Laurel Zuckerman is the author of the bestselling Sorbonne Confidential, which is available in both French and English, and Les Rêves Barbares du professeur Collie. She has long been an advocate for writers here in Paris. In addition to posting information about upcoming readings, writing conferences, and calls for submissions to literary magazines and contests, she has organized a reading series, interviewed authors on her blog, and spoken about writing and publishing at colleges and writing conferences. Today, I am excited to talk to her about her new role as the editor of the Best Paris Stories anthology.

How did you decide to launch the Best Paris Stories competition and anthology?

There is so much writing talent in Paris, I wanted for years to find some way to showcase it. Until recently, the project looked too daunting. If I finally took the step it’s thanks to recent changes in the publishing industry that make it possible to distribute a book like this worldwide. Also, I had a lot of help and support from writers in the Paris community; without that, I never would have had the courage to launch the contest.

Were you surprised at how many entries you received?

It was like throwing a message in a bottle out to the sea. I had no idea who might respond, but I thought is was important to reach out to writers far from France and the USA—in Asia, North Africa, the Gulf states, Australia—to favor a diversity of voices. In the end we had hundreds of submissions, enough to guarantee quality in the shortlist without overwhelming us entirely.

Anonymity was really key. Submissions were centralized and coded before going to Editorial Committee members, and later Judges. First-time authors were read with the same respect for the text as established veterans.

What have been some of the challenges and rewards of the process?

Discovering new writers! That was definitely one of the great rewards of the process. Another was viewing submissions from the editor’s point of view and observing the selection process (I had no input into selection, but watched and coordinated the 24 members of the Editorial Committee and the Finalist Judges) Every writer should see submissions from the other side at least once. There are many lessons to be learned from this. In fact, this strikes me as such an important experience for a writer that I asked two excellent Editorial Committee members, Thirza Vallois and Mary Ellen Gallagher to write about this for Paris Writers News (to be published later this month).

The cover design contest was amazing, too. We had no idea what the result would be, no preconceived idea of what we wanted. The submissions were all so original and different, we are really grateful to the artists who participated. In the end, after astonishingly contradictory input from the Editorial Committee, Lydia D’Moch’s cover, which featured an evocative, moody photograph of Paris with the authors’ names on blue and red bands top and bottom, emerged as the winner. Lydia is a graphic designer based in California, and we liked working with her so much that we asked her to design the paperback and the kindle singles as well.

One of the most interesting aspects of launch the Best Paris Stories anthology was finding a way to communicate about the stories worldwide. Here we have eleven really talented writers, each very different: in age, background, education, profession, interests, etc. How to let each one shine? Fortunately terrific literary magazines like Her Royal Majesty and Tale of Three, as well as literary blogs (such as yours!) have gotten excited about the anthology, featuring interviews or excepts.

We hope that Paris publications, travel writers and bloggers will also find the Best Paris Stories of interest for their readers, and that book reviewers will like it, too. We have no advertising budget so mainly, of course, it’s up to the readers. If they like the anthology, we hope they will tell their friends!

In this respect, the publication of Best Paris Stories has also been an occasion to discover (again) the incredible power of social media. Sites like twitter and facebook break through physical and financial barriers to enable any reader interested in our stories to, we hope, find us. At least, that’s a challenge we’ve set for ourselves.

Did you have a favorite story?

Oh, of course. But that means nothing. I was very glad not to be a Judge—it’s incredibly difficult to select a story because as readers we react to a story on so many different levels. How to distinguish a “good” story from the one we like best? Reading is such an intimate, personal action. Perhaps the only one we have left.

I am sure that it has been a lot of work and coordination with the judges and writers. Would you do it again? What’s next?

I’m pretty focused on the present right now: getting everything ready for the event at the American Library in Paris on May 29th, making sure the paperback gets to where it needs to be, etc.

