Friday, July 24, 2020

SUSAN TEPPER’s WHAT DRIVES MEN is #177 in the never-ending series called INSIDE THE EMOTION OF FICTION


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****SUSAN TEPPER’s WHAT DRIVES MEN is #177 in the never-ending series called INSIDE THE EMOTION OF FICTION where the Chris Rice Cooper Blog (CRC) focuses on one specific excerpt from a fiction genre and how that fiction writer wrote that specific excerpt.  All INSIDE THE EMOTION OF FICTION links are at the end of this piece

















Name of fiction work? And were there other names you considered that you would like to share with us? What Drives Men is the title of my latest fiction, a road novel.  It had an earlier title: Where You Can Find It.

What is the date you began writing this piece of fiction and the date when you completely finished the piece of fiction?
It started out as a short story written about 7 years ago.  Then each time I looked at it, I wrote more, and then realized I had a novel on my hands.  I played with it for about 7 years and last summer I decided ‘enough is enough’ and sent it to a publisher who did two other books of mine.

Where did you do most of your writing for this fiction work?  And please describe in detail. All the writing of this book was done on both my laptop and PC.  I have a small writing room, 9 by 9, off my back hallway and convenient to the powder room and kitchen.  So I could write, then run in and cook a bit, then go back and write.  I write wherever I can.  
       
       I wrote some of it while sitting next to my mother’s hospital bed when she was ill.  She was a poet and loved hearing what I’d written.  It was a nice thing for both of us and broke the dreary hospital routine.  It also calmed me because I was so worried about her.  I think in a way I was trying to entertain her, and she had a zany humor, like I do.  We both laughed like crazy over these characters.  So the book is pretty zany.  
          But I don’t outline, or pre-think the work.  I don’t have a special routine except that I do write almost every day.  When this material grew into a ‘novel’ the first winter I was working on it, the weather happened to be very cold and icy.  The plot seemed to move quickly in that direction, starting out during pleasant fall weather and going straight into the dead of winter.  I had so much fun with these characters that I didn’t want to let go of the MS.  But eventually, it was the right time.  I’ve come to believe that timing is everything.

What were your writing habits while writing this work- did you drink something as you wrote, listen to music, write in pen and paper, directly on laptop; specific time of day? Music, never. It gets in the way for me.  I drink tea, lots of tea.  I’m English at heart from living there during my first marriage.  I like silence, but my dog did bother me periodically because he likes a lot of hugs.  And his persistence generally rules.

Please include just one excerpt and include page numbers as reference.  This one excerpt can be as short or as long as you prefer.                                                   
Prologue
Should I come with you he thought of asking then knew it would sound idiotic.  Maggie.  Magpie.  Good ole Mags. Marching room to room shoving clothes and other things in suitcases.  He watched her put her address book and little tin recipe box into an already jammed bag; kneeling on its canvas side in order to get it zipped.  Maggie was strong – he had to give her that.  Russell followed behind, room by room, refusing to help.  Why should he?   None of it was his idea.  Not that she’d asked for help.  Not her.  When she was done, bags zipped, coat on, she phoned for a taxi. Dark-blue suitcases like sentries standing guard in the kitchen. Russell stood in the hall, just past the archway. They waited it out in silence.  When the taxi finally got there its horn blared.  Russell stepped further back into the shadows.  Let her leave all alone, he thought.  Let her wonder what will become of me.  He heard the back door slam.  Went to the living room and sat on the sofa.  He heard the taxi start up then pull away, down the long hill of their driveway.  He could feel the taxi driver's foot on the brake pedal all the way down to the road.  Hesitation he thought; hoping. The taxi noise fainter and fainter.  After that Russell felt nothing.             
                                           
                                                               CHAPTER 1
                                                                  Raging
                                    

