Hi Shannon. Let’s jump right in. This October, your first collection of stories, Company, will be published by the highly esteemed Graywolf Press. This is a huge accomplishment. Congratulations. Please share your thoughts and emotions. Gush. Brag.
Oh gosh, I’m elated! Publishing a book is my longest-held dream, and I’m really pleased with the way this one has turned out. Graywolf is a dream press, and I’ve had amazing luck at every stage of the process—my agent (Reiko Davis) is wonderful, the book’s editor (Yuka Igarashi) is fantastic and brilliant, and I’ve been delighted by the early blurbs and encouragement.
A huge part of the book’s backstory is that while I was writing it, I was working full-time and expecting twins (my second and third children) in the earliest days of a global pandemic. Even after I had signed with an agent and had an early manuscript, there were months when completing the project felt like an impossible task. I’m sure there are many alternate realities in which I set the book aside or gave up entirely. I’m glad that didn’t happen in this one, because I’m excited to one day tell my kids I pushed through and got it done. (This is not to take away from anyone—especially any parent of small kids—who, for whatever reason, must set their work aside to deal with more pressing things. As proud as I am of Company, so much of its existence was outside my direct control.)
Care to give us a teaser for the collection?
Happy to! This is a collection of thirteen tightly linked short stories following three generations of a family of Black entrepreneurs, musicians, academics, and big-hearted flailing Millennials. The title refers to the fact that in each story in the collection, someone either pays or receives a visitor; the stories explore the tensions those interactions kick up, the long reach of the past, and the idea of cultural inheritance. It’s full of secrets, jazz, and sisterly sparring.
I first became a fan of your work through two stories: “Mote” (published by Joyland) and “The Second Liliosa” (published by TriQuarterly). At first, they seem quite distinct, yet on second read, the similarities of old friendships, difficult relationships, and child raising are clear. Are these recurring themes in your work? And how does a story come to you?
That’s really interesting—I hadn’t thought of those connections between “Mote” (which is included in Company) and “The Second Liliosa” (which isn’t). I think the similarities you’re noticing come from the fact that when I wrote both stories, I was in sort of a creative hangover from my twenties and still processing some of the challenges that decade gave me. For example, I was still grieving the recent end of a 20-year friendship I’d thought was lifelong, and you can really see that in a lot of my stories from the time. I think I was writing a lot of characters who felt compelled to reach back into their own childhood friendships and examine how they affected the present.
Something similar is true of parenthood. In 2017, when I wrote “The Second Liliosa,” I was starting to talk about kids with my then-fiancé; in 2019, when I wrote “Mote,” I was in the trenches of raising a toddler. I had spent a lot of my twenties wondering whether I’d ever be in the right relationship for parenthood to make sense; even after that question was resolved, I still carried a lot of the stress of wondering. Early parenthood is so difficult and transformative, and it was very therapeutic to write Merritt (the main character of “Mote”), a character uninterested in motherhood. “Mote” isn’t about motherhood, but it is partly about how motherhood can limit our movement. And now that I have kids, I suspect that all the questions surrounding parenthood (including the choice to remain child-free) are going to show up in my future work.
So I guess the answer is, whatever I’m going through, whatever I’m obsessing over or worried about, is where the nut of the story comes from!
Lightning round 1: name two authors, one historical and one contemporary, who inspire you.
Historical: Toni Morrison, though of course I could spend my whole life trying to achieve half what she did in hers.
Contemporary: There are so many! This is cheating, but I’ll name three—Danielle Evans, Deesha Philyaw, and Lisa Taddeo.
Lightning round 2: I know you have three very young children (all boys?) but allow yourself to imagine them twenty years in the future as young men. What three books, other than their mothers’ works, would you like them to have read by that age?
The Warmth of Other Suns (Isabel Wilkerson)
We Should All Be Feminists (Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie)
Black Magic (Chad Sanders—my brother!)
In this issue, we are highlighting established BIPoC writers such as yourself, alongside young writers from Howard University. You went to an HBCU (Spelman College). Can you tell us about that experience and how it shaped you as a person and a writer?
Spelman College is such a wonderful place. All my early schools were very diverse but predominantly white; by the time I got to college, it was really important for me to get to learn and explore my identity in a place where my core sense of belonging wasn’t constantly called into question. I majored in English (with a pre-law concentration). In addition to a standard curriculum of literature and composition classes, I got to take a few electives that were very focused on African diasporic writing and specific eras of Black writing. One of my most formative Spelman experiences was a seminar I took on the work of Toni Morrison with a professor who was doing her dissertation on that subject—I could have read Morrison’s work on my own for my whole life and not uncovered some of the insights I got from that class!
The last few years have been very hard. Hard for kids, hard for parents, hard to be an American, hard to be a world citizen. Do you see fiction as having a responsibility in these times? Do you feel an extra responsibility, duly or unduly, as a Black female writer?
Phew, “hard” is really an understatement, isn’t it? I was having babies during the most isolating parts of the pandemic—but if I hadn’t been, I know I would have been consuming tons of fiction (books, movies, and TV) to feel normal and stay connected with the world. As is often pointed out, fiction (in all forms) is so important and sustaining, especially in times of crisis.
I’ve been paying attention to all the difficult conversations happening in publishing, particularly about who gets to publish what and how much they get paid to do so. Whatever reactive things people are saying, we all have access to the numbers and we know that Black writers remain underrepresented on bookshelves and on those all-important lists. There are all sorts of reasons for that, but one, we know, comes down to simple economics: most fiction writers are not supporting themselves entirely through their writing. So although I know this isn’t exactly what you meant, the answer is YES, I feel a huge responsibility: to take advantage of opportunities as they arise and to share those opportunities, and to help demystify certain publishing realities to help make the whole thing more accessible to other writers of color.
Any advice for young writers?
This connects with my previous answer. I hate to see writers buying a fantasy about a particular sort of writing life, then getting frustrated when it doesn’t manifest. I work full-time and do my writing on the side, in my spare time. There are lots of writers who do it this way, but there are others who do MFAs and spend some time focused entirely on writing (with or without funding), and still others who are supported by partners or parents. My advice is to make informed choices about the sort of writing life you’d like, then to prepare accordingly. Also, if you can, find writers whose circumstances are like yours and talk to them about what works for them. (This can be tricky, because artists can be very opaque about money matters, but some are very open and honest about this stuff.)
For me, working full-time in another industry means I have less writing time than I’d like and can’t get away for glamorous residences—but also means I have an income that can support occasional writing-related expenses (conferences, workshops, books, etc.). I’m always happy to talk about how I budget around my writing life and what it takes to fit it in!
A couple of hard-hitting questions to finish. I know from Twitter that you like to knit. Any connection to writing? Complement? Antidote?
I took up knitting about six years ago, and I can hardly remember my life without it! Knitting is very meditative. You can do it while you watch a show or listen to music, because it occupies your hands and certain parts of your brain but not the whole thing. I do find myself working out tricky sections of dialogue while I’m knitting! But it’s also sort of the opposite of writing. You can write for hours and not wind up with a usable draft. If you knit for hours, you WILL end up with a scarf (or whatever).
Another imaginative one: You have carved out space and time to write, zero distractions, but nothing coming. Classic writer’s block. What snack and/or beverage helps you out here? And do they work?
If it’s evening and the stars align (meaning no kids are waking up to ask for water), I love to write with a glass of red wine. Throughout all my stories, you can find references to the wines I either was drinking or wished I was at certain points in the writing. But that was mostly pre-kids! These days, I turn more to music to help writer’s block.
Anything else I should have asked you?
Côtes du Rhône; or, to save some money, Zinfandel.