But, I will admit, when I reread the stories, which I do with increasing pleasure each time, I think: but why not a story about working at EuroDisney? Or a “manifestation”. Or elderly French women. on hot dates. Or…

There is no end to what can be said about Paris…

The Best Paris Stories series continues with writer Bob Levy. He has been writing short fiction and literary memoirs since 1990. His work has appeared in many literary journals as well as The Chicago Tribune (2001 Nelson Algren Award Winner) and San Francisco Bay Guardian. He has been twice nominated for the annual Pushcart Fiction Prize and received the 1998 Langston Hughes Award from the University of Kansas. Bob spends the majority of the year in Paris where he teaches Creative Writing, the rest in the San Francisco Bay Area.

It is an honor for me to interview Bob. We met at the writing workshop I led in the upstairs library of Shakespeare and Company. I had started the class to meet other writers and felt very lucky when Bob signed up. He is not only an award-winning writer, but also an excellent editor. He helped and encouraged the beginning writers in the workshop. Much of his advice has stayed with me. While revising my chapters, I always think about what he said. I am already looking forward to taking his class at WICE this fall.

Why do you think Paris fascinated and inspires?

Every reader has his / her own image of Paris. Accurate or otherwise, this image frees the writer to spend more time on character, on plot, on dialogue and theme. The reader has already placed the stories’ conflicts, their beginnings and endings, in a world of cafe tables. A saxophone heard through an apartment’s open window. A young couple embracing on a Metro platform …. More than this, the word ‘Paris’ connotes change; the possibility, the realization, ‘The young man comes to Paris …’ The Paris story already has a ‘leg up’ on the believability of that change, when indeed the change actually does take place.

Can you tell us about your story?

‘Sunday with God’ is a true story. The story concerns an art gallery which, strangely, seemed never open, and from which – and for reasons that went beyond aesthetics – I desired to buy a work. But on a particular July Sunday during which I did a ‘good deed’, low and behold, and as though God had interfered, the gallery was ‘Ouvert’. Everything, including my wife’s reaction to the purchased piece of art is absolutely – and some might say, ’sadly’ – true.

What books are on your nightstand?

Salinger’s ‘Catcher in the Rye’
Philip Roth’s ‘American Pastoral’
Ian McEwan’s ‘Enduring Love’ and ‘Comfort of Strangers’
Julian Barnes’ ‘Sense of an Ending’

What is the best advice you have ever received?

Writing-wise, be specific. As specific as possible. Avoid generalities; ‘happy’, ‘bright’, ‘generous’. There must be an image, a phrase, that does the job ‘better’.

What advice would you give a writer interested in trying the short story?

My best advice is … DO IT. Do it because the process will take you through writing’s most important components without having to spend a lot of time doing it. You will learn about beginnings, endings (earned and otherwise), and how to make your ‘middles’ interesting. Of course you will learn to be concise. You will decide what really ‘counts’ and what is simply garnish. In fact, if it were up to me, all writers of the ‘long form’ would be ‘forced’ (not really) to work in the short form, to develop those skills. I would tell the writer, decide on word-length before you start; find a published short story you like, count its words, and then YOU do it. And the shorter you make it, the harder, the more effectively, you will work.

What’s next?

There are those who say, Those who can’t teach. True or otherwise, that seems to be where I’m at currently. The desire to write (whether fiction or otherwise) seems to have diminished. But the desire to pass along to others what I’ve learned, what I’ve acquired over the years, that desire … it burns.

]]> http://www.jskesliencharles.com/2012/05/happy-may-day/feed/ 1 http://www.jskesliencharles.com/2012/04/spotlight-on-best-paris-stories-2/ http://www.jskesliencharles.com/2012/04/spotlight-on-best-paris-stories-2/#comments Tue, 24 Apr 2012 17:19:21 +0000 jsc http://www.jskesliencharles.com/?p=3083

This week, I am continuing my series with authors featured in the Best Paris Stories anthology. Lisa Burkitt lives in Donegal, Ireland, and has worked as a weekly columnist and print journalist before moving into broadcast journalism and presenting. She has written scripts, short stories and her debut novel The Memory of Scent, comes out in May.

