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Author Spotlight: Braeden Michaels
Braeden Michaels won 1st prize in Prose Poetry in the Northwind Writing Award 2023 for his poem “Echoes of Stale Air.” It is an honor to feature his Q&A here on Raw Earth Ink as part of our promotion of truly exceptional authors.
Q & A
Candice: In Echoes of Stale Air, you seem to master the genre of prose poetry, is this a genre you feel very attached to? If so, why? How do you feel it differs from poetry or prose alone?
Braeden: That is quite a compliment. I actually have not published much prose. I think prose for me is a bit more challenging because there is more structure than verse. Overall, I challenge myself as a writer to separate myself from others. I take a lot of pride in my craft in a few specific areas; creative title, imagery, and language. Prose for me tends to be a bit more challenging to incorporate imagery and to make the piece flow. I don’t see myself as a master but always looking to improve. I will say though I am very confident. There are pieces that I have finished and see that I have accomplished my goal after reading it.
C: In I Am the Color Black, your description is so vividly written, it has such an unapologetic blunt approach that distinguishes your writing. Is this intentional? If a style you are drawn toward, how did this come to be?
B: As a writer, I want all of the senses to be felt within my work. Yes, I want the majority of my pieces to grab you by the throat. Is this intentional? Absolutely. I create conspicuous phrases and compelling lines to make you reread it again. To me it’s a recipe, a pinch of this and a pinch of that but never too much of one ingredient to consume you. As far as this particular piece I will turn into a book. This project will be layered meaning I will take a phrase from each piece and be the title of the next poem. Each of my books have a different feel and objective to them.
C: What wakes you up in the night and gets you writing?
B: Actually, I get my best ideas from a good night sleep. I tend to wake up with titles or phrases in my head.
C: Where do you feel you struggle the most as a writer, in terms of any aspect of the writing experience to you personally?
B: I started to write between 8 and 10 years old. I spent my youth hiding it and didn’t realize I was writing poetry until high school. My mother was constantly sick growing up and she was the only one who saw that I had a gift. Most of the pieces I wrote were dark and just felt misunderstood. My first book “The Raven’s Poison” is the only book where a reader will read pieces that reflect some of my personal experiences. I struggle to put myself into my work because I don’t want my work to be repetitive. My focus as a poet is to be a storyteller and tend to see the world from a different perspective so my work is gravitational.
C: What do you get out of other writers and how? Meaning, when you read a book, you absolutely love, what is it specifically that really pulls you in?
B: I am generally pulled in by the details and intelligence of the writing. If I see holes in a plot, I stop reading. Dialogue has to feel realistic. I tend to analyze everything I read and watch.
C: Which writers have cultivated in you an urge to write as well as them, even if differently and what was it about their writing or story that encouraged you to begin your journey as a writer?
B: The poem that inspired me to write and say I want to be a poet was “Howl” by Allen Ginsberg. I am a huge fan of the Beat Generation. It was first time you read poetry with curse words. The poetry from this group was unhinged, poetry that spoke the truth. I have read “Howl” a dozen times and wanted to do something similar but with my voice. COVID hit and the world begin to change. It inspired me to write “Growl from the Sun.” My approach to this poem wasn’t about sides but about humanity. If I had to pick a few pieces that someone should read, this poem would be one.
C: If you were describing yourself to someone else, anonymously and they did not know you, what would you want them to know about you?
B: This is a great question. I don’t like to describe or advertise who I am. I want people to ask the right questions and let them decide who I am. Many of us advertise who we are, and our actions don’t often reflect who we are. I tend to speak the truth and people generally don’t want to hear it.
C: What do you make of writers who do MFA programs versus those who do not? In other words, do you think a writer needs a degree of ‘education’ or do you believe a writer is born able to write or becomes able to write through lived experience primarily?
B: Education is subjective and there are different types of writing. I think most creative writing can be a combination of experience, natural ability, and some form of education. It depends on what you want to do as well. I seek out poets that I don’t know and try to read them to improve my craft. Reading and writing go hand in hand to improve.
C: What role do you think mental health plays in our role as writers? Can you be entirely balanced as a writer? Does it tend to attract people who struggle in some way? Has it no bearing? How does it play into a writer’s output if at all?
B: I get the impression from society’s point of view that a writer is different, unique, eccentric, and a little off beat. The view of a poet is somewhat similar but add “broken” to that definition. A poet is writing to tell their story, heal, maybe help others. I think as a poet we attract those who can relate to it. I think writing is very therapeutic and again for me it is challenging because I need it to be. The day it’s not I will stop writing. I think we all write for different reasons and sure it helps our mental health.
C: Share something random with me…
B: Most of us would rather be right and lose someone than admitting they are wrong and have someone.
BRAEDEN MICHAELS is an American author living in beautiful Georgia with his family and his own unique creativity. Within his analytical mind dwell the many passages and corners of a world built by observation, investigative perception, and penetrating rationale. He’s been published in several anthologies as well as his own books of poetry, written in the method of Deconstructive Literature, in which he pulls apart nuances within human nature then organizes and restores it in poetic style. You can read more from him on his website.
Blog: braedenmichaels.com
Instagram: @braeden.michaels.author
To read The 2023 Northwind Treasury, including Braeden’s winning piece, you can purchase it (come December) in paperback on Lulu, Barnes & Noble, or Amazon or as an eBook on Lulu, Nook, Kobo, or Kindle. To see the list of contents and winners, visit our winner’s page.
Author Spotlight: Wren Oldham
Wren Oldham won 2nd prize in Fiction in the Northwind Writing Award 2023 for the story “Never Seen or Heard from Again” It is an honor to feature they’re Q&A here on Raw Earth Ink as part of our promotion of truly exceptional authors.
Q & A
Candice: In Never Seen Or Heard From Again there is a fluid and natural mastery of the genre of the short story, is this a genre you feel very attached to? If so, why?