Playful he was thinking a moment earlier, watching the squirrel scramble up the trunk of a big oak.  Fall had come early and they were charging everywhere.  A lot of his backyard torn up from their buried nuts. 
            Part way up the tree it must've decided to make an about-face, throwing itself squarely onto his neck.  I’m going to die had crashed through Russell’s mind as the squirrel dug deep into his throat.        
            After he passed out, then came to, he was unable to offer any specific information.  Some people had gathered around.  A few women with baby strollers and a police officer.  The women presumably from this neighborhood.  On his back in the street Russell couldn't recall having seen them before.  Two blonds.  A third woman who looked darkly foreign.  He thought he smelled a type of oil or perhaps even incense coming off her.  Russell inhaled.  Then her odor seemed taken by the breeze (cool-ish with an underlying warmth was how he would later describe that day).
            The police officer, pad and pen poised for writing, stared down at him.  He thought the officer looked young. 
            As for the sky – as viewed beyond dappled leaves not yet fallen from that tree; that particular tree; thereafter to be known by Russell as the squirrel tree – the sky that day just happened to be a pure raging blue. 
            "It bit me," he said.  "It jumped out of that tree and it bit me."
            The women murmured.  The young police officer cleared his throat.  "Sir, there is no blood."
            "What!"          
            He tried sitting up but the officer pressed him back down.
            "Don't try and move," he told Russell.
            "Well if there's no blood... I don't understand. I felt it sink its teeth in my neck."   
            "Maybe it was the claws," said one of the women. 
            "Even if it was the claws you'd still have blood," said another. 
            "Blood, claws, what's the difference!"  This third voice less flat than the others who sounded like they ironed their vocal cords. 
            Russell couldn't stand that dry, offhand way these younger generation women spoke.  As if some emotion, a little feeling in their tone, might somehow jeopardize their position in the world.  Though what that might be, he had no idea.      
            "With the rising real estate market this has become a dangerous neighborhood!" said the perkier voice.
            Dangerous!  Russell tried sitting up again only to be shoved down. “Did you check for gunshot wounds?”
            “Ladies step away!” barked the police officer.
            “Law enforcement in this town is practically non-existent."  This from the flat voice Russell recognized as suggesting the claws. 
            "Yeah, the cops did zilch when my xenon headlights were stolen right off my driveway," said another one.
            "OK, Ladies!  There'll be no more chat."  The police officer frowning down on him! "Not another word until the ambulance gets here."
            Ambulance!  Russell felt himself growing chilled, though it had been a nice enough day when he started his walk into town – close to sixty would be his guess, if he were a betting man.  Not to mention all that sunshine pouring down. Underneath him, the blacktop surface felt cold, almost slimy.  Crushed gravel set into wet tar then rolled.  Messy he was thinking, bits of loose gravel sticking to his palms. All summer his mother had been warning him.  Trouble ahead the old woman kept saying.  Russell assumed she was turning senile.  And that gypsy woman, too – always waving the red flag – that Clara.  The one his brother Stan dated up through Labor Day.  She had mentioned some kind of trouble.  Naturally Russell paid no attention. 
            "I'm all alone in the world," he said when the police officer asked about his next of kin.
            The women murmured again.  Pleasantly harmonic, he thought; somewhat surprised.  He shifted on his back favoring his left side, certain the sweetest voice must belong to the darkly foreign one he'd glimpsed briefly – naming her FigSweet Fig.  Though he'd barely seen her, that didn't stop him picturing her breasts, ripe, with their dark nipples.   
            "I wonder if it's carrying rabies," said the flat voice.
            Russell stiffened clutching his neck.
            "Sir, I wouldn't do that if I were you. You don't want to touch the wound."     
            "You said there isn't any blood!"
            "True enough.  Still it's best to be careful with these things.  No point risking infection."
            The young officer had a frank expression, innocent-seeming.  Innocent of the worst sorts of things policemen see regularly.  "How old are you, Son?"  he asked the police officer. 
            In December Russell would turn fifty.
            The officer bristled swiping at his nose with the back of his hand.  "I won't have that kind of talk."          
            Russell sighed.  OK, he thought. OK.
            Staring up into the squirrel tree he wondered what had become of it?  Small, gray, furry.  Gray, he thought again.  Enigmatic.  Squirrels everywhere.  Dashing across roofs, along gutters and fences.  The neighborhood overflowing. 
            “Sir, I’m going to have to frisk you,” the officer said.
            “What!”
            “Just lie still and it’ll be over in a moment.”  He knelt on the ground patting Russell down.
            “But I don’t have a weapon!”
            The officer stood.  “Sir, I can see that all is A-OK.” 
            A-OK?  Russell stared up at him.  Has the whole world gone mad?
            When the ambulance finally got there, and the ambulance workers each took a turn looking at his neck, they told Russell he could go home.  "Stay there," said the burly-looking guy.  "Stay inside.  And for Pete's sake lock your door."                              
            Everyone laughed.  Everyone, that is, except Russell. By then he was on his feet – the skinnier ambulance guy having given him the nod.  He glanced over at the women then brushed off the seat of his pants.  "Thank god," he said. 
            From one of the strollers a baby began squalling.  Sweet Fig turned out deeply disappointing.  Instead of earthy, she was more the short squat type. On equal ground with them now, he decided Sweet Fig did not sound remotely foreign but more from the borough of Queens.  In the baggy brown sweatshirt she looked bulky.  Then he contemplated the sex of the squirrel that ripped him.  He’d seen some covert ops go down in Desert Storm.  Turning the possibilities over in his mind.  Squirrel, he decided.
            "It attacked me for no good reason," Russell said.
            "Go home and sleep it off."  And the young police officer gave him a light, friendly swat on the back.
            The women laughed again.  That started the ambulance guys going, everyone getting their rocks off at his expense. 
            "Fine," said Russell.  "Fine.  I’ve seen a few things myself.  In The Gulf.”  
            “Shrimp?” said the bulky guy.
            “No, The Gulf War.” He paused, waiting.  Something. Anything.  Nobody uttered a word.  Then he caught some movement high in the tree – quick, darting, and poof it was gone. 