Why do you think Paris fascinates and inspires?

For me, Paris fascinates because it was fascinating to so many who I am fascinated by. I want to somehow pilfer its essence, to stalk its historical footprint, to segue into the lives of others from decades and centuries before me. Woody Allen’s; ‘Midnight in Paris’?…..I got it! In fact, several times in one week after its release! I have dragged people around Montmartre exclaiming; ‘But this is actually where Suzanne Valadon worked…’ and watched them swell to the dizzy heights of indifference.

Can you tell us about your story?

‘A Pinch of Tarragon’ brings us into the world of Sophie, a weary waitress in Paris of the late 1800s, whose sustenance is a long ago memory of passion and a sensitive but untutored palate. George recognises her as a kindred spirit.

What books are one your nightstand?

I like biographies, or the memoir-of-sorts approach – like Mrs. Lincoln: A Life, by Catherine Clinton. The Lacuna, by Barbara Kingsolver. I like reading about interesting, quirky and talented females and I have Yu Dan’s Confucius from the Heart, if I am thinking too much.

What is the best advice you have ever received?

‘Don’t forget to feed the dog.’ Someone once told me that if you have a dog in your story – then make sure it is being looked after. It made me think more about the interconnection between what is on the page and what is going on in the background. When you bring your characters to life, you have to make sure they are living authentically and not just as siphons for a plot device.

What advice would you give a writer interested in trying the short story?

A short story is not an introduction to something else. It is not a first chapter, an extract, an outline, a kite-flying expedition. It has to be an entity in and of itself and not something that has simply been condensed. It cannot be the literary equivalent of decanting your favourite perfume into a travel-sized bottle for convenience.

I used to think that the short story was for the uncommitted reader – and then I began to read Chekhov. Ireland where I live, with its strong oral tradition, seems to lend itself easily to the short story format. Maybe it has something to do with a long history of religious, cultural and political oppression and poverty, that it was a way for people to simply vent…..to gather around hearths and seek an escape through ghost stories and fairy tales.

What’s next?

My debut novel; The Memory of Scent is scheduled for a May release. It is set in Paris in the 1800s on the fringes of Impressionism. Two young models sit for the same artist, who ends up dead. Each seeks the other out as their lives diverge. It is a novel of the senses and an exploration of the dualities of wealth and poverty, survival and defeat, light and shade.

What an honor to be asked to be a judge for the anthology Best Paris Stories! By turns humorous, bittersweet, historical or surreal, each story in the collection invites readers to explore different facets of life in Paris. Over the coming weeks, I will be interviewing writers whose work was included in the collection. Today, I’m delighted to interview Jane M. Handel. She was born in England in 1958, grew up in Birmingham and the Isle of Wight and studied English and French Law at the University of Kent. She has two children, now grown up. She lives with her husband near Paris where she teaches yoga.

Why do you think Paris fascinates and inspires?

I think Paris’ ability to fascinate and inspire people reached new heights at the beginning of the 19th century, because the city and its architecture were so modern and harmonious. All the major art styles from the 1850s to the 1920s were born, or well-represented in Paris – the impressionists, Nabis, Fauves, Cubists etc. This then drew writers, artists and people and they created and perpetuate ‘the Paris myth’ of magic and romance.

Can you tell us a little about your story?

My story is about a young woman adjusting to the new codes of behavior in a foreign city – Paris, of course. At first, she is indifferent to its charms…

What books are on your nightstand?

I currently have eight books on meditation and Buddhist psychology next to my bed but I have just finished ‘Enduring Love’ by Ian McEwan.

What is the best advice you have ever received?

My best advice is drawn from the ‘The Serenity prayer’ –

Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;
the courage to change the things I can;
and the wisdom to know the difference.

What’s next?

I am working on a novel and it’s killing me!

