Interview by Lynne Jamneck http://www.lynne-jamneck.blogspot.com/

Joan Opyr is the author of Idaho Code: Where Family Therapy Comes With a Shovel and an Alibi. She is a regular columnist for New West Magazine (www.newwest.net), Stonewall News Northwest (www.stonewallnews.net), and a number of other newspapers and magazines. She lives in Moscow, Idaho with her partner of fourteen years, their two children, four dogs, sixteen chickens, and a complete set of in-laws. Opyr’s next book, From Hell to Breakfast, will be published in March 2007.

What first attracted you to the notion of writing?

Reading.  As soon as I learned to read, I began to write.  I seemed to write a lot in the early days about famous cats.  I wrote a series of stories about a cat named Sylvester who sang and played the cello.  Very talented cat.  Later, I got hooked on Nancy Drew.  I took those characters, introduced them to Bigfoot, and produced my first novel, “The Monster.”  It’s about thirty-five pages, double-spaced and written with a fat, red, Number One pencil.

Was writing something you always wanted to do?

Yes.  There has never been a time when I didn’t want to write.  There’s never been a time when I didn’t write, even if it was only composing letters or emails.  I write all day, every day.

Who were your literary heroes as a youngster?

Carolyn Keene, the conglomerate of women and editors who wrote the Nancy Drew series.  I was devastated when I found out there was no Carolyn Keene, per se.  I had a picture of her in my mind, and I had invented quite the biography for her.  I don’t suppose ghostwriter Mildred Wirt Benson was an aviatrix and World War I spy?

I loved Beverly Clearly and a couple of other children’s writers, but as soon as I could, I made the leap to Agatha Christie.  My first Christie mystery was Postern of Fate.  I think I was about ten, so I missed quite a bit, but I loved it anyway.  I loved the tightness of her plots.  The next thing I read was Arthur Conan Doyle’s A Study in Scarlet, and I became deeply suspicious of the Mormon family who lived next door.  Did they know about Brigham Young?  Were they drifting into polygamy?  They were the only Mormons I knew, and they were converts from Catholicism, but at age ten, I believed everything I read.  It was about this time that my mother let me borrow her copy of Chariots of the Gods.  Disaster!  Somewhere in the back of my mind, I still believe in little green men.

When did you feel like a writer for the first time?

I felt like a writer at seven.  I felt like I was a writer when I wrote my “Sylvester the Cat” stories.  And then, after high school, I lost that feeling.  I went to graduate school, and I felt like a future English professor.  I left graduate school, and I felt like a drop-out.  It didn’t matter that I left to write Idaho Code; that I left because I had to in order to be a writer.  I don’t think I felt like a writer again until I got that phone call from my literary agent, Victoria Sanders (www.victoriasanders.com).

Writing is a struggle.  It’s something you are and something you do, but unless you’ve got a published book in your hand, it’s hard to feel like a writer.  No – it’s hard to feel like a successful writer.  It’s very easy to feel like a failed writer, or a writer wannabe.  You have to push through that feeling and believe in yourself almost to the point of delusion.  Was I a writer before my first book was published?  Before I was a regular columnist for New West and Stonewall?  Yes.  I really wish I knew how to hold on to that feeling you have as a kid where if you write, you are a writer; if you dance, you are a dancer.  Something – the world, I suppose – knocks that confidence right out of us, but we need it.  We can’t succeed without it.

Bywater Books recently released your fiction debut, Idaho Code. Can you tell us about the inspiration/ idea behind the story?

I’m originally from Raleigh, North Carolina, but I married an Idaho girl.  We came out to Moscow for a visit, and I fell in love with the place.  We live on the Palouse, an area in the northern part of the state covered in rolling hills and waving wheat.  Moscow is a small college town, very progressive, very granola, and yet it’s not like Chapel Hill or any other college town.  This is the Wild West.  In Moscow, you see Volvo station wagons with gun racks.  We’re different here; we’re unique. 

I was intrigued by this town, and by the vast size of Idaho and its sparse population.  This place is twice the size of North Carolina, and yet I think our population has only recently reached one million.  On that first visit, we drove all over hell’s half acre, and I thought, “You could hide a body anywhere here, and no one would ever find it.”  That was the beginning of Idaho Code.  The story grew in the telling, though.  It’s not a straightforward mystery.  It’s a book about family, love, community and a little murder here and there.

What was the most challenging aspect of writing the book?

Finishing it.  I began Idaho Code in 1993.  I finished, officially, last December.  That was when I submitted the final copy-edited draft to my editor at Bywater Books.  For nearly seven years, I tried to work full-time, raise two kids, and write in the evenings.  I was able to quit my full-time job in 2000 and go freelance.  I finished the first draft of the book in three months and had a literary agent in another two. 