Prologue on page 3 and Chapter One on pages 5 through 8.
Why is this excerpt so emotional for you as a writer to write?  And can you describe your own emotional experience of writing this specific excerpt? I feel empathy for people who are deserted by a loved one for no apparent reason that they can understand.  It happens to all of us, therefore it’s a universal kind of sadness.  It certainly has happened to me, in various ways, and I don’t think it gets any easier as time goes on.  Pain is pain.  In this book it happens to my protagonist, Russell.  When people are deserted, it tends to undermine their self-esteem which is a terrible thing.  It can lead to all sorts of bad choices.  As a fiction writer it’s my job to figure things out on the page.  Not in advance, but as I write and move along in the story.  If you figure out plot in advance, you’re writing with one arm tied behind your back.  So much comes forth in spontaneous writing that would never even enter your mind if you outline a plot.  So, spontaneous writing presents the reader with a basket full of emotions.  A novel is like a huge cornucopia of fruits: sweet, bitter, mushy, tart, dry, juicy, bland.  It’s all part of the mix of a really good story. 

Were there any deletions from this excerpt that you can share with us? And can you please include a photo of your marked up rough drafts of this excerpt. I did so many drafts, probably 50 or so full drafts over the 7 year period.  I didn’t save them, but replaced with the new material as I went along.  I generally don’t save, I don’t see the point.  Your mind has re-decided things, so I stick to the new material and move along with it.  I will add that it should always be fun to write.  It should be a joyous outlet for the writer.  If the writer is struggling, something is off.  If it’s not fun, why bother?  Life is fraught with difficulties.  Art should ebb and flow as naturally as the oceans.