Photo: Vincent Thibert

After reading her fascinating blog and interviewing her at the American Library, I wanted to learn more about Denyse Beaulieu, Parisian author of The Perfume Lover: A Personal History of Scent (Harper Collins UK).  She inspired perfumer Bertrand Duchaufour to create a new scent based on her memories of a summer night in Seville. Denyse has learned the principles of perfume composition with the help of some of the profession’s most prestigious noses. Her expertise has been acknowledged by the London College of Fashion where she has taught an intensive “Understanding Fragrance” course. She is a member of the Société Française des Parfumeurs and a juror at the Fragrance Foundation France.

What first brought you to Paris?

I came to do my doctorate in French literature, a memoir on feminine education in the works of the Marquis de Sade. But by the time I’d published a short essay on the theme for the literary review L’Infini, I figured that what could be said in ten pages didn’t have to be stretched out into five hundred. There were a lot more exciting things to do in Paris, and all around Europe – so many classic films to catch up on in art-house theaters, so many galleries and parties and cities to explore… I never did finish my dissertation!

What keeps you here?

When I was still a student I loved the idea I could fall asleep in a train and wake up in a different culture. I’ve never learned to drive because I couldn’t imagine living in a place where you needed a car. Where you couldn’t walk your way to a decent cup of coffee… And then there’s the blend of intellect and passionate attention to what other cultures would consider frivolous, the light-hearted theater of seduction: Paris is a great place to be a woman in.

What are some of the challenges and rewards of writing your bilingual blog?

I’m bilingual from birth since my parents are French-Canadian but I spent the three first years of my life in Western Canada. My career as a writer and journalist had been entirely in French. However, I decided from the outset that I’d write my perfume blog Grain de Musc in both languages: English to have a wider readership, French because I knew most of the people in the perfume industry were French. I wanted to reach them too, in order to learn more about the art. I found out that writing in English came naturally, and of course if I had any trouble translating an expression or turn of phrase, I could just write something else and therefore, re-appropriate the text. The main challenge is that I can’t just knock a blog post together and put it up: it’s twice as much work. But writing about perfume is always-already a form of translation, the creation of a verbal object echoing a scent-object.

Can you tell us about your book The Perfume Lover?

The book is made up of two narrative threads: the making of a perfume and the making of a perfume lover. The former was inspired by the story of a night during the Holy Week in Seville, which I told the renowned perfumer Bertrand Duchaufour: the book chronicles the development of the fragrance, Séville à l’aube, which will be launched by L’Artisan Parfumeur in July 2012. This creative journey summoned memories, which led me to explore how I could interpret a life through scent – mine, since that was the material at hand. Reminiscing about my own milestone fragrances led me to delve into the history of perfumery – for instance, when I write about the first masculine fragrance I wore, I also explain why in the West, certain notes are considered feminine and others masculine. Developing Séville à l’aube made me seek out the people who were renewing the art of perfumery, so that I could better understand how to communicate what I wanted to Bertrand Duchaufour. The book is really a way of approaching fragrance through as many facets as possible: stories, history, science, eroticism, religion…

What books are on your nightstand?

Francis Ponge’s La Rage de l’Expression. Collected essays by Walter Benjamin. A facsimile of Stéphane Mallarmé’s short-lived fashion magazine, entirely written by him, La Dernière Mode.

What advice would you give to beginning writers?

I can only pass along the words of wisdom of Fabiana Heifetz, a dear friend, now deceased, who was a poetry editor. I had told her that as I re-read my earlier chapters, I felt I’d moved on so much I needed to redo everything. She told me not to attempt to put all the books I wanted to write into the one I was writing. To trust the person I was when I wrote those pages. That there would be other books.

What is the best advice you have received?

A French writer, who I was very close to at the time, once told me: “Write everything that happens to you, and other things will happen to you.” As though it was the writing itself that generated events. I don’t know whether it’s good advice, but I’ve always been open to adventure, and it worked.

What’s next?