W: I’ve always enjoyed a good short story. Sometimes an idea, no matter how engaging, just, doesn’t have enough meat to it to become a full-length novel or novella on its own, while still being worth putting to paper. Additionally, I’ve always felt little bite-size pieces of fiction can be a very engaging format, and with say, an anthology, if one story doesn’t land for a particular reader, well, just get through the next few pages and we’ll be on to the next one. It can be a nice contrast to reading say, an 800-page fantasy epic or something.
C: The premise of your short story is incredibly clever because you unfold the purpose with tremendous subtlety and involve the reader from the beginning. I particularly liked how you set it in a definite period in time and I felt it was very visual. Do you feel short stories need that level of placement (in time, with visual emphasis) to do well and draw the reader in?
W: I’m personally of the opinion that giving any hard-and-fast rules for what makes any kind of fiction work is a bit of a fool’s endeavor. The basics are, of course, helpful guide posts, plot structure and trope-savviness and all that, but in the end, for every little thing I can recall reading that a good story “needs”, I can think of examples that break that mold but are nonetheless engaging and enjoyable. That said, my intentions in setting this particular story in the time period I did and in writing in a more visual style had more to do with my own ‘vision’ so to speak than anything else. Originally, the idea came to me in the form of a sort of ‘short film’ in my head, and my challenge was to transform this very visual idea into a textual format while maintaining the original tone and feel I had envisioned.
C: In Never Seen or Heard from Again, there is a definite homage to the challenges in the past regarding individuals born identifying as the opposite gender. Not much has historically been written about this and yet, humans across time must have grappled with this in societies that did not accept it. Your gentle recognition of this quiet suffering was very moving; is this a subject you feel passionately about? How so?
W: As a nonbinary person, I feel it’s very important to portray the full spectrum of gender and sexuality, as well as to acknowledge that this spectrum existed even before the people on it had terms with which to describe themselves. On a more personal note, I did base some of the emotions in the text on experiences I had myself when I was younger, namely the experience of dysphoria.
C: Those readers who may not be interested or supportive of the struggles of LGBTQ+ might be turned off this story because of its potential ‘woke’ elements, but you transcend their bias by the mastery of your writing – whereby you can tell a story regardless of subject and bring home a lot of sympathy and emotion for the subject. I would say this is the true gift of a writer, to proffer a controversial subject that some may typically reject, and for those people to warm to the subject because of the quality of storytelling. As you wrote this, did you wonder how it would be received and what some readers might think, given there is still prejudice out there? How did that impact your direction and narrative?
W: I suppose I write my queer stories with a certain level of subtlety, though I’ll be honest, re-reading the story, the trans reveal feels very obvious to me. Granted, I’m the one who wrote it, so I suppose that makes sense, but I do feel like a trans reader would pick up on it a bit quicker than many cisgender audiences might. Apologies for being such a rambler, but to get to your main question, no, I try not to worry about others’ biases when I’m writing. I’m far more concerned with my own biases, as in, ensuring I’m portraying marginalized people as respectfully as I can, both for groups I belong to as well as ones I do not. If a reader puts my story down, or if someone refuses to publish my work on the basis of my inclusion of LGBT+ themes, that would hurt, but in my mind it would speak more to that individual and the way they relate to these themes as opposed to any flaw on my part as a writer.
C: How does autism influence your writing if at all? In terms of your perception or how you believe you are perceived and how you communicate?
W: I feel being an autistic person does influence my writing in that I’m not as rigidly married to traditional ideas of structure or the ‘rules’ of storytelling as a neurotypical writer of the same skill level might be. Additionally, as my communication style can be a bit difficult for neurotypicals to jive with, I tend to over explain myself, hence why all these answers are so long, haha.
Frankly, though, this one is a bit hard to answer. Feel free to leave this bit out if it comes off as too confrontational, but to demonstrate why, I’ll fire back.
How does being allistic (Not autistic) impact other peoples’ work and passions? How do you describe the way your brain works in opposition to others’ when you can’t see or experience how their minds work? Is that even possible to answer? Maybe, but personally, I find the prospect a bit daunting.
tara’s response: I found this a really great response, because it’s not always easy to put ourselves in other’s shoes. So what is normal for me is not for you and vice versa. And that’s okay!
C: I found the description of your couple was immaculately portrayed, whereby I was left wanting to know (what became of them) but glad you ended it where you did (without us ever knowing) which tied so well to the title of this piece. Do you consider all those things as you write or do, they just come out that way, almost intentional without being?
W: I do enjoy keeping things vague in my writing; it’s just more fun to me that way. And I mean, I think the answer is a bit of both? I definitely intended to be a bit vague as I was in the process of writing, but also, when I first envisioned the story in my head, that final line was always in there. The double-meaning of the phrase just sort of, appealed to me, once I’d thought of it.
C: Why do you think autistic people are more likely to be gender-fluid than those who are not on the spectrum, is there a relationship in your opinion?
W: I don’t necessarily think autistic people are MORE likely to be LGBT than the general population. Rather, I am of the opinion that autistic people are more likely to consider that they might be LGBT and to explore that idea than others, if that makes sense.
For instance, a neurotypical might write off any non-standard ideas about their own gender and sexuality for the sake of keeping the status quo intact. Meanwhile, a non-diagnosed autistic person who’s repeatedly heard LGBT people describe their experiences of “Knowing they’re different, but not knowing why” and find that that resonates, thereby enticing them to consider whether they, themselves, may be part of that group.
I hope that makes sense, my thoughts on the subject can be a bit difficult to explain properly.
C: As a ghostwriter do you find you approach the genre of storytelling differently to writing your own fiction, and how does your experience of being a writer, assist you in ghostwriting others works?
W: Ghostwriting is a very different beast indeed; more like, say, doing a creative writing project in school than to writing something on my own time. I have some creative freedom, yes, but I’m also limited in the topics I can cover and the language and formatting I’m allowed to use.
C: When you write your own material, are you aware how incredibly clever and insightful your subtle awareness of human nature is to the reader? Do you get a lot of feedback on your subjects given they are very ‘now’ in terms of their relevance to modern society and our shifts in what matters to us?
