contrasting perspectives, reveals that at a significant (or ‘meta-‘) level it is a
community populated by folks contributing to a single culture. Different races, different eco-
nomic groups, different eras and social practices do not stand apart from one another, but

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instead, in a complex way, influence one another, making each one even in reaction a part
of its neighbours’. The violent, the victimized, the glorified and the ignored cannot really be
understood if they are not seen in their vital juxtapositions. The many points of view taken in
this novel are an attempt by one author to allow competing voices to speak for themselves –
sometimes in chorus, sometimes in contradiction. To me, taking only one of these viewpoints
would be implicitly to discredit any other.

14. W hat is your opinion about the publishing industry today and
about the ways authors can best fit into the new trends?

The ‘problem’ most of us have in making any sort of choices is not in finding what we want,
but in actually knowing what it is we want. The advent of digital technology in publishing
has created opportunities for writers to reach audiences on a scale never seen before. Yet it
has also created so many such opportunities that readers can feel a little overwhelmed. It is
as if the main shopping street in your town suddenly has 100 new bookshops on it – some
specialist, some with entrances you cannot locate. Nowadays, readers need more savvy than
ever before to locate the authors they’ll enjoy. The same is true for writers. It used to be that
writers only had to understand readers (ie most publishers did the same things). Now, writ-
ers have to understand the challenges that publishers face, and ask themselves how they
can form a real partnership that allows for genuinely shared ideals about books to commu-
nicate to the readers eager to hear about good books. It’s an exciting time, in my view, and
really professional writers will embrace it.

15. What is your opinion about your publisher – Adelaide Books?
I’m thrilled to be a contributor to Adelaide’s portfolio of new works. Everything about the com-
pany shows expertise and promise. Readers can be thankful that Adelaide is working for them.

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DAVID GERBER

author of the A ROBOT’S JOURNEY
TO FIND A HEART

1. Tell us a bit about yourself – something that we will not find in the official author’s bio.
a. As a teacher, coach, keynote speaker and author my favorite job is being a dad! In addi-
tion to owning my own leadership and conflict management company for 16+ years, I am
also a certified black belt instructor in Krav Maga and Self-Defense. I have self-published
many books on different subjects including conflict, divorce, self-defense and project man-
agement. Additionally, I have my Master’s Certificate in Reiki. Jessie is a creative writer, poet
and has taught herself how to play the ukulele. She sings and even writes her own music.

2. What was the motivation to write a book for children?
a. We wanted to be a part of children’s journey to learn how to read, embrace diversity and
help teach valuable life lessons that most families embrace. Helping to build confidence,
creativity, and connection to other people is important to learn when young and we wanted
to help support teachers & parents.

3. Why a robot that wants to find a heart?
a. For us, it is like a modern-day ‘Tin-Man’ story from the Wizard of Oz. It is a good way for
people to think about who and what they love. It is about emphasizing the basics because
often they give us direction and meaning...in this case a journey where parents and kids
can bond while learning together. This is also a story about a father and a daughter that get
to spend time together, every moment is precious. Adults also get to question themselves
about the role of humans in a world where robots will someday be very similar to humans
themselves. But a heart is also what makes us different than a robot and that is an important
reminder.

4. What is the message that you want kids to retain with this book?
a. Many messages in this book, especially using our hearts to love. There are messages
about how to take care of yourself, make good choices, do actions that will lead to a stronger

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heart. Also, we want kids to embrace diversity and value other people that look different
from each other.

5. What books marked your childhood and how did they influence this story?
a. This story, as I alluded to before, really has some roots in the Wizard of Oz. In that movie,
each character was on a personal journey to find what they needed. The Tin Man needed a
heart. There were lots of kids books we enjoyed although I don’t think any of them contrib-
uted to influencing this book.

6. T ell us about the process of creating this journey and
finding the right illustrations for the book.

a. When I went to the New York Book Expo I saw how much attention there was in the kids’
book section. Having self-published a number of other books, I thought it would be a great
experience to create a fun, educational and inspirational book for children. Because I have
written other books with my daughter it was my thought she would enjoy being a part of
this process. I was able to find the perfect illustrator for my vision and she got started imme-
diately after I sent over the content. There were several revisions and it turned out exactly
how we wanted.

7.  You worked with your daughter Jessie to bring this
story to life. Tell us about that experience.

a. Working with my daughter is always a great experience. It allows me to spend more time
with her while doing a purposeful project intended to help others. Jessie and I would go
over the dialogue and make sure that it was the way we wanted. We have written two other
books together on self-defense for kids, so this was different and fun!

8. What advice would you give to other authors that aim to write children’s books?
a. Find a good illustrator to help bring your vision to life. Be sure to have a challenge or
something that gets in the way of the main character. Be positive, try to accomplish multiple
outcomes with the same book. Our book was intended to help kids learn to read, embrace
diversity, generate moments of family time, help children start to embrace diversity and hear
more about the power of love.

9. Will we see the robot as a protagonist again in the future?
Absolutely!

10. Are you currently working on other books?
Working on a few different books, both for kids and adults. Jessie is working on a motivation-
al quote book for kids and I’m excited about the future of our Robot!

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