September 24th, 2009
Blog Book Tour: A Chat with Libba Bray with Melissa A. Bartell
Libba Bray is funny, sassy, and amazingly talented. She’s also a phenomenal writer of vastly entertaining YA novels, the most recent of which is Going Bovine. She recently sat down with us to answer a few questions. We hope you enjoy her responses as much as we did.
We all know you as the author of several wildly popular (and entertaining) YA novels, but give us your elevator speech – how would you introduce yourself to people who didn’t already know your work?
Hello. I am Libba Bray, the author of several wildly popular (and entertaining) YA novels. But you might know me better by my pen name, Kurt Vonnegut.
Tell us about the path you took to get where you are today?
I went left. A lot.
Your results may vary.
Do you have a personal motto or mission statement? What is it?
Yes. Do not wear chaps. You always think you’ll be the one who can carry it off. You are wrong.
Besides your daily work, what are you passionate about?
Everything! Especially my husband and kid, my friends, music, chocolate, New York City, politics, human rights, Dr. Who, Pete Townshend, George Saunders, Stephen Sondheim, theatre, books, movies, Halloween, Texas football, food, humor, great writing, libraries, librarians, bookstores, booksellers, hearing from teen readers, animals, Clive Owens’ snarl, red Converse high-tops. Having clean underwear. I’m a fairly passionate person.
What advice would you give to other women who want to do what you do?
Could you do it for me? Because I would like to go to Target today.
Besides the obvious—read everything; get your butt in the chair and write every day; write what scares you/write what you must write/write the story that matters to you and not the My Boyfriend is a Hot Pterodactyl novel because hot pterodactyls are all the rage in publishing right now —I would offer this female-centric advice: Submit your work. I was at the New Yorker festival once and heard the editor, a woman, talk about how often women will sell themselves short. They’ll think they’re not good enough and they won’t submit their work. So, you know. Submit. Your work, that is.
We know you have a presence on LiveJournal, but do you keep an actual journal? Online or on paper?
I used to, but not anymore. The truth is, I rarely wrote in my journal when things were going well. It was always the “woe is me” stuff that ended up in there—and the confessions of mad longing for whatever musician boy was keeping me at arm’s distance that that moment. Now, I’m more likely to email a rant to a friend if something’s bugging me.
I do use the Live Journal to sort of “think” on paper, so I suppose it functions as a journal in some ways, albeit, one I know will be read publicly. More philosophical, less confessional. And when I’m stuck in my writing, I will often do a little free write to try to find the suppressed emotion that’s causing my block.
Your biography (all versions) on your website is full of humor and snark – do you consider yourself a funny person?
You know who thinks I’m a funny person? My doctor. He laughs every time I tell him I’ll stop eating crap and take up an exercise program.
Author Tanita Davis suggested that Young Adult fiction was some of the best work on the shelves. Do you agree? Why or why not?
I do agree. I’ve read some really tremendous stuff across all genres in YA. From David Small’s graphic memoir, Stitches, which is just heartbreakingly honest, to E. Lockhart’s wonderful, bittersweet, subversively feminist The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau Banks. Margo Lanagan. M.T. Anderson. I mean, sheesh. Margo can make words do things at her house that they will not do at mine. And no one can accuse her of writing “safe.” Same for Adam Rapp.
Tobin’s writing is gorgeous and his storytelling is impeccable. There’s terrific genre writing going on, books that tackle big ideas, such as Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games. I think there is a greater emphasis on story in YA fiction, perhaps, because our audience demands it. I find teens to be some of the most passionate, exacting, honest readers, and if you’re being too self-indulgent in your writing, they will stop reading—or let you know via your website. It really keeps you on your toes as a writer. I’m so grateful to them for that.
And yet, YA is so often denigrated in the mainstream publications. Why is that? It mystifies me. Clearly, they are not reading Octavian Nothing.
What drew you to the YA genre, as a writer? Do you still read it? What keeps you reading it?
My husband (literary agent Barry Goldblatt) suggested that I try YA, that he thought it would be a good fit. He knows I’ve never stopped being fifteen. YA hadn’t really existed, per se, when I was a teen, and I was wowed by what I was reading: Gingerbread by Rachel Cohn, Weetzie Bat by Francesca Lia Block, Feed by M.T. Anderson, Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, Tithe by Holly Black, among others. I read it all the time. And I love reading what my friends have written. That’s a joy. I read like a fan.
As for what keeps me reading it, well, it’s great stuff. Who wouldn’t want to read something that keeps you turning pages while also engaging you emotionally and making you think about life and how you’re living it?
What was the inspiration for Going Bovine? Was it from a love of road trips, or did the character exist first?
The seed of a strange idea inside a sad story existed first. My mother had told me the story of a man back in Texas who had been diagnosed with Creutzfeldt-Jakob’s disease, the human variant of mad cow. He suffered from hallucinations (The prions in CJ destroy your brain), one of which was to see flames shooting up. That horrified me and touched on some primal fear: If you can’t trust your reality, what happens? That led to another question: Well, what is the nature of reality? And another: Why are we here? Who designed this system, anyway? What happens to us when we die? And how do we really learn to live? So that was the start.
I do, however, love road trips and any sort of quest novel. And that’s where Don Quixote came in. Sort of the ultimate crazy road trip novel. I wanted to draw from that. Certainly, I owe a debt to Cervantes there. Not literally, because he’s dead and I can’t buy him a drink. But if I could, I would.
Is Cameron based on anyone you knew?
Not really. I’m sure he borrows from me an uncomfortable amount. I see a bit of my older brother and some of his pals in him. But characters usually surprise me during the writing and become whoever they’re going to be. Getting to know them is hard, ultimately joyous work.
Do you have a favorite scene in the book (that you can share without spoiling it)?
I’m partial to a scene that comes about midway through the book. Gonzo and Cameron are sharing a hotel room, and Gonzo has a bit of a freak-out, and we learn something deeper about him, about the burgeoning friendship between him and Cameron. It was tempting to have a real hug-it-out-kum-ba-yah moment. But that wouldn’t have been right for these two emotionally stunted people. And so it takes a left turn, and both characters collude to avoid the connection and in so doing, make a connection anyway. I hope I managed to stay true to who they are and not cheat. I hope.
The other moment is one between Dulcie and Cameron that takes place at the party house. And that’s all I’ll say.
Now, all the other scenes I didn’t mention have a complex. They’re paging their therapists even as I type. I’m sorry other scenes. You’re special in your own ways, too.
Road trips beg for music mixes. What songs are included on your ideal road trip soundtrack?
Depends on the road trip. I can tell you some of the tunes on the Going Bovine soundtrack. (I make a playlist for every book I write. I know. My method writing borders on the embarrassing.) Trouble/Ray LaMontagne, Pompeii AM Gotterdammerung/The Flaming Lips, She’s a Mystery to Me/Roy Orbison, One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces/Ben Folds Five, Keep the Car Running/Arcade Fire, Pink Moon/Nick Drake, Kick the Stones/Chris Whitley, Roadrunner/The Modern Lovers, Joy/Apollo 100. Volume at eleven, of course. Cheese Nips and Dr. Pepper optional.
Is there any question that you never get asked, that you really want someone to ask? What is it, and what’s the answer?
Q: Why is Clive Owen so obsessed with you?
A: I cannot say. I must protect his honor. I’m chivalrous like that.
After Going Bovine, what’s next for Libba Bray?
Shopping for chaps. I’m going to break the curse. Or die trying.
Libba Bray’s blog book tour has also included YABooksCentral and Good Bad and Unread. You can find out more about Ms. Bray, and her work by visiting her website at LibbaBray.com.