W: You’re seriously going to make me blush, haha. Frankly, I don’t tend to get much feedback at all; WordPress users don’t seem big on leaving comments, and I admittedly don’t have much experience of having my own work published. Frankly, I don’t feel the subject matter to be especially ‘now’, given the sorts of things I tend to read. For instance, did you know Octavia Butler, an author who died in 2005, included topics such as bisexuality and even characters who could be interpreted as gender fluid in her Patternist series, which ran from 1976-1980? You have to dig sometimes to find it, but people have been writing about this stuff for a while now.
C: Does your own personal gender-fluidity impact the subjects you choose? Do you have an aim to speak for people who have similar experiences, outlooks and life stories to your own?
W: My identity as a queer person definitely impacts the subjects I choose, namely that I often find myself a bit bored when reading say, a cis straight romance novel or something of the like. Not that I can’t write a cis straight character, just that a world feels more fleshed out and real to me when it’s acknowledged that queer and trans people exist within it.
I’m not sure I can say I intend to “speak for” the groups I belong to, because they’re incredibly diverse. My experiences and those of any other gender fluid person can vary wildly, and the same goes for other autistic people.
That said, I do intend to speak for myself, for my experiences, and to write things and include topics that I would enjoy reading. I can only hope that my work might resonate with others; to me, hearing “your work spoke to me on a deeper level” would be among the highest praise I could receive.
C: Many writers claim they do not need to read to be a writer. You mention your appreciation of other writers, how has being a reader impacted your ability and desire to write? Is it hard to avoid comparison? Or can it be beneficial?
W: Writers say that? Huh, that’s wild to me, but to each their own I suppose. Having been an avid reader for most of my life is probably the only reason I ever stuck with writing; as a kid, I had to be dragged out of the library by my dad once a week, usually holding a stack of books that rose to the top of my head. I feel like reading so much gave me a lot of the tools I needed to be a successful writer despite not having much formal education on the topic.
As for the point about comparison, oh God, yes, it is so hard sometimes to avoid comparing myself to other writers I enjoy. I often have to remind myself that the likes of Neil Gaiman and George RR Martin have been doing this for decades and that I don’t need to feel I’m immediately on their level for my work to be ‘good enough’ or what have you. Still, all in all, I do feel like my love of reading has benefited my skill, though it can be a bit of a double-edged sword at times, haha.
C: Whilst being gender-fluid rejects notions of determined gender, do you ever find that your writing has a gender? Or do you consciously try to avoid such labels and confines? How does gender impact authors in general? Do you think it holds them back? Restricts them? Makes them predictable or limits them? What does a gender-fluid writer bring to the table in that regard?
W: I think that gender is a social construct, though one that can definitely be limiting to some writers. For instance, I’m sure there’s probably some cis woman author out there who’s writing bodice-ripping romance when if she stopped to consider it, she might be more drawn to writing swashbuckling adventures or horror stories. I also feel like some authors can be limited by their perceptions of what they consider the “opposite” gender to be; ie, a male author who writes every female character to strongly desire motherhood and constantly compare themselves to every woman around them.
Still, I think a skillful writer with a good well of empathy and understanding can overcome these challenges, regardless of gender. Having an idea of gender as more of a role people can choose to play or not play than as who they intrinsically are I do think helps avoid these pitfalls somewhat.
C: When you compare how you wrote when you began and now, what are the most palpable differences you observe in how that writing has shifted?
W: The stuff I write now embarrasses me less to re-read, haha. Granted, when I began I was twelve and mostly wrote stuff that was either extremely depressing or bordering on edgelord territory. Also fanfiction, though I wasn’t as good at that. As for things I wrote as an adult, I feel the biggest difference is my growing confidence in my own abilities. Initially, when I got started again, I mostly wrote very short flash fiction or else, just let my brain vomit out whatever came to mind in an effort to get something onto a page. Nowadays, my writing is a lot more structured, and I try to put real intent behind it.
C: What wakes you up in the night and gets you writing? Or conversely, wakes you up early in the morning.
W: It’s been a while since I’ve done this since I don’t want to wake my partner, but as a youngster I would definitely get out of bed and find myself quickly scribbling down a poem or idea for a story. My motivation is mostly that I know the idea will be gone by the time I wake up in the morning and I don’t want to lose that spark of inspiration.
C: Where do you feel you struggle the most as a writer, in terms of any aspect of the writing experience to you personally?
W: Definitely procrastination. You see, I write on this magic box that’s full of video games and I can tab over and start watching Netflix whenever I feel like. I’ve actually started using a Pomodoro timer just because it helps me force myself to focus. Really makes one understand why George RR Martin writes on a PC from the ‘80s with no internet access.
C: What do you get out of other writers and how? Meaning, when you read a book, you absolutely love, what is it specifically that really pulls you in?
W: This is difficult because there are so many books I absolutely love, and it’s difficult to boil them all down into a single quality or set of qualities. Still, if I had to, I suppose I’d say that a good book to me needs to have some sense of emotional truth to it. For my very favorite authors, once I’ve read all their books, I often feel like I almost know the person on some level, if that makes sense. Not that everyone writes from literal experience, but that sense of emotional experience has to come from somewhere, and I think that tends to be what most resonates with me.
C: Which writers have cultivated in you, an urge to write as well as them, even if differently and what was it about their writing or story that encouraged you to begin your journey as a writer?
W: I know I’ve brought both up before, but Neil Gaiman and Octavia Butler, though I’m also partial to Effie Calvin, who writes queer-centric fantasy romances that I just adore. For Gaiman, in particular, I was exposed to his writing at a very young age, both his children’s literature as well as stuff I was definitely too young to be reading at the time. His rather poetic sensibilities and hints of magical realism that he inserts, even into very dark stories, has always really spoken to me, and I hope to one day be halfway as good a writer as I feel he is.
C: When you considered entering the Northwind Writing Award, did this consideration influence what you ended up submitting and why did you choose the pieces you chose?
W: I’ll be honest with you, I don’t remember. In between ghostwriting assignments I just sort of submit to contests as a way to hopefully boost my independent career, though as your press does appear willing to elevate marginalized voices I did feel more comfortable submitting this particular story.
