#less shiny

Mary Miller's Less Shiny was Magic Helicopter Press's first release, back in 2008. Check out excerpts from the collection in elimae and SmokeLong Quarterly. Our next author catchup interview hears Mary chatting about those stories, what she's currently working on, and her take on readings.

1. You published Less Shiny, your first chapbook collection of stories and Magic Helicopter Press's first release, in late 2008. These stories have been praised for their controlled grittiness and portrayal of tumbled and tumbling relationships. Nearly 5 years past that collection, how do you view those stories now?

The stories that make up Less Shiny represent the best of my early flash fiction, and they're special to me in ways that the stories I’m currently writing could never be. After five years, I'm still hounding Mike for copies so I can give them away to people. I also really love chapbooks—how easy to carry they are, how readable. I met Jennifer Davis not long ago here in Austin and gave her a copy (Davis did the cover art for Less Shiny). She hadn't read it and seemed excited to receive it. It also makes me happy to have been Magic Helicopter’s first, to see how far the press has come.

2. In 2009, you published a full-length collection of stories, Big World, with short flight/long drive books. And since that time, you've been in graduate school, most recently as a Michener Fellow at the University of Texas-Austin. How has your writing changed since writing Less Shiny? How do the stories sit with the rest of the stuff you've done in Big World and since?

I think the stories in Less Shiny are smaller versions of the stories in Big World. The writing style is similar and the narrators and situations are similar. They’re stories about a young woman’s struggles with herself and her place in the world, as clichéd as that sounds. Over the last few years, my writing has changed. My range has grown; I’m doing a lot more research. I’m actually writing an essay about how I’m unable to write about myself in the way that I once was. The narrators in Less Shiny and Big World were versions of me; they shared my fears, doubts, and struggles. The older I get, though, the less interested I am in writing about myself, or the less I’m able to capture myself on the page. I’m not quite sure which it is.

3. Your stories have always had a memoir-like tone and feel to them. And I'm curious to hear that you're currently writing (at least one) essay(s). How does your approach differ when writing a prose piece that is strictly nonfiction from an autobiographically-charged fiction story?

Yes, I just finished an essay; I wrote it over the weekend while avoiding my novel and wondering why I hadn’t gone to the Hill Country with my friends. What happened was this: I started thinking about how my stories have changed over the years, how I’m unable to write about my life in the way that I once was, and wanted to try and figure out why. I’ve written very few essays over the years. I feel like essays should have a “point,” and I’m only able to raise questions. I didn’t figure anything out, but it was a nice exercise. I may try to strong arm a friend into putting it up online.

4. The stories in Less Shiny certainly rely on the struggling and disheartened point of view of women in flailing/failing relationships. In a story from the collection, originally published at NOÖ, "This Boy I Loved A Rock," the gender roles and the characters' struggles within those are the big hum created by this instrument you've created: the man provides the food (although it's not what the woman wants/needs), the woman is working to keep herself and the house neat and clean (although obsessively and destructively so), etc. What do you see as fiction's capabilities and perhaps obligation to shed light upon and discuss these types of gender relation issues in our society which currently struggles greatly with such roles?

I never think in terms of fiction’s capabilities, shedding light. I think this is probably why I’d never be much of an essayist. When I was writing “This Boy I Loved a Rock,” I was just writing a story. I didn’t think about where the food came from or the girl grooming herself as having anything to do with gender roles.

I don’t think a writer should be too self-aware, at least not while in the process of writing. I used to hate plays because I felt like so many of them started with an idea instead of a character. I like plays pretty well now, after reading so many of them, but I’m still turned off by a writer trying to insert an agenda into his/her work. I would hope that no one would ever describe a story of mine by saying “it’s about stereotypical gender roles.”

5. Last summer, I saw you in Atlanta at the solar anus reading series with the Southern Summer Comfort Tour, alongside Elizabeth Ellen, Brandi Wells, and others. People often huff and puff about readings, but I (usually) get really stoked for and at them. That reading was a great example of why I dig small press readings--lots of people crammed into a hot, hot art gallery, readers with energetic pieces, and the whole thing hosted by a solid literary community with everyone going out and hanging afterwards. What was that experience on that tour like for you? How do you feel about readings?

I had a really great time on the tour. Elizabeth is one of my closest friends and it’s always so good to see her. We’re kind of like sisters, i.e. we fight sometimes but always make up quickly. Those readings were particularly great because we invited writers in each city to join us, and became a part of their community for a night. And every place we went, we got to hang out with amazing people, like Ryan Call and Gene Morgan in Houston. I had been weirdly scared of Gene Morgan before that night, but he’s such a sweetheart (and has the coolest wife and an amazing boutique clothing store).

In general, I usually don’t love readings, though I’ve been to some amazing ones here in Austin. Nick Flynn blew my mind. And Denis Johnson was, well, Denis Johnson. This sounds obvious, but I think readings are best if you like the writer. A lot of people will just go to any ole reading to watch any ole person stand up on a stage and look at a piece of paper. I'm doing less and less of that, particularly now that I'm not editing a magazine. Sometimes poetry readings make me want to die.

6. What are you currently working on? What are you currently reading?

I’ve recently finished the final (final!) edits on my novel, The Last Days of California, which will be out in late winter/early spring of next year. I can’t wait to see an advanced reading copy, hold it in my hands. Now I’m working on a new project, another novel, which is inspired by the story of Mary Mallon, better known as Typhoid Mary. I have no idea what I’m doing, but it’s going okay so far. I would like to reiterate that I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing.