I did a couple of radio interviews yesterday. One was for Radio New Zealand and the other was for Sydney ABC. Dont ask me what I talked about as these things are always a bit of a blur for me and I dont like listening to myself talk. But if you want to hear the silky tones of North Belfast filtered through Oxford, New York, Jersualem, Denver and Melbourne and possibly hear me waffle on about Fifty Grand, crime fiction, Cuba, rugby, sandwiches (?), JRR Tolkien and other stuff then you can listen to the Radio New Zealand Podcast here on the programme Nights With Bryan Crump. (Nice chap, Bryan). I dont think the ABC interview with the equally charming and fragrant Jon Casimir is up yet but this is the web site for when it does become available.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Kiwi Is Not The Only Fruit
I did a couple of radio interviews yesterday. One was for Radio New Zealand and the other was for Sydney ABC. Dont ask me what I talked about as these things are always a bit of a blur for me and I dont like listening to myself talk. But if you want to hear the silky tones of North Belfast filtered through Oxford, New York, Jersualem, Denver and Melbourne and possibly hear me waffle on about Fifty Grand, crime fiction, Cuba, rugby, sandwiches (?), JRR Tolkien and other stuff then you can listen to the Radio New Zealand Podcast here on the programme Nights With Bryan Crump. (Nice chap, Bryan). I dont think the ABC interview with the equally charming and fragrant Jon Casimir is up yet but this is the web site for when it does become available.
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64 comments:
"mysterious German guy, the Japanese guy taking photographs, the wise old lady..."
LMAO.
Great interview. It's always interesting to hear someone you've never met, but have followed with great interest, speak for the first time too.
Grand interview, sir. I'd love to read some future McKinty set in Jerusalem. And not a bad idea to bring Mercado to Melbourne either. I see something with that.
Bob's taking another look at some of my work, a full manny. If you speak to him, tell him what a great guy I am, full of charm and wit and mudane experiences here in Laramie, WY, the Mecca of the midwest.
Hey, is the title of your post a nod to Jeanette Winterson's Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit? Are you trying to say something, Adrien, as in Christmas is not the only time to enjoy a good fruitcake (or is it time for my pills again...)?
Great interview! I sure hope we do see Mercado again, but I'm also one who didn't want to see Michael Forsythe go away.
On my first trip to New York, I was lucky enough to get a philosopher taxi driver who grew up in Brooklyn with Irish parents. On the ride from the airport to the city, I mentioned the violence of New York (it was the early '90s) and he was slightly offended and went into a little soliloquy I’ve always remembered: “Yes, New York can be violent, but look around you. In Lebanon, they have 2 religions and they’re killing each other. In Ireland, there are 2 religions and they’re killing each other. In Jerusalem, there are 2 religions and they’re killing each other. In New York, we’ve got every religion, ethnic group, and race known to man. If other places have a hard time keeping the peace with only 2 religions, don’t you think it’d be even harder given New York’s mixed up makeup?” He had other little gems, too, which I won’t go into, but he was an absolute treat to listen to and I tipped him big time.
Brian
I'm glad you liked it. I was a bit stressed about the interview to tell the truth. I was supposed to go on air at 5.15 live and my phone didnt ring until 5.13 because the hotel people put the RNZ lady on hold, so, to coin a phrase, I was keeing my whips.
Anyway glad you liked it.
Liam
The good word is in. Now dont embarrass me by going on a killing spree or something.
Yeah I wouldnt mind doing something in Jerusalem either but nothing has quite popped out at me and since its been nearly 9 years since I lived there I have a feeling nothing will...
Just listened to the nz interview, really great... it was so relaxed and the interviewer did a really good job. Well done, should sell a few books I reckon!
Sheiler
Of course!
Great book BTW and I very much enjoyed the BBC adaptation too.
Christmas is in fact the only time to enjoy Christmas pudding if you ask me.
Holden
Yeah in many ways its a miracle that NYC holds together at all. Certainly in 1993 I thought it wasnt going to. At the time I was reading a lot of Cyberpunk fiction and nothing in those books seemed that far from the reality around me in Harlem.
I dont want to say too much about this right now, but MF may be making a cameo appearance in the next book. I said I wont do another Dead book and thats true but MF might be wandering into other people's stories is all I'm saying.
Clare
Glad you liked it. I hope it shifts a few units as they say in the trade. My fantasy too is that Peter Jackson caught it just when he was casting around for his next film project....
It would be nice if they put the podcast of the ABC Sydney one online too, I think thats where the sandwiches conversation came up if I'm remembering at all correctly. (I may not be I had three Belgian Trappist beers before the ABC interview so I'm a little bit friskier in that one too).
Thank you, my friend.
Do you have any ideas in the works for after Dark Energy?
Terrific interview, Adrian. I heard the one you did for Colorado Public Radio some years back and I have to say I'm damn impressed you don't trot out the same old stories. I know I would, that's for sure. All praises to the interviewers as well, you got a great one there and here.
Forsythe making a cameo in an upcoming novel? If it was one of your YA books it would be a total gas, but Michael Forsythe is always welcome.
You do a really good interview. I thought the interviewer was good as well--it's nice to hear a bit of his own personality thrown in the mix--less psychophantic that way.
Here are my questions. How can you have called in sick for Columbine day after going to Jordan to play the Fijians under the threat of missiles?
And, more importantly, how can you say that you wouldn't be able to be a travel writer because you have to go around asking people questions when that was apparently exactly what you did in prepping for Fifty Grand?
I don't think Mercado would go to Melbourne, though. But you could write it and prove me wrong.
Actually, I would like to see her solve some crime in Cuba. That would be interesting.
Liam
Still getting DE done. Should be receiving the edits this month and be done by October (hopefully) for a Fall 2010 release. Coupla ideas.
Matt
I dont want to say too much about it now. It may get edited out. You know how these things go. But hopefully, we'll see.
Seana
I think the difference there was that I never took notes. I just chatted to people and thought about the conversation afterwards, you know what I mean? In Ghost Train to an Eastern Star Theroux is constantly talking about how he is making notes DURING the conversation and then later he writes the notes up. I could never do that in a million years.
I dont know what's next for Mercado or me. Its funny, about a year ago I had an idea for a novel called Total Girlfriend Experience about a happily married conservative guy from New Hampshire who goes to NYC twice a year and gets the same escort and she gives him the the Total Girlfriend Experience for a day (and night). This goes on for years until one time he's in NYC and it all goes wrong. Cute idea huh? Anyway I didnt do much work on it and I'm relieved because just this morning I happened to see the title of Steven Soderberg's new movie...
Well, that's a little freaky, if you are not making it all up. On the other hand, everyone and his brother wants to write about call girls these days, so maybe it's not that surprising.
I didn't read the latest Theroux yet, but I remember one, maybe Pillars of Hercules, where he mentions at the end the aspect of sitting down every night and writing up what had happened that day. It sounded difficult and disciplined, but it didn't sound like something you couldn't do. I didn't get the impression that he took notes like a stenographer.
Anyway, however you did Cuba for a novel you could do for nonfiction.
Seana
I'm sure Soderberg's film is miles better than my concept which didnt really have a second or third act but I still think my title is better.
The ads all promise a TGF. Total Girlfriend Experience which I think is better than A Girlfriend Experience. Seems more weird somehow.
Anyway too late.
Yep--it's a better title. Too bad.
"if you're not making it all up"
Sheesh.
As Paul Shaefer says as Artie in This Is Spinal Tap "I thought we had a relationship here."
Admit that you could have made it all up, though.
I'm not saying that you wouldn't have confessed it in the end.
SO VERY GLAD to hear Michael Forsythe has not disappeared into the nether world!
Seana
Well I do have my notebook which is something like this:
Total Girlfriend Experience
squiggle squiggle squiggle,
but then I suppose I could have faked that. Oh this skeptical age we live in.
Holden
I'm not committing myself. At the moment he's in but as Heidi Klum says in Project Runway one moment you're in and the next you are out. It'll be the editor's call.
Thanks for that documented proof. The squiggles are unimpeachable.
I'm just saying that if there is a joke to be had, you will probably have it, even at the expense of strict accuracy. At least in the short run.
seana
well yes I agree with that you can exaggerate a wee bit for the sake of a joke.
Speaking of Simon Schama, did you ever see this spoof made by a couple of Oxford students. I thought it was pretty funny.
Sheiler
rule of thumb : if a book contains a hint of a sex scene between women, he has read it.
I've downloaded it. Will listen Tomorrow.
Nighty
I missed you, Marco.
Adrian, I am so confused. One thread, another thread. First 'the N word' and then some sort of strange antipodal fruit. And yet, miraculously, Simon Schama is there to make sense of it all.
No, it's a great parody. I admit that I was taken aback a bit by Schama's on screen persona, when none of that theatricality is evident in the writing. But in the end it doesn't really detract much, does it?
"I dont want to say too much about this right now, but MF may be making a cameo appearance in the next book. I said I wont do another Dead book and thats true but MF might be wandering into other people's stories is all I'm saying."
Nice!
I'll hopefully get a chance to listen to the interviews tonight. Hope they're still available.
gb
Marco
Oooh you cheeky scamp.
You might however be on to something. I'm the only man I know that has read The Well of Loneliness.
Seana
I thought the kid did a good job. Funnily enough I used to go in the Ashmolean two or three times a week, but never thought of parodying Schama. Well, I couldnt if I had thought of it.
You're the only person I know who's actually read it. Although somebody must be, because we sold it forever and perhaps still do.
I remember Rebecca West was one of the writers who went to testify on her behalf when the book was the focus of an obscenity trial, but found it difficult because she said the book itself wasn't very good.
I suppose I shouldn't have just taken her word for it, but I guess I did.
I missed you, Marco
I felt you were beginning to take our internet relationship for granted.
Absence makes the heart grow fonder.
But seriously, thanks. That's very nice of you to say.
I'm the only man I know that has read The Well of Loneliness.
So, was it worthwhile?
Seana
Well, its not very good to be honest. Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit is good however. I like JW quite a bit.
Marco
Very poor. When I was about 13 I ploughed through the whole of DH Lawrence's The Rainbow just to get some swimming pool lesbo action. It wasnt worth it.
I dont know how I missed Lovecraft's ridiculous views. Stupidity I guess. His grave is nice and creepy though.
Ger
I still dont know if this is going to happen or not. Its written and its in there but I will bow my judgement to wiser heads.
Marco, it's rare, but, very occasionally, I am both nice and sincere.
Adrian, I never read OANTOF, but I did read The Passion, which was very good, though not in the way the title might indicate in this conversation, as it is very much about Napoleon and Elba.
I wasn't as impressed with Written on the Body, as it seemed very self-absorbed somehow, despite it's tease about the gender of the narrator--pretty easy guess, I'd say. I did like her nonfiction book about her own immersion in the art world, Art and Lies--it seemed both more revealing and more humble.
I've heard good things about some of her most recent novels, and I have been meaning to get to one or two of them.
I suppose if you've only played the Chtulu rpg game you could have easily missed them.
Your voice is a bit different from what I had imagined. It's always so, though.
"I wasn't cut up for the law"
and the rest is history.
Seana
I liked the Passion too. Even though she has an enormous presence I still think she is a bit underrated. I really like her stuff.
Marco
I think its that Northern Irish accent maybe. Most people are used to the Dublin or West of Ireland sometimes the Ulster glottal stop can throw people. Of course mine is messed up too because of the years in America.
Marco,
well, this blog *is* called the psychopathology of...so you've done your homework.
Adrian (sorry for the earlier misspelling of your name..I always hear Sylvester Stallone cry out "Adrian, Adrian" everytime I see your name...and I was trying to distinguish between the two Adrians), I guess I am forced to turn over my lesbo card, since I never read the Well of Loneliness.
But JW's the Passion was/is one of my favorite books ever. My hands shake when I think about reading it again. I've put off re-reading it (only read it twice), because I have a date with myself for when I turn 50. Hey, I'm building up to it.
Seana, I didn't like JW's non-fiction stuff at all.
I think what I liked about Art and Lies was probably just that she talks about coming from a background where no one really thought much about art and no one outside of that world really expected her to think about it either, but she seized it for herself and I think was encouraging others not to sell themselves short in that realm either.
The one thing I've thought about off and on over time, though, was her belief about buying art and living with it. A sort of buy what you can afford thing. Personally, I realize that I tend not to see the things I own. But my other question about all this has to do with someone else, maybe Robertson Davies, saying that people tend to value original artwork over really good prints of great stuff when the opposite should be the case. And as I can't really decide between these two positions, it sticks in my mind.
Sheiler
Honestly I wouldnt bother with Well. Life is too short. Maybe if you were writing some kind of paper on it or something but otherwise, avoid.