C: Is there anything you really despise about writing or writers, a pet peeve or something that disgusts you when you read it?
W: I really don’t like allegories. I feel like authors will sometimes get so wrapped up in their story being an allegory for something else that they forget to make it make sense or be enjoyable to read. Yes, I got forced to read Lord of the Flies in high school, why do you ask? I jest, though that one in particular was one of my least favorite of the ‘classics’.
C: How do you envision your writing journey in say, five years’ time, what do you hope in terms of where you will find yourself?
W: With a movie deal that makes me fabulously wealthy enough to never have to worry about marketability in my writing again. I joke, but only partially. Realistically, in five years, I’d like to be making enough income off my own writing that I am reasonably comfortable and can be more selective about what freelance jobs I take on.
C: If you were describing yourself to someone else, anonymously and they did not know you, what would you want them to know about you?
W: That while I’m a bit long-winded and have a tendency to put my foot in my mouth at times, I really do mean well.
C: If you weren’t a writer, what do you think you’d have liked to do with your life and why?
W: Well, I’ve actually already done some political advocacy work with a group called Young Invincibles and found the atmosphere to be very comfortable, so I’d probably try to stay in an advocacy-centered space.
C: In this moment as you read this, name one novel that blew your socks off and describe why it did?
W: Picking just one is really difficult, since there are so many I love. I think in this case, though, I’ll go with The Chosen and the Beautiful, by Nghi Vo. It’s a magical realist reimagining of The Great Gatsby from the point of view of an Asian-American bisexual version of Jordan Baker. I’ve always loved The Great Gatsby despite its flaws, and I very much enjoyed reading a story that brought the original’s inherent queerness out of the realm of subtext and placed it front and center. I also enjoyed the fantastical elements, and how the entire thing was written in such a dreamlike fashion as to make readers unsure at times of what was really happening. I definitely enjoy a writer who can take on a more poetic style, and Vo does so beautifully.
C: Not in relation to writing per say (although everything is related if you’re a writer) what makes you really furious these days? And what makes you really happy?
W: Lots of things make me furious these days; we live in contentious times, and it only takes a glance through any given newsfeed to find some injustice or other going on in the world around us. Still, for the sake of my own wellbeing, I try to give myself space.
What makes me happy are simple things, finding a good book or a good game to play, spending a day working on a new sculpture while my partner and I take in a good show, that sort of thing.
Granted, none of that compares to the ecstatic glee I felt when I got you guys’s first email- reading “Congratulations!” when, as a writer, you learn to expect rejection letters nine times out of ten, was a high in its own right.
C: What role do you think mental health plays in our role as writer? Can you be entirely balanced as a writer? Does it tend to attract people who struggle in some way? Has it no bearing? How does it play into a writer’s output if at all?
W: I don’t think you have to be mentally ill to be a writer, though most writers I know of are. I do think writing does tend to attract struggling people, because everyone wants to have their feelings validated, to know that they have been heard. Writing can be a great way to get what are often messy complicated emotions out in a coherent way. Still, I do feel like it can negatively impact output. When I’m feeling depressed, for instance, I might be able to pump out a sad poem or two, or I might do some stream-of-consciousness journaling to get the emotions out, but it completely saps my motivation to say, actually get my ghostwriting assignments done on time.
I can write about depression in a coherent, thoughtful way, yes, but not while I’m at my lowest point; I think you have to have a bit of distance from which to look upon your feelings in that state in order to fully understand them, if that makes sense.
Wren Oldham is an autistic gender-fluid poet, originally from Oklahoma, though they now reside in Colorado Springs, Colorado with their cat and partner.. They have been writing on a hobbyist basis for 14 years now, and in 2022 took up freelance writing. They’re currently in the process of ghostwriting a series of novellas.
They previously had a poem featured in the online publication ‘The Creative Zine’, as well as being a finalist in Globe Soup’s 7-Day Story Writing Challenge. Their hobbies include reading and sculpting, and they’re a big fan of authors Neil Gaiman and Octavia Butler.
They currently run a WordPress blog, a Linkedin profile, as well as one on Upwork, the latter of which is how they have found the majority of their clients.
To read The 2023 Northwind Treasury, including Wren’s winning piece, you can purchase it (come December) in paperback on Lulu, Barnes & Noble, or Amazon or as an eBook on Lulu, Nook, Kobo, or Kindle. To see the list of contents and winners, visit our winner’s page.
Author Spotlight: Logan Medland
Logan Medland won 1st prize in Fiction in the Northwind Writing Award 2023 for his short story “Start a Religion – Stay Out of Jail.” It is an honor to feature his Q&A here on Raw Earth Ink as part of our promotion of truly exceptional authors.
Q & A
Candice: In Start a Religion – Stay out of Jail, you seem to master the genre of the short story, is this a genre you feel very attached to? If so, why? How do you feel it differs from poetry or prose alone? Is it challenging given you have also written novels, to put everything together with the restrictions of a short-story.
Logan: Short story writing was always my first love. The form seems to me as simple as a piece of music. An idea that begins, perhaps with a phrase, and then grows into its own completion, anywhere from a page to twenty pages. To me a short story feels like one idea, or one riff, worked out. When I started to work on longer forms: novels, plays, musicals, the difficult lesson that I had to learn was how to understand form and structure in a larger piece. This involved getting very lost in the forest at times. Short stories have always felt like a single journey and often, when I get an idea for one I already have a glimpse of the ending.
C: As a musician, how do you compare musical scores with the written word, if that’s possible? How are they alike or different in your experience with both?
L: To me music and writing come from essentially the same place, which has to do with a movement of ideas through time. Sentences have rhythm, tone, color, accents, cadences, pauses and dissonance, just like music. In music, like in writing, a central theme connects everything.
C: A favorite line from Start A Religion – Stay Out Of Jail is: “One morning a man from a rival religion came to our door. He told me he was a member of CROC, The Church for the Removal of Obstinate Cults. It was his duty to stop the pagan activities that have been taking place under the cover of our religion. I told him the media had misrepresented us; that we were merely goat farmers with a flair for theatricality.” You’re incredibly funny, are you like that in life as well as the written word? How important is humor to you? Especially when dealing with potentially serious subject matter.
L: I’d like to think I’m incredibly funny in real life, but I think I’m more the type that thinks of the funny thing to say while in the car on the way home from the party. I do live very much for a certain sense of absurdity. It seems like we live in a crazy world, and having a strong sense of the absurd protects me surrendering to some of the madness in which we live.
C: Is writing in Canada and writing in New York City two different experiences for you and how? In other words, is there a big city voice and a smaller city voice? Countryside voice? Are there distinctions you’re aware of that differentiate Canadian writers from American? Or do you see it as more an age/race/gender/location issue, than nationality?
L: I feel like there are definitely national differences for writing. Canadian writers tend more toward the poetic and personal I feel, Americans more towards big issues. While in Canada I lived for many years in a very rural area. I think it influences setting and characters, you have to write about what’s around you of course. Ultimately I think a writer’s voice is an individual thing, definitely all of age/race/gender etc play a part, but for me it comes down in the end to personal life experiences: we all draw from the subconscious, so the way your pysche was formed is the well that you draw from. This effects which writers first spark your imagination and what you want to write about.
C: Start a Religion – Stay Out of Jail – was a judges favorite because it possesses a rare combination of being both humorous and incredibly clever, whilst also telling and insightful as to cults, people and human nature. Not easy to do, it could have fallen flat but it didn’t. I found myself laughing out loud, nodding and also feeling anger and sorrow. How do you fit all of this into one short story!
L: This story came about from the first sentence and flowed quickly from there. At the time I was living in the country and we were pretty isolated, so the idea of actually starting a cult seemed kind of plausible in a ridiculous kind of way. People I knew were starting yoga schools, life-coaching businesses etc. so this seemed to me only one more step. To me absurdism is so close to real life, you only have to shift a few things for it to become comedic and sad at the same time.
C: You are a pianist and composer and director of musicals; why are you writing short stories? Is there an impetus that isn’t met in music? Or do they compliment each other as invariable facets of the same thing; the creative impulse?
L: Oddly enough for me, my early music career was in classical music, which gave me a huge amount of discipline, but not a lot of creative outlet because you are only interpreting the works of others. I tried writing classical music at one time, but found that I was very restricted, I guess with too much reverence for the masters and didn’t find my voice there. As an avid reader from a very early age, words came easier, and with less self-judgement. At present I’m working a lot on writing new musicals: writing in a more popular vein: musicals as opposed to classical music is liberating, and writing for theatre enables me to play with words and music at the same time. Oddly enough I don’t really feel there’s a strong distinction between “commercial” and “artistic” writing, the only differences are really in terms of genre.
C: In Hurricanes in the South, your description is so vividly written, it has such an unapologetic blunt approach that distinguishes your writing. Is this intentional? If a style you are drawn toward, how did this come to be? You focus on the real but using extreme events to illustrate some of the metaphor around the chosen subject. Here there is a seeming zombie-apocalypse but I get a sense this is much more about the modern world underneath the obvious. As if the speaker is seeing people as dead because they feel dead (to them) not literally but figuratively.
L: The style of this story I think came about as a way to contrast the the catastrophe surrounding the narrator. In a way it felt like this character had to be detached and almost unemotional to talk about this. Like they were a hollowed out person. And of course, yes, this is definitely all a metaphor, but hopefully not one that’s too specific ie it really could be about any kind of wasteland and loss: spiritual, cultural, physical, or simply the death of hope or faith.
C: Be honest, you don’t sleep do you? I say this because who can do everything you do and still have time to write award-winning short-story-fiction? What’s your secret? Or what’s in your coffee?
L: Haha, I do like to sleep, but sometimes I get caught between being a night owl, and an early riser. Being a freelance artist is both a blessing and a curse. When I have time away from music directing and professional music gigs, I keep myself sane by writing. Sometimes I have several months free, and if I didn’t create, I’d probably get very stressed about work. There’s something satisfying about creating your own work that gives me strength. In all honesty, there’s a certain restlessness that gets me up in the morning, and an awareness that time is always fleeting that gets me motivated when I get lazy.
C: In Hurricanes In The South, one favorite line is; “I wait for what must be years. Days at least. Minutes or hours, seconds, millenniums. It’s a long time anyway, if time is the right word. An elongated moment that stretches and stretches and simply cannot be snipped off. I give up hope; I get up and run around the house in a frenzy. I stick my fingers in an electric socket; I take a knife to my arms.” I read this several times and it felt to me very much like you were writing about a universal experience most of us can tap into. How important is it for your work to speak to people about their own experiences, even if not direct? To indirectly demand they consider things that are hard and potentially painful?
L: I’m so glad you like this moment! To me it’s the culmination of the story. It’s a moment that is very despairing for the narrator, and yet also is not quite real, the electricity doesn’t work and the knives are dull, in this strange dystopia in which he is living, even suicide does not seem real. But I think it gets to the heart of the alienation this person is feeling and I’m glad it came through. I genuinely hope that writing, and reading other’s writing is an effective way to deal with some of the worst things in life. I think the thing that comes to me now, rereading this story, is how little the narrator is able to feel anything.
C: The direct writing approach is very distinctive, and when employed by a writer of short fiction often seen as a more masculine way of writing. If you didn’t know better, would you say your writing has a gender? If not, how do you feel your writing evolves in terms of the way it approaches the reader?
L: I have written a lot of stories in first person. I feel like there’s something very immediate about the voice, and the character is immediately more intimate with the reader. I’m not sure there’s a gender to my writing voice, ideally each character would have somewhat of a different voice, some more masculine or feminine, along a spectrum. Being a writer and assuming the voice of a character allows one to explore other tonalities within oneself.
C: When you compare how you wrote when you began and now, what are the most palpable differences you observe in how that writing has shifted?
L: The biggest difference in my writing now is knowing more of what to leave out. Often when I go back and rework old work, it’s ninety percent cutting things out. Sometimes you cut what you once thought were some of the best lines, which now seem overwritten.
C: What wakes you up in the night and gets you writing? Or conversely, wakes you up early in the morning.
L: There’s nothing more exciting than a new good idea. I used to carry around a pad in the old days before cell phones, but now the memo page is full of stuff tapped out at various times, and every once in a while I go through and reread old memos and discover some wonderfully odd things. For me, it’s really just the pursuit of a really strong unusual idea, and then the problem solving that takes place when you work out that idea over the longer term.
C: Where do you feel you struggle the most as a writer, in terms of any aspect of the writing experience to you personally?
L: The biggest challenge is simply keeping the faith. Trying to make a living as an artist has been a long journey with many highs and lows, and the struggle to find any kind of publication or readership makes one doubt one’s abilities and want to give up.
C: What do you get out of other writers and how? Meaning, when you read a book, you absolutely love, what is it specifically that really pulls you in?
L: That’s a big question. I think it has to do with – for example, taking cooking as a metaphor. Reading a great book is like seeing a dish really well made, first in the process – I always have a huge respect for that – but then also the way it all comes together in a soulful or emotional experience, the way a great meal moves you emotionally, and then there’s the third aspect of it, the realizations that come with great literature: that you can read something and be forever changed by it.
C: Which writers have cultivated in you an urge to write as well as them, even if differently and what was it about their writing or story that encouraged you to begin your journey as a writer?
L: So many: Initially Dostoevsky (Notes from the Underground) gave me a love of perverse characters and unique voice, Chekov, for his clarity and playfulness and then later Calvino and Barthelme. From Bartheleme, I loved the notion that many of his stories seemed like extended riffs. Take an idea and keep pushing it. I have a huge respect for Kurt Vonnegut: his ability to combine a colloquial style with very large philosophical questions. I think all of these writers have a sense of playfulness that I connected with.
C: How much does the physicality of your existence influence your writing? And what else do you believe really drives you as a writer in terms of influence and/or tools that you utilize consciously or subconsciously to craft your storytelling?
L: This is a challenging question I’ve never thought of. I do think there are writers who live an entirely different life in their literature: people with lifelong illnesses who can be someone else in their writing, and that it is therefore an escape. I think the things that influence a writer have to do with how they process the world. For me, I think wit, irony, philosophizing are coping mechanisms.
C: Is there anything you really despise about writing or writers, a pet peeve or something that disgusts you when you read it?
L: I’m not a big fan of didactic writing. I don’t care about a writer’s politics, I don’t want to see an echo of myself in someone else’s writing, and I want to see flawed human beings as characters in writing, not “good” or “bad” people. I don’t think writing should be about “teachable moments”, it should be about exploring the breadth of the human soul and human experience, from the glorious to the perverse.
C: How do you envision your writing journey in say, five years’ time, what do you hope in terms of where you will find yourself?
L: Well wishfully thinking … there’s a lot I’d like to have happen. But realistically, what I want in five years time is more opportunities to write, both for theatre and for fiction, and to get the opportunity to use my skills to share my work more widely.
C: If you were describing yourself to someone else, anonymously and they did not know you, what would you want them to know about you?
L: I’m like the duck that looks like they are sitting very serenely on the pond, but underneath there’s a whole lot of furious paddling going on.
C: If you weren’t a writer, what do you think you’d have liked to do with your life and why?
L: At one time, I really wanted to be a painter.
C: In this moment as you read this, name one novel that blew your socks off and describe why it did?
L: Italo Calvino’s “If on a Winter’s Night a Traveller” was one book that really blew me away on first read.
C: Do you think film and plays and theater, music and dance and all those other forms of art, and entertainment, influence a writer as much as novels and writing do?
L: I would hope they do. I think fiction benefits from having outside influences. I love writer’s with a sense of theatricality, musicality etc.
C: What do you make of writers who do MFA programs versus those who do not? In other words, do you think a writer needs a degree of ‘education’ or do you believe a writer is born able to write or becomes able to write through lived experience primarily?
L: I never did an MFA program, though I did a classical music degree. I feel like the biggest danger in the “higher eduction” of artistic fields is that it risks homogenizing writing, and an individual voice is harder to find. I think an artist should struggle, find mentors, copy their betters and write until they’ve gotten written of all their bad writing. We have had centuries of great literature without MFA programs.
C: Not in relation to writing per say (although everything is related if you’re a writer) what makes you really furious these days? And what makes you really happy?
L: Well …. I could get into politics here, but … in all honesty there aren’t a lot of things that make me furious except online customer “service” and airline travel. Aside from this there are a few things that make me despair, the biggest being how with only a little more effort and intelligence and kindness we could make this world a lot better and yet we don’t.
C: What role do you think mental health plays in our role as writers? Can you be entirely balanced as a writer? Does it tend to attract people who struggle in some way? Has it no bearing? How does it play into a writer’s output if at all?
L: Great question! Writing in my youth was definitely a way to process mental health issues. Poems in my teens were ways to deal with depression and anxiety and to try and process a world I didn’t understand. The arts in general are a form of meditation for me, which has been a great mental health tool. Yes artists do tend to be crazy, but I’m not sure if they are drawn to the arts because they are, or because a life in the arts makes you unstable. I think people who are off-kilter have a lot to offer the world, and I also think certain types recognize they can’t live a typical “normal” life and give themselves permission to fly their own “freak flag”.
C: Do you consider yourself an indie writer? What do indie writers bring to the table that other kinds of writers such as large-publisher-writers or journalists do not possess or utilize?
L: I guess I’m an indie writer yes. I think everything right now is so much about publicity, and clicks and “platforms” and “brands” etc, that we miss out on really interesting off-kilter perspectives from real people. So much of our cultural life, and our experience is commodified. It’s nice to come across stuff that isn’t.
