Title: U.P.
Author: Ron Riekki
Publisher: Ghost Road Press
Paperback: 236 pages
ISBN-10: 0979625564
ISBN-13: 978-0979625565
First off, congratulations on the big novel sale! Give us the elevator pitch. What’s your book about?
Hmm. I’ll do what Lynn Hoffman did when you interviewed her, namely quote a review: ”Heavy metal and the disenfranchised, partners in crime since the genre first scared the world some years ago. And it’s in just such a place as Michigan’s Upper Peninsula where these two meet and become survival soul mates of the first order. U.P. really is the story of the lost American youth, told with an expertise that only one who lived through it could provide. I know, I’ve been there, having grown up in small towns only to eventually make my living staring at those reflective disenfranchised faces every night. But the remarkable thing you see is that the goal is the same. Find what is real, escape the living prison, and create freedom and individuality, which is honest as well as strong. The trick is in surviving the struggle.” That was Jeff Pilson of the band Dokken, who feature predominantly in the book…and my childhood. So to have him give me a blurb was an honor. I still can’t believe I got such positive blurbs/reviews from Jeff Pilson and MC Serch. I loved Dokken and Third Bass as a kid. Still do. (And then also to get rave blurbs from Ann Beattie, Stuart Dybek, Christopher Tilghman, Don De Grazia, Taylor Antrim, and Laura Dave was amazing as well, especially Casey’s comment that “I wish Kurt Vonnegut were alive to read U.P. He’d love it.” Incredible comment, as Casey actually knew Vonnegut well.)
2. Most new novelists have an interesting story to tell about their journey to publication. What’s yours? Did you use an agent? Make sure to tell us about the day you found out you’d sold a book.
It was both an easy and a tortuous road to get U.P. published. (And if you misread ‘torturous’ into that last sentence, it still fits.) National Book Award winner John Casey (and a true mentor-he was in the dedication section to U.P., but it was cut by the publisher, perhaps too long) nominated U.P. for the Sewanee Writers’ Series. Was set for publication with Overlook Press, when they backed out last minute, said they were focusing more on poetry. Discouraged, I quit fiction for awhile, for playwriting and journalism, then very slowly got brave enough to return to fiction and start sending U.P. out again, based off of feedback from people of “Whatever happened to that book?” No agent. I got a nice small respectable pile of agent rejections, but what kept me submitting was they’d drop in positive feedback: “I like the writing, but . . .” “The characters are intriguing, but we don’t handle experimental fiction.” Found out it was ‘experimental’ when I didn’t realize it was. Was just how I wrote. Then John Bullock, a previous UVa alum with me, published a novel excerpt from U.P. in New Ohio Review, which he edits. John got his novel Making Faces accepted by Ghost Road Press and said a lot of great things about them, so I sent ‘em my novel. And they took it! I got an email from Matt Davis, who heads Ghost Road, telling me how much he loved the novel and he included a top ten list of his favorite metal albums of all time. That kind of won me over with him. In the novel, my character, Cräig (yes, there’s an umlaut over his a-the book explains it), has a list of his top metal albums, so Matt wanted to tell me his. Thought that was cool. When I saw the caliber of writers Ghost Road publishes (e.g. Aaron Abeyta, ForeWord Book of the Year Award winner Wayne K. Sheldrake, Colorado Book Award winner and Denver Poet Laureate Chris Ransick) and also found out Matt has tattoos, it was sealed that I was going with Ghost Road.
3. Do you have another book in the pipeline? What are you working on now?
I’m lucky. Ghost Road is looking at a long term deal with me where they’d publish four of my books over the next five years. And all of them are already written. They’ve given me a verbal agreement on the deal, but we’re still handling the contract aspects. In 2010, they’d publish my psychological horror novella A Portrait of the Artist as a Boogey Man, about a Tom Araya-slash-John Denver fan who wants to actually feel what it would be like to be Raskolnikov from Crime and Punishment. In 2011, Ghost Road’d publish my epistolary memoir of my military experiences entitled I Hate It Here. In 2012, it’d be my pulp crime underbelly novel Hunger and the Ass (whose title is a nod to both Nick Cave and Knut Hamsun). (And if anyone hasn’t read Sult, please do so.)
So, if all works out, will be wonderful to have a press so dedicated to my books, especially as readers would get to see such a variety of my writing. In the meantime, I’m struggling through a (more commercial) post-military memoir, rewriting an epic novella (if that’s possible?) entitled nothing blazing Abandoning, organizing a poetry collection, and desperately need to send out my plays (especially an eight page Holocaust survivor play entitled Home Schooling, that I think is one of the best things I’ve ever written, but it requires an eighty-year-old female actress in the lead and I’m finding that, very sadly, theaters don’t have older actresses). I’m also getting some screenplays ready for my return trek to Hollywood next summer; this last summer I was there and had a blast–got Screen Actors’ Guild from a brief appearance on ABC’s Pushing Daisies, so I’m a big Hollywood fan right now. And, really, what I’m working on, beyond the writing, is thoughts on how creative writing applies to liberation theology, how I can apply what I’ve learned and give those skills to others less lucky. I set up a creative writing program for the homeless at Kalamazoo’s Gospel Mission and currently volunteer to teach creative writing at a medium security prison-and it amazes me the stories these guys write. Very impressive. It feels wonderful to help give them that authorial voice.
I guess I’m working on how I might be able to work on that on a larger level. Perhaps one way is for writers to read this site to get inspired and be active. Please volunteer to teach creative writing at homeless shelters and prisons in your area. If they don’t have one, set one up. Feel free to hunt down my email and I’ll give you some tips. When I think of writing, I think of Frederick Douglass and how critical those skills were to his freedom.
4. What’s your writing process like? Morning writer, night writer, or something in between?
Night writer. Period. I like how the world stops at night. I can think. I used to live in Montréal and I’d go out on Rue Sherbrooke at 3:30 a.m. in January and I loved how this massive city became a still church at night in that cold. An entire city to myself. I love nights. (It’s of course just after midnight right now–and I’m listening to Nellie McKay on youtube.)
5. There seems to be an unusually high percentage of writers who own cats. Here at The First Book, we’re doing a study to find out if there’s a direct relationship between writing success and cat ownership. Do you own a cat? If so, tell us about him or her. If not, tell us what you have against cats.
No cats. Nothing against them. Just like dogs. Friendlier. Plus I remember as a kid reading some Egyptian legend about how cats sneak into your room at night when you’re sleeping and they’ll suck your soul out. That always freaked me out. But if a cat is nice, they’re OK.