Susan Tepper has been a writer for twenty years and is the author of nine published books.  She writes in all genres, with stories, poems, interviews, essays and opinion columns published extensively worldwide. 
An award-winning author, Tepper has been nominated eighteen times for the Pushcart Prize, has received a Pulitzer Prize nomination for the novel ‘What May Have Been’ (currently being adapted for the stage), Second Place Winner in Story/South Million Writers Award, 7th Place Winner in the Francis Ford Coppola sponsored Zoetrope Contest for the Novel (2003), Best Story of 17 Years of Vestal Review, a nomination for NPR’s Selected Shorts Series, and other honors. 
     Additionally, Tepper has been an editor at Wilderness House Literary Review and Istanbul Literary Review. For seven years she was panel moderator of the SMALL PRESS PANEL at Marymount Manhattan College Writers Conference which eventually morphed into the Hunter College Writers Conference. FIZZ her reading series at KGB Bar, NYC, ran for a decade, and showcased the talents of our literary stars as well as many first time authors.
     Before settling down to the writing life, she worked as an actor, singer, flight attendant (left), marketing manager, overseas tour guide, TV producer, interior decorator, rescue worker and more. She blames it all on a high-interest range. Tepper is a native New Yorker. 


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The Master of Verona
by David Blixt

#153 04 30 2020
General Fiction (Family)
Bread Bags & Bullies:  Surviving the 80s
by Steven Manchester

#154 05 01 2020
Adventure-Thriller/Horror
Into The Ashes
by Lee Murray

#155 05 06 2020
Coming of Age/Crime Novel
All Things Left In The Wild
by James Wade

#156 05 10 2020
Paranormal Mystery
Southern Bound
by Stuart Jaffe

#157 05 13 2020
Mystery/Crime Novel
Yardbird
By Mark Slade

#158 05 15 2020
Horror/Crime Novel
Hotel Nowhere
By David E Adkins
#159 05 16 2020
Satire/Crime Novel
THE LYING BASTARD
by Clint Margrave

#160 05 19 2020
Southern Gothic Fiction
REVIVING THE HAWTHORN SISTERS
by Emily Carpenter

#161 05 21 2020
Women’s Domestic Life Fiction
MERCY HOUSE
by Alena Dillon

#162 05 26 2020
Screenplay/Film
BEAST MODE
by Drew Fortune and Spain Willingham

#163 05 31 2020
Coming of Age/ Psychological Thriller
MY SISTER & OTHER LIARS
by Ruth Dugdall

#164 06 01 2020
Psychological Thriller
IN HARM’S WAY
by Owen Mullen

#165 06 02 2020
Small Town Short Story Collection
SNAPSHOT “Old Lady”
by Eliot Parker

#166 06 04 2020
Noir Crime Novel
SKIN OF TATTOOS
by Christina Hoag

#167 06 06 2020
Coming of Age/Historical
THE ORPHAN COLLECTOR
by Ellen Marie Wiseman
#168 06 08 2020
World War Two Historical Fiction
THE PRISONER’S WIFE
by Maggie Brookes

#169 06 09 2020
Novella
(about the 1960s,
Rolling Stones in their exile,
genocide, it’s survivors, and
people from places that no longer exist.)
BLUE COAST MYSTERY:  ALMOST SOLVED
by Nick Sweeney

#170 06 11 2020
Family Life/Coming of Age Novel
THE EXTRAORDINARY LIFE OF SAME HELL
by Robert Dugoni

#171 06 26 2020
Women’s Divorce Fiction
QUEEN OF THE OWLS
by Barbara Linn Probst
#172 07 01 2020
Short Story “The Belindas” from the Short Story Collection LOVE WAR STORIES
By Ivelisse Rodriguez

#173 Inside the Emotion of Fiction
07 04 2020
Organized Crime Thriller
BLUES IN THE DARK
by Raymond Benson

#174 Inside the Emotion of Fiction
07 08 2020
Contemporary Literature & Fiction
THE ESCAPE OF MALCOLM POE
by Allison Burnett

#175 Inside the Emotion of Fiction
07 09 2020
Horror Novella
TERMINUS STATION
by Jeff Lyons

#176 Inside the Emotion of Fiction
07 12 2020
20th Century Historical Romance
“The Bootlegger’s Wife”
by Denise Devine

#177 Inside the Emotion of Fiction
07 24 2020
Literary Fiction Novel
“What Drives Men”

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