Logan Medland is a writer and professional musician based out of New York City. His short stories have been published in numerous literary magazines in Canada (where he’s from). In the U.S. both his first
novel: The Edge of the World, and his second novel: That Mad Cervantes, were semi-finalists in the Amazon Emerging Novel Competition. He is the composer and writer of Fingers and Toes, a 30’s era musical that was part of the New York Musical Festival in 2010, and has had three regional productions since then. Most recently he wrote music and lyrics for “Love Goddess: The Rita Hayworth Musical” which played Off-West End at the Cockpit Theatre, November/December 2022 and is currently under development for a U.S. production. Since the early 2000’s he has worked as a professional music director/arranger and pianist for Broadway and Off-Broadway shows such as “Cats” (International tour),
Chicago (US tour) Jersey Boys (US tour) and “Dr. Zhivago” and “A Bronx Tale” on Broadway. He is currently working simultaneously as a composer, lyricist and book writer on a number of projects in
development.
To read The 2023 Northwind Treasury, including Logan’s winning piece, you can purchase it (come December) in paperback on Lulu, Barnes & Noble, or Amazon or as an eBook on Lulu, Nook, Kobo, or Kindle. To see the list of contents and winners, visit our winner’s page.
Birds Photography
*actually, this day I watched one crow knock over another one and was viciously pecking it and beating it. The other began crying out, it sounded in pain, until several other crows walked up, as if to break it up, they just surrounded them closer and closer until the bully let the loser hop away, crying and sadly croaking as it did. None of the crows did anything except surround the bully. When it hopped a couple times after the loser, they tightened their circle until it turned the other way and separated. Then they all went back their ways. Super fascinating interaction. I was absolutely touched and in awe. Love these birds.
*this was an interesting interaction. A young bald eagle flew across the property with what I believe were moose guts in its talons. It flew into one of the spruce trees on my land, landing about 2/3 down, went deep into the branches, hiding, eating. Two more adult eagles followed it. One landed on the ground below the tree and this one in a nearby tree.
tara caribou | ©️2023 all photos by me
Nov 4 Photography
tara caribou | ©️2023 all photos by me
Author Spotlight: Angela Townsend
Angela Townsend won 2nd prize in Non-fiction in the Northwind Writing Award 2023 for her non-fiction story “Basking.” It is an honor to feature her Q&A here on Raw Earth Ink as part of our promotion of truly exceptional authors.
Q & A
Candice: In your short story “Basking,” you seem to master the inner world of a new college student and her challenge with adapting to college-life manifesting in a degree of orthorexia or type of eating disorder. This is an important and oft neglected subject, is that one reason you chose it for a short story?
Angela: This topic is close to my heart, as “Basking” is inspired a bit by my own experience. In times of turmoil, I think we often reach for ways to squeeze life back into our own two hands. There is healing in surrendering to the great wild open, but we need gentle companions to help us feel safe on that odyssey.
C: You are close to your mother, is this relationship influential in your own writing, given her background as a writer also?
A: She is my constant inspiration. My Mom introduced me to the companionship of words before I could hold a crayon. We made weekly pilgrimages to the library, carrying home as many books as they’d allow, and she read me “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” and Maya Angelou’s poetry as far back as kindergarten. Of course, my favorite poems were always her own. We are our own little two-woman writers’ colony, with poetry and prose flying across Pennsylvania to one another every day. Her best friendship constantly gives me the courage and light to write from my soul.
C: Your studies include time in a Theological Seminary. Does that influence the style you employ as a writer in any way? Or the direction you choose? And if so, how?
A: I have always felt writing to be a gift from a generous, joyful God. For me, it is a sort of prayer. I am incorrigibly smitten with this ragged world, so I am always striving to bear witness to light. My small stories are nestled in the big story of mercy.
C: How does your admirable work with rescuing cats and your sanctuary, affect the direction of your writing if at all?
A: As grateful as I am for my education, it’s been my sixteen-plus years at Tabby’s Place that have honed my writing. My role at the sanctuary is storytelling, and the cats have been happy to school me in character studies. It is a challenge and a delight to honor these beings who seem to live in a state of grace, free from bitterness. They are gratitude on four legs, masters of mindfulness and mirth. They have also taught me most of what I know about comedy!
C: What wakes you up in the night/gets you up in the morning, and demands you write?
A: An overflow of love. For good and ill, I have always erred on the side of exuberance. I am incurably infatuated with people, animals, and the thousand glistening gifts of any ordinary day. I feel driven to capture it all, as a kind of thanks.
C: The humor of your story is inescapable. I particularly felt drawn to your description of The Walrus and how by the story’s end, Roy does not respond. For me, it was better that he not respond, as such unsung heroes do not relish attention but are perhaps angels among us. Do you feel similarly or was his role different for you?
A: You’ve captured it! I believe we are all granted a lavishment of companions across our timeline, some for just a season. Yet they travel with us always, asking only that we treasure them and let their love enlarge us.
C: What do you get out of other writers and how? Meaning, when you read a book, you absolutely love, what is it specifically that really pulls you in?
A: I experience other writers as my best friends. I am drawn to those writers who, even in thick lament, leave me with the sense that grace will prevail, and all shall be loved. Often the most sheltering words come from people whose lives are profoundly different from my own, yet with a family resemblance that makes the world feel like a hearth.
C: Which writers have cultivated in you an urge to write as well as them, even if differently and what was it about their writing or story that encouraged you to begin your journey as a writer?
A: My touchstones include Henri Nouwen, Emily Dickinson, Madeleine L’Engle, Anne Lamott, Brian Doyle, C.S. Lewis, Kathleen Norris, Mary Oliver, J.R.R. Tolkien, and Dave Barry. As different as they are, each one strikes me as having a conscious sense of being on pilgrimage, falling often but trusting greatly. They all take hold of rebel joy and love life furiously, even in times of torrential tears. They also own their odd and incandescent selves fully, something I am a long way from doing!
C: Your story touched me on many levels, not least in really illustrating the challenges of going to University and how they can exacerbate ‘conditions’ such as anorexia, because of being alone for the first time. What was your goal with this story in terms of what you wanted to ultimately convey?
A: I think the essential message is that we are never ultimately alone. Our seasons of barest isolation are ringed with angels, who may wear bushy mustaches or Java City aprons. There is nowhere we can travel where we can’t find mercy.