The book took a while to sell because it’s hard to pigeonhole; it doesn’t fit any particular genre.  It’s a mystery, a romance, a novel about family, and it’s a love letter from me to Idaho.  One editor (who rejected the book) said that it was a great read but that she feared it was “in that no man’s land between literary and commercial fiction.”  And it is.  I am grateful to Marianne Martin and Kelly Smith of Bywater for taking a chance on the book, and I am in love with my agent, Victoria Sanders.  Remember how I was suspicious of Mormons after reading A Study in Scarlet?  Now I’m thinking polygamy might work – I keep inviting Victoria to be my second wife, but she always turns me down.  I don’t think she wants to live in Idaho.  She’s like Lisa on Green Acres.  She doesn’t like fresh air; she likes Times Square.

Your alter ego, Auntie Establishment, writes a column called No Rest For The Wicked. Have you ever attracted any flack for topics that you choose to write about?

Constantly!  I get hammered on right-wing blog sites.  I’ve had dog shit smeared into the air intakes on my car.  My editors at New West tell me I receive more hate mail than any of their other writers.  Good!  I don’t deliberately set out to make people angry; I set out to speak my mind, and I’m not afraid to do that.  For a time, I was being harassed by a load of loonies called The Army of God for a throw-away comment I made about serial bomber Eric Rudolph.  That was a bit unnerving, but what I said was true, and I don’t regret it.  My targets are religious fundamentalists of all stripes, bigots, homophobes, sexists, theocrats, and the spoiled rich bastards who are at present sitting on top of the ash heap they’ve made of the U. S. Constitution. 

Most of the time, I take flack from the hard right, but I’ve caught a bit from the soft left recently for saying that I will not vote for Hillary Clinton.  I’m through supporting Democrats who don’t support me.  If you’re not out there supporting equality for everyone, if you’re not out front on gay marriage, then I won’t support you.  I’m tired of triangulating.  Yes, Bill Clinton was worlds’ better than George W. Bush, but let’s aim higher.  Let’s look for our next FDR, our next real visionary.  I’m afraid my favorite candidate for President just died of esophageal cancer: Ann Richards.  Now there was a true maverick, a Democrat’s Democrat.

I understand that you’re supposed to grow more conservative as you get older.  I’ll be 40 soon, and I’ve grown more liberal.  But then I do everything bass-ackwards, as my grandfather used to say.

What makes you crabby?

Waking up in the morning.  Getting a wand up my jacksie at airline security.  Liars.  Hypocrites.  Cheap tippers and people who are rude to waiters, waitresses, and other people working in the service industries.  Ann Coulter makes me as cross as two sticks.  So do George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and the rest of the current U.S. administration.  I don’t like fat-assed, loud-mouthed, belligerent preachers.  Or bullies.  I really don’t like bullies.  I enjoy knocking them down a peg or two.

Are there other specific genres you'd like to write in at some point?

I’d like to try writing Shirley Jackson-style ghost stories.  There is no book on earth more frightening than The Haunting of Hill House.  Jackson was a genius.  I like to make people laugh, but it might also be fun to scare the pants off them.

Which aspect or elements of writing do you find the most challenging?

Getting that first draft down on paper.  I do my best work in the multiple edits.  As I mentioned earlier, my stories grow in the telling.  I like editing.  I have trouble not editing as I’m writing that first draft – if you edit when you’re drafting, you get bogged down.  That’s a problem for me.  I need a firm, solid deadline.  I am great with deadlines, even though I complain about them bitterly.  Without a deadline, I’d never get anything done.  I’d putz and futz until I’d worked a piece to death.

How do you feel about the current trends in lesbian publishing?

Honestly?  I am pleased to see the proliferation of small presses, but the poor quality of the books and the writing is a problem.  You can’t trust those Amazon reviews.  We lesbians are so anxious to see ourselves in print, on film, and on television that we’ll put up with anything.

It’s like politics.  The Democrats can do better than pandering to the wishy-washy middle, but we don’t try hard enough.  We don’t have the courage of our convictions.  We listen to the air-heads, the know-nothing pundits who tell us it’s more important to win than to be on the right side of history.  In publishing, we should aim for quality, not quantity.  We should be aim for higher quality in lesbian writing and publishing – strong writing, beautiful covers, and excellent typesetting.  We produce some very good work but not nearly enough.  When I pay Amazon.com fifteen bucks plus shipping for an incoherent novel with plot holes you could drive a truck through, I get crabby.  And when the cover is hideous, and the book looks like it was typeset by a myopic monkey, I hate that I’ve wasted my money – again.

Hey, there’s something else for my crabby list.  I’m a complete curmudgeon.

What are some of your favorite books from 2006 so far? 

Terry Pratchett’s Thud.  Pratchett just gets better and better.  I loved Lindy Cameron’s Blood Guilt and Marianne Martin’s Never Ending.  I’d like to mention a few books published before 2006 that I think are wonderful: Helen Shacklady’s The Patterned Flute, The Stolen Crate, The Lacquered Box, and Stoppage Time.  I love Shacklady’s work; she’s a very funny writer, and her characters leap off the page and into your head.  They’re damned good company.