I’ve pretty much finished the French version of the book, which will come out in early 2013 at the Presses de la Cité. I’m working on the development of three new fragrances – teaming up with a perfumer is a wonderful antidote to the solitude of writing. Mostly, I’m trying to figure out what a writer can bring to the world of fragrance: not only inspiration, but also thought, aesthetics, a more fruitful way of introducing people to this invisible realm – exploring the olfactory adds another dimension to human experience. It is also, once you begin to master the language, a formidable writing generator, so that the inspiration goes both ways.

For more insight in to Denyse’s experience in talking about and creating perfume, read this wonderful interview by Laurel Zuckerman.

“Standard oil heiress and fashion icon Millicent Rogers, a beauty who traveled with thirty-five suitcases and seven dachshunds, made headlines throughout her life for her famous romances and influence as a style-setter. Cherie Burns has written a page-turning tale of a society rebel.”-Meryl Gordon, author of Mrs. Astor Regrets

Cherie Burns is the author of Searching for Beauty–The Life of Millicent Rogers, the first comprehensive biography of the Standard Oil heiress and fashion icon. It was a delight to meet Cherie, who is a fabulous speaker. She brought the beautiful, spirited Rogers to life. Later this year she will be speaking at venues such as The Nantucket Book Festival, so please check her events page.

Raised in the Gilded Age of New York society, the heiress came of age as a debutante and flapper. She eloped with an impoverished European nobleman and lived in high-living pre-war Europe. During WWII she returned to the U.S to pitch into the war effort, and at war’s end she followed American glamour (and Clark Gable) to Hollywood. She then moved to Taos, New Mexico where she fell in love with the Pueblo Indians and re-imagined southwestern style for the New York fashion world.

In addition to Searching for Beauty, Cherie Burns is author of The Great Hurricane: 1938 and Stepmotherhood—How to Survive Without Feeling Frustrated, Left Out or Wicked.  Her work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine,The Wall Street Journal, People, Glamour, New York, and Sports Illustrated. She now lives in Taos, New Mexico.

Cherie Burns at home in Taos. Photo by L. Foster.

What took you to Taos? What keeps you there?

My family and I skied in Taos, so were were familiar and intrigued with it. When my husband retired from the news business, we moved from New York City to Nantucket, where we had a summer house. Winters there were very slow and unstimulating, so the jump to Taos was easy. It has suited us. Taos is a very sophisticated and deep community in which many people hail from New York and LA, or at least visit those cities frequently. Lots of ideas and creativity move through here. And the expansive western living is great. I love living in an adobe house.

How did you first become interested in Millicent Rogers?

I discovered Millicent Rogers at the Millicent Rogers Museum here in Taos. It is a great little gem of a museum about the Southwest, and I started wondering who she was and why I hadn’t heard more about her. The more I investigated, the more interesting her story became to me. Most of her life was lived on the East Coast and in Europe. Taos was just an interesting coda to her story.

What were some of the challenges and rewards of researching the biography?

Writing a first comprehensive biography is a big undertaking. Also, most people who actually knew Millicent Rogers are now dead. It took four and a half years and a lot of research and digging. Also, Millicent had become legend here in Taos an to some degree within her own family (she had three sons with two of her three husbands), so that posed real reportorial challenges.

Millicent Rogers

What books are on your nightstand?

Catherine the Great by Robert K. Massie and The Starboard Sea, a novel, by Amber Dermont.

What advice would you give to beginning writers?

Writing is as much a craft as an art. You can’t get away with just answering to your muse. Read books, study literature. For me, it helped working as a journalist. The discipline and training are important.

What is the best advice you have received?

Writers write, I was told. The best don’t always talk about it. They write. It is a solitary and lonely task, often.

What’s next?

I am still out talking about Searching for Beauty, which is now in its fourth printing. Meanwhile, I am thinking about what to write about next. I have a few ideas. Once you do a biography like Rogers’s, which took four and half years to complete, you choose carefully what to commit to next! Fortunately, Millicent Rogers’s life was interesting every step of the way.

Birth of a Book from Glen Milner on Vimeo.