C: The encouragement aspect of your story was inescapable, and one of the most poignant elements. Do you believe encouragement goes a long way in building others up and helping them avoid falling? When we consider the high attrition rates in education, especially University, how important is this?
A: I believe encouragement is as essential as breath. We as a species are exasperatingly blind to our own light, and it is the better part of love to merely be a mirror. I attribute the entirety of my thriving to the encouragement of my family, and I see daily how a mere handful of words can give someone back to themselves. I keep a secret, sacred “encouragement” folder in my own inbox!
C: How much does the physicality of your existence influence your writing? And what else do you believe really drives you as a writer in terms of influence and/or tools that you utilize consciously or subconsciously to craft your storytelling?
A: Although I would do cartwheels for a cure, I would never trade away the force with which a lifetime of Type 1 diabetes has turned me to writing. They don’t use this word anymore, but when I was diagnosed at age nine, they described me as a “brittle” diabetic – particularly challenging to control (which is, of course, a problematic word in itself). I learned quickly that, even if I felt poorly, I could transcend my body when I wrote. With my little notebook, my weary body became fully cheetah, free. Writing has been a kind of peace treaty between body and soul for me, where they can meet on healing ground.
C: Is there anything you really despise about writing or writers, a pet peeve or something that disgusts you when you read it?
A: I grieve all instances of meanness and competition turned caustic. I am a big believer that “we need us all,” and that there is room at love’s table for the whole kaleidoscope of words and their wielders. To turn the question around, my heart thrills every time I feel part of a gentle, generous community of writers rejoicing in each other.
C: How do you envision your writing journey in say, five years’ time, what do you hope in terms of where you will find yourself?
A: If I could trust that my words offer candles and companionship, that would be the highest joy. Whenever my ego belches a desire for accolades, I remind it that the goal is to bear hope and light, and to trust that my little offerings will land where they are intended.
C: If you were describing yourself to someone else, anonymously and they did not know you, what would you want them to know about you?
A: Although she stumbles hourly, Angie strives to do everything from love.
C: Do you think a writer needs a degree of ‘education’ or do you believe a writer is born able to write or becomes able to write through lived experience primarily?
A: I believe there are as many paths to life-giving writing as there are lives. For this reason, I’ve always been ravenous for biographies of writers, a motley lot of miracles!
C: Your animal family: how do they encourage you? Would you be the person you are today if they were not in your life?
A: I don’t believe I could write another paragraph if not for these comedians and counselors. Animals live with such a shimmery immediacy, they lead me to experience my life in real-time, which is the only address for inspiration. I am exasperatingly indoorsy, but they nudge me to remember that I am “in nature” by the sheer, spectacular virtue of having a body. They love without calculus and have never heard the word “worthy,” so they are singularly good at picking me up from rejection or just a rumply day. And they have never heard of Pushcart nominations or The Paris Review, so they catch my wandering ego when it loses love’s path!
Angela Townsend is the Development Director at Tabby’s Place: a Cat Sanctuary, where she is honored to bear witness to mercy for all beings. She has an M.Div. from Princeton Theological Seminary and B.A. from Vassar College. Her work appears in bioStories, Cagibi, Dappled Things, Fathom Magazine, Hawaii Pacific Review, and The Razor, among others. Angie has lived with Type 1 diabetes for 33 years, laughs with her poet mother every morning, and loves life affectionately. She lives outside Philadelphia with two shaggy comets disguised as cats.
To read The 2023 Northwind Treasury, including Angela’s winning piece, you can purchase it (come December) in paperback on Lulu, Barnes & Noble, or Amazon or as an eBook on Lulu, Nook, Kobo, or Kindle. To see the list of contents and winners, visit our winner’s page.
Book Review – Lockless Doors in the Land of Harsh Angels by Dave Matthes
Available at Amazon.
I read this book as a paperback. This is an unsolicited review.
The Review:
I really enjoyed this book. The tragedy and drama of the Ponce siblings kept me up a bit late a couple nights as I read it. Each one a train-wreck of a person but somehow lovable – flaws, quirks, and all. I appreciated how unapologetic each of them were. Unapologetic in their personality and in their decisions. In their love and in their mistakes. It was as if Matthes created a family who on the surface appears dysfunctional, yet they have each come to realize who they are and they aren’t afraid to be themselves.
The story is told from Ed’s point of view, as he finally reveals (in the form of an admission to himself and the reader) the Moment which altered his entire future. The crossroads which really had no other options yet he blames himself and never quite gets past that corner. You want to slap him and hug him. To offer to be his confessor. To help him forgive himself and move forward.
Of course we don’t get that chance, and Matthes has done what every good storyteller does: gets in your head and in your heart. Or rather, allows his characters to do so.
My Overall Score:
I give this book 5/5 stars. Excellent story. Great length; really good characters – every one of whom is believable and neither overdone or cliche; nice setting; some laugh-out-loud, shake-your-head parts; memorable and well-written. Highly recommended reading.
Read more book reviews by following the Book Reviews Category.
be a good writer: read.
~tara caribou
A FINAL NOTE ON REVIEWS: it may seem that I am harsh on many writers for their editing, formatting, grammar, punctuation, etc. I do so unapologetically. First, because this is a review not a popularity contest. Second, because honest criticism should help us grow as artists.
The fact of the matter is, these things MATTER. A mathematician must use his tools and use them correctly to be an effective mathematician. A surgeon cannot simply say, “I know I can’t sew the wound closed but at least I could remove the appendix or whatever that thing is called.” Same with writers. We can’t claim to be writers yet refuse to use proper spelling, grammar, and punctuation. We can’t claim to be a photographer just because we know how to push the button on the camera (or phone). There’s an art to it.
So while I may appreciate the artist as a person and their words, I believe that it does us all a disservice to claim that lower quality editing is okay, whether in word, deed, or omission of criticism. Instead: believe in yourself! Believe in the power of your words! Put the effort into being the very best you can be. Ask for help. Grow and learn.
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