On my many days of chronic over-employment (or at least professional over-stretchment) I often find myself daydreaming of a simpler life of commune living, of swapping pupik lint and wild-harvested leeks for ink pens and coffee beans, and this sort of thing.  I’m far from alone in this fantasy.

In Steve Himmer’s breathtaking debut The Bee-Loud Glade, our hero realises this fantasy by becoming a decorative hermit.  Below, author Himmer chats with The Bee-Loud Glade audiobook narrator Mark F. Smith about employment, wealth, and self-sufficiency.  Maybe if you read the entire thing, you’ll find a way to win a copy of the audiobook for yourself.

Mark F. Smith, narrator of The Bee-Loud Glade: OK, right away, we need to know if the inspiration for The Bee-Loud Glade was a family camping trip in your past that went horribly wrong?

Steve Himmer: Thank goodness, no. I’ve had some exciting camping adventures but never one that went horribly wrong. The closest I’ve come to was a camping trip in Australia during which some drunk hunters out spotlighting mistook (somehow) my friends and in our brightly colored sleeping bags for possums. The seed of the novel probably was planted during that trip, though, because during my time in Australia I was volunteering as a conservation laborer and became fascinated (and confused, and appalled, sometimes) at the degree of artificiality and construction even in so-called “natural” landscapes. I spent a couple of weeks, for instance, removing all the “unapproved” plants from a riverbank so the “approved” plants could thrive.

Author Steve Himmer

MFS: How on earth did you latch onto the idea that a great self-gift for the man who has everything is having one’s own hermit?

SH: It came from TV, from the BBC series The Worst Jobs In History. I watched a marathon of that show one afternoon while home sick, and in the episode about the Georgian period one of the worst jobs was “ornamental hermit.” It just clicked in my imagination, and I knew immediately I wanted to write a novel about someone with a contemporary version of that job.

MFS: I wanted the employer, Mr. Crane, to turn out to be some mystical being with a hidden purpose. Were you really tending in that direction as you wrote?

SH: No, there’s nothing mystical about him, I’m afraid, although he has attained a level of wealth that approaches being supernatural and as implausible as mystical powers. But I was committed to making the novel plausible, though unlikely — I don’t think there’s anything in it that’s strictly impossible, though I wasn’t terribly concerned with making it realistic.

Narrator Mark F. Smith

MFS:Why did you decide to impart special flow properties to the artificial river?

SH: There’s that old adage attributed to Heraclitus, that you can’t step in the same river twice (though the number of other people that also gets attributed to suggests you can coin the same phrase twice). Finch, however, can step in the same river twice. It’s a natural feature, yet wholly artificial at the same time, and that seemed potent to me — we’re used to thinking of rivers as flowing, as both timeless and deeply entrenched in the passage of time, and I enjoyed playing with and inverting that notion.

MFS: Just as the reader is left wondering about the employer and his life, the camping couple invites the same question. What’s their backstory?

SH: Oh, I can’t tell you that! I’d rather each reader or listener work that out on their own, or make up their own version. Some of it’s revealed, of course, in the end of the book, but the specifics… well, I suppose I like keeping the reader in the dark about that to the same extent Finch himself is kept in the dark. One of the novels I drew inspiration from while writing The Bee-Loud Glade was William Gaddis’ Carpenter’s Gothic, and what I enjoyed most in that book was how much of the action took place “off stage,” so to speak, and beyond the knowledge of the main characters and readers alike. I hope I’ve done something similar in my story.

MFS: At some point I wondered at the unfairness of Finch’s contract: five million a year to do nothing. That had to rankle Smithee and the other employees. Why so much for a decorative hermit?

SH: Oh, absolutely it rankled, as Smithee eventually makes pretty clear — and yet that’s all beyond Finch’s ken, isn’t it? There’s some tension, I hope, around that issue of labor and so-called self-sufficiency. But as for why he’s paid so much, you’d have to ask Mr. Crane, but there’s a vicariousness, a symbiosis maybe, between employer and employee: Mr. Crane is willing to pay so much first because he can, but also because that’s all he can do — he can’t actually live as Finch does, whether he wants to or not, and throwing money at the problem is his only real option. As it seems to be with most of his life.