This lovely film made me want to go right out and buy a copy of the book created in the video.

*For the Daily Telegraph. Shot at Smith-Settle Printers, Leeds, England. The book being printed is Suzanne St Albans’ ‘Mango and Mimosa’ published as part of the Slightly Foxed series.

Shot, Directed & Edited by Glen Milner

I’ll be taking the fast train to Mâcon tomorrow, where I’ll be giving my first talk in French about my novel, called Les Fiancées d’Odessa. Many thanks to Antoinette and Jean Marc of the bookshop Le Cadran Lunaire for their kind invitation!

My husband is the first reader of each blog post, and he jokes that I am always “thrilled” or “pleased” or “delighted” to interview each writer. He is right that I love success stories and am always glad to see a new book come out because I know how much time and effort goes into writing, editing, looking for an agent, working with the editor to polish the manuscript, etc. It is especially exciting when a friend’s book comes out. I have been lucky to be able to interview several my writer friends – Anne Marsella, Laurel Zuckerman, Heather Hartley, Chris Vanier, and Barry Kirwan, just to name a few. We all started out as unpublished writers over a decade ago and after so much writing and rewriting, rejection, attending workshops and conferences, and perseverance, several of us have published books.

Anne and I are both alumni of the Geneva Writers’ Conference and I am thrilled to be interviewing her about her novel, An Unexpected Guest, which will be published by Little, Brown US on April 17. It has been chosen as an April pick-of-the-week by WH Smith Booksellers here in Paris, where she’ll be reading and signing on May 31st. Also in May, the novel will be a featured alternate selection by Book of the Month Club, Literary Guild, Mystery Guild, and Quality Paperback Book Club. So far, rights have been sold in Italy, Russia, Serbia, and Australia. Congratulations, Anne!

What took you to Switzerland?

My husband’s work as a human rights lawyer.

What keeps you there?

Love, and the attendant bonds of holy matrimony. But Geneva also possesses great natural beauty; the mountains and lake make every day here remarkable.

Can you tell us what your book is about?

An Unexpected Guest tells the story of an American woman, married to a high-ranking British diplomat in Paris, who is asked at the last minute to put on a dinner that could make all the difference to her husband’s career. Alas, a secret from her past chooses this same twenty-four hours to raise its hoary head. How we live with our past, how we equilibrate our private versus our public lives, global life after 9/11, modern diplomacy, perceptions of terrorism and terrorists, marriage, parenting and especially parenting in multi-national or expat families, Rodin, and even what to serve at a spring dinner party in Paris are all woven into the narrative. Clare Moorhouse, the main character, is a very multi-tasking woman!

What were some of the challenges and rewards working on it?

I am happy to say that the one mostly led to the other, starting with all the research that went into the book – from plying a retired veteran diplomat with questions about protocol to reading copious studies, histories, and interviews related to the Troubles – and how to weave that information into the story in literary fashion. Simply determining how to indicate a Northern Irish brogue without driving readers crazy took hours of study! But I came away at every step with a richer world, both as a writer and just as a person.

What books are on your nightstand?

Agamemnon’s Daughter by Ismail Kadare, which I’ve just finished, and When a Crocodile Eats the Sun: a memoir of Africa by Peter Godwin, which I’ve just begun. I never read more than one book at a time, but I do always keep a few collections of short stories and of poetry, and a crumbling copy of Edith Hamilton’s Mythology at arm’s reach. And then there are two shelves of to-reads on the wall right beside my nightstand.

What is the best advice you have ever received?

Writing advice? Stop to pick the fruit.

What advice would you give to other writers?

Work hard, and then work harder.

What’s next?

My next novel! But I contemplate for a long time before I start writing, so, as I think the narrative through, I’m finishing a few short stories. Oddly, they all seem to be about displaced people… I’ll also be giving a bunch of author events in the U.S. and in Europe after An Unexpected Guest’s pub date on April 17th, including readings in Paris in May and October. Thank you for asking!