I think everyone should read V. G. Lee’s Diary of a Provincial Lesbian, and I’ve enjoyed all of Sarah Waters’ work except Affinity.  That was just a matter of personal taste – Waters is a brilliant writer, but Affinity was deeply disturbing.  But do read it anyway, and read Fingersmith and Tipping the Velvet.  I love Emma Donoghue and Ann-Marie MacDonald.  I love the late Jean Swallow.  Her 1985 novel, Leave a Light on for Me, was a book ahead of its time.

What are the fundamental elements of good storytelling?

I prefer character-driven stories.  I can’t imagine writing PWP (Plot, what plot?) but I also don’t outline – at least not in the beginning.  I try to create fully realized characters, and then I drop them into difficult families or difficult situations and let them lead the way.  I enjoy following them around, listening to their conversations.

Good dialog is important.  You need to have an ear for the way people really talk.  I like good description and clever turns of phrase, and I’ll tweak a single sentence for hours until I’m satisfied with it.

Tell us something about Joan Opyr no-one else knows…

I grew up in the South, where women are taught to fawn and flirt and cater to others.  I was trained from infancy to charm and please.  I like people, and I’m an extrovert, so I’ve always found this easy to do.  I work well with crowds.  I enjoy book readings and book signings.

What people don’t know is that the older I get, the less I give a tinker’s cuss what anyone actually thinks of me.  To quote my grandfather again, I do what I goddamn please.  I am still a Southerner.  I am still innately friendly and always ready to charm, but I have discovered my inner core, my tensile strength.  I am not a steel magnolia; I am a titanium Southern butch.  I’m looking forward to turning forty, but what I really want to be is seventy-five.  Forget about wearing purple.  When I’m an old woman, I’m going to strap on a flame-thrower and a grenade launcher like Ripley in Aliens.  I intend to put the panther into the Gray Panthers.  My kids and grandkids will look upon me and despair.
Do you ever suffer from writer's block?

No.  I suffer from procrastination.  Why finish today what you can put off until the drop-dead date?  Why write when you can nap?

How much time do you spend writing, on average, and what do you do when you're not writing?

When I’m not writing, I’m thinking about writing.  I’m having conversations with characters in my head.  My kids and my partner find this hilarious because sometimes my lips move.  I spend a lot of time writing, but not enough of it writing books.  I write a lot of columns.  I write a lot of letters and emails.  I’ve collected one of my lengthier email exchanges with a local fundamentalist preacher on my website, edited it for clarity, and published it as “From Queer to Eternity.”  I think it’s pretty funny.  The preacher didn’t.  You can read it at (www.auntie-establishment.com/church.html).

What has the Internet meant to you as a writer?

The Internet has given me an audience.  It has also sharpened my thinking.  I love the rapid-fire exchanges on the different chat groups.  I belong to a couple of lesbian fiction lists and to a Moscow community chat group.  I really like corresponding with people from different parts of the United States and from different countries.  I’ve made a few enemies, but I’ve made many, many more friends.

Have you ever censored yourself with your writing in any way?

Yes, long ago.  When I was in the English Department at North Carolina State University, my MA was in English with a Creative Writing emphasis.  I wrote a novella called The Book of Margery.  It could have been good, but it wound up being incomplete and half-assed.  Why?  Because it was written by committee.  I don’t mind being edited.  I welcome a good edit, but I will never again write by committee.  I won’t override my own instincts or my overarching plan for a book to satisfy someone else’s needs or whims.  External censorship is bad; self-censorship destroys the soul.

I’d rather never publish again than censor myself, say something in a namby-pamby way, or not say something that I think needs saying.  I’ll just blurt it out and take my chances.  Speak truth and shame the devil.

What's the best advice anyone has ever given you about the publishing industry?

Be open to good editing.  Remember that there is no such thing as a perfect first draft.  There is always room for improvement, but stick to your guns.  Ultimately, it’s your book.  You own it.  Your name is on the cover, and those are your characters.  Don’t be bossed and don’t be bullied.  Know the difference between editing and a hatchet job.

My advice to new writers is to find a good agent or a good attorney.  Know what you want and where you hope to go.  And remember that no one is going to sell your book for you.  I don’t care what the publisher’s marketing budget is or how much PR they promise to do.  Big press or small press, you are your own best PR.  Writing the book is only the beginning.  Get your ass out there and sell, sell, sell.

A happy writer is...

A writer who has just finished the final copy edit on her book.  It’s out of her hands now and off to the printer.  She’s got a glass of Scotch in one hand, someone else’s good novel in her other, and, stretching out before her is a grand total of about forty-eight hours before she starts writing her next book.  That’s the moment to savor.