Seana
Havent read the non fiction. Perhaps I'll give it a go. Massivee TBR pile though, including Stuart Neville etc. people I like and have to read...
Oh, I wouldn't say you have to read it. Sometimes non-fiction just kind of hits you at the right time. And besides, I have a weakness for those Vintage paperbacks. Very nice design I always think. But I think sticking to her fiction is probably fine. Except that you are a completist and all. I'm an incompletist, which is a lot easier though a lot less satisfying.
I'm almost done with The Ghosts of Belfast, and I'm feeling very lucky to have been able to snag a copy. In fact, I think maybe I'll go polish that off right now.
Seana,
I love how you say you'll polish off reading something, as opposed to polishing off the last of the coffee oreo ice cream.
Sheiler, if I had some coffee oreo ice cream, I would polish that off too.
I did just finish Stuart's book and though I was going to try and say something non-spoilerish, I think I will just encourage everyone to read it.
Well, I will say one spoilerish thing. It's not a cozy.
Seana, Sheiler
Let me tell you one thing about this country in need of improvement: no Ben & Jerry's for love nor money.
The nearest B&J is in Hawaii. You cant even get the tubs.
About two months ago I had a dream about Chubby Hubby.
Okay, Sheiler and Adrian, you are setting me on a bad path here. First Sheiler plants the suggestion and then Adrian makes me think, but what if I move to Australia some day? Shouldn't I eat as much Ben and Jerry's as I possibly can now?
Adrian:
Hate to break it to you, but in view of skinny chic, they have officially changed the name of Chubby Hubby to Hubby Hubby. No shit.
PKL
What a waste. Everyone will see through that one. They could at least have called it Hubba Hubba.
Also, PKL, your blog is back up now!
That makes me happy. Some nice pics there.
Patrick
Hey, long time no hear.
Hubby Hubby tell me this is a wind up. Hubby Hubby doesn't even make sense.
Seana
I seriously thought about bringing some in a cooler from the UK - it would have been madness of course, but I could maybe have squeezed a short story out of it or something.
I don't know if Patrick is winding you up or not--my guess is not. But if true, those Vermonters are close enough to New York to know that Chubby Hubby's are in, at least if Brooklyn is the center of the world, which it probably is right now. Maybe you could send them a copy of your blog post and in gratitude for the news that they are partly responsible for a new fashion trend, they might air ship you a case themselves.
By the way, you are always going on about ideas for short stories. So where are they?
You people and your Ben and Jerrys...so sorry to rub it in but Boston heralds the best homemade ice cream joints around. A place called JP Licks and a place called Christina's in Cambridge. Better than B&J. Coffee Oreo to die in some french orgasm.
But on an even further tangent, I was driving my usual weekly drive from Canada to Boston and stopped in Waterbury VT to fill up the tank with gas when I realized my credit card (hence my money) was still in Quebec. I thanked my stars for being a slob, and proceeded to scrape change from my car seats and the floors. I had about $3 in grubby change. While scraping some guy at the gas tank next to me asked me, "Can I help you?" I told him my about my screw up. He said, "What do you need to make it to Boston?" I said $8.50. He pulled out a $10 and gave it to me. I started writing him a check. He would not take it. Then, he said, "Do you like ice cream?" I said, "Who doesn't?" He pulls out of a cooler in his car three pints of Ben and Jerry's ice cream (mint chocolate cookie, and two other no nut kinds) and said, "I just got off work at B&Js."
I drive down to Boston and need to change my shirt, what with all of the ice cream stains on it.
I'm getting of the age where I think I need reading glasses. But am determined not to succumb. Which means polishing off a book is not as enjoyable as eating frozen sweets from strangers.
That's a good story. Apparently you don't actually turn down B&Js if it's offered, then.
seana
well I've got a story coming out in Brennan's collection next year.
Sheiler
Excellent story. New England is that kind of place.
White Farms in Ipswich, Mass - the butter crunch. I've mentioned it in two books, what more can I do?
You don't look a gift ice cream man in the face...and not take his ice cream.
That's right, I kind of forgot about that story. Or maybe I didn't even know it was a story. And you've an essay for Declan Burke too, right?
Hope we can get both those collections over here.
'well I've got a story coming out in Brennan's collection next year.'
And it's an absolute cracker!
gb
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