What would Jesus drink? Journey Prize nominee Mike Spry's debut short fiction collection Distillery Songs (Insomniac Press), answers that question (spoiler: hot toddies) in addition to offering many other witty and fresh stories. Spry chats with Open Book about time management, the joy of public readings and the girl with the scar on her cheek.
You can also read a previous interview with Mike Spry at Open Book: Toronto.
Open Book:
Tell us about your new book, Distillery Songs.
Mike Spry:
Distillery Songs is my first collection of short fiction. It’s a collection of ten stories that examine peripheral characters, and is concerned with speakers that lack the natural tendency of writing to be identifiable, or likeable.
It leans towards the absurd, and a gallows humour, and likes to consider characters that are lonely, or removed in some way, and how they deal with that. Also, there are several talking animals.
OB:
What was most challenging about writing or publishing this collection?
MS:
Time. That’s always my biggest challenge. Finding the time to concentrate on writing. Life is busy. My job keeps me busy, and I just completed my MA which involved writing a novel. Then, once the book’s out, finding the time to read from it. I’d tour like the Dead if I could. There’s a notion that social media and a strong online presence can replace or make up for this inability to find the time to read from your work, to access the reading public without leaving your iPhone. But, that’s nonsense.
OB:
How do you know when the germ of an idea will be the right fit for a short story?
MS:
I think, for me, it’s when the germ is particular or odd in a way that feels like it can be maintained in an interesting or intriguing way for 2000 words. There’s usually something that motivates me, that propels the writing, and I find myself eager to find out how it ends. If it’s not entertaining to write, it won’t be entertaining to read, so I look for something to excite me.
OB:
What do you enjoy most about the process of writing a short story?
MS:
I enjoy the first reading of a piece the best. I find that given the nature of my writing, I believe it is at its best when it barrels forward and accelerates well, and a public reading is where I find out what works and what doesn’t. That, and the occasion where someone writes you a cheque for a short story. Or maybe that’s the part of the process that my folks enjoy the most.
OB:
How do you make a character vibrant and realistic in just a few pages?
MS:
Honesty. To me, the only way to successfully create a dynamic character in a restricted space, is to ensure that the reader will find the character to be genuine, honest, natural. That, despite the absurdity or fantastic nature of the narrative, that the reader believes in the piece and forgets it’s a story.
OB:
What recurring themes or obsessions do you notice turning up in your short stories?
MS:
I write about addiction a lot, whether that addiction is to drugs or alcohol, or love, or need. I like to investigate flawed people, flawed ideals, flawed choices. I like to write about infidelity. I think infidelity, adultery, whatever you want to call it, has been romanticized, and I want to write about it for its inherent immorality and malice. I like to write about the odd, the uncomfortable, the unsettling. And (as the wonderful Gillian Rodgerson from Insomniac pointed out) I seem to write about a girl with a scar on her cheek a lot.
OB:
Is there such a thing as a perfect short story? What story have you read that's come closest?
MS:
I don’t think there’s perfect anything. At least, not until the Habs win the Cup again. Everything, everybody, is flawed in some way. Some stories do come close. “The Aleph” by Borges. “Scarlotti and the Sinkhole” by Padgett Powell. Irvine Welsh’s "The Granton Star Cause." Powell, George Saunders, Donald Barthelme, Barry Hannah, the Sorrentinos, Jayne Anne Phillips, ZZ Packer. They get the closest to perfection.
OB:
What would you say to convince someone who is "more into novels" to give short fiction a try?
MS:
Read one of the above’s collections. Buy (and, well, read) The Art of the Tale or one of Granta’s Book Of the American Short Story. I don’t understand the reading public’s inability to fully embrace the short story. Especially given the ever shortening attention span of the general populace. We live in an era of instant gratification, which the short story would seemingly be tailored for. I dunno. Maybe e-books will help change that.
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