MFS: Which is closer to the truth: The Bee-Loud Glade is a commentary on how people live vicariously by watching other people’s lives, or, it’s about how one can live while under that scrutiny?

SH: Can I just say, “Yes?” I suppose the question for me is is a combination of those two, or one that falls between them: how dependent is one life upon other lives, and how possible is it to actually live independently or in isolation? So it’s about not only watching other lives, but impacting them whether through wealth or labor, and also about telling ourselves we’re independent while depending so directly on institutions, and structures, and myths, to give ourselves that complicate, possibly false, sense of independence. With regards to watching and being watched, I guess I take it more or less for granted — or did in this novel, anyway — that we’re all in the panopticon already.

MFS: Come on: — you can tell us — didn’t you want to write a love story between the hermit and his employer’s wife?

SH: I can honestly say it never occurred to me to have an actual romance blossom between them. Desire, yes, and a sense of possibility, certainly, but no, I never thought about having something actually happen. In part, because the story required isolation rather than connection, as well as the monastic nature of Finch’s commitment. And I doubt Finch is capable of an actual “love story” — certainly not one with a woman he’s built up in his head before he even meets her, to the point he’s more or less incapable of seeing her as the person she actually is.

Miette Elm: In an interview with Atticus Books, you express a tendency toward isolation and solitude in your characters. I think that as a rule, the experience of listening to an audiobook removes the element of solitude from the reading experiences by introducing a narrator reading the book to you. How do you think The Bee-Loud Glad, specifically Finch in all his solitude, works when interpreted as audio?

SH: On the one hand, the nature of the novel is so interior — told in Finch’s voice, with so little dialogue, that I think a narrator becomes the embodiment of the character as much as of the story (if that makes any sense). There’s a freneticism, and exuberance, I imagined in Finch’s voice that I think Mark captures nicely. At the same time, one of the elements of the story is Finch’s own need for an audience, one he fulfills by imagining a “scribe” who follows him around and writes down what he thinks and does. So by listening to the story the reader is almost forced into the role of that scribe, following Finch around, taking in his story as it unfolds. I find that pretty appealing, because it adds a whole new layer to the experience.

ME: Finch’s voice is so rhythmic throughout the text, and his story so vibrant, that to me The Bee-Loud Glade seems perfectly suited for the oral tradition. Did you read aloud while writing? (Or, do you as a rule?)

SH: I do read aloud, and I’m very concerned with rhythm; I’ll add or remove a word or syllable just to match the rhythm I hear in a line. And writing, for me, is as much about connecting to oral traditions as literary ones — I’m really interested in folklore and storytelling performances (which isn’t to say I’m much good as a storyteller myself), and I think that’s reflected in how I write. The use of alliteration, for instance, which I know some reviewers and readers didn’t care for, but to me is an element of oral tradition that makes a story take on a performative life of its own.

ME: We love identifying great contemporary books that would be missed by mainstream audiobook publishers. What titles come to mind that you think would benefit from an audio treatment?

SH: Oh, well… just off the top of my head, I think Sara Levine’s new novel Treasure Island!!! from Europa Editions’ imprint Tonga Books would be a phenomenal audiobook. Her narrator has an exiting, madcap, and distinctive voice that could really come to life in the reading. Also, Robert Kloss — who, full disclosure, is a friend of mine — has a novel coming out with Mud Luscious Press called The Alligators of Abraham. His writing is dense, and driven less by narrative than richness of description, repetition, and incredibly vivid imagery. Fiction like that would be really exciting to listen to, and could envelop a reader with more than “just” hearing the story. The way Seamus Heaney’s recording of Beowulf does, for instance.

Tom McCarthy (C, Remainder) calls The Bee-Loud Glade An allegorical novel that seems eerily contemporary. Thoreau meets Ballard, meets Huysmans and many more.

Steve Himmer’s The Bee-Loud Glade can be had for $6.99.  Or, for cheapskates bargaineers:  We’re still all swoony from recent corporate chocolates, so from now until Friday, February 17, 2012, get this and any other title for 50% off by entering the code love-your-ears when prompted for a discount code at checkout on Iambik.com.

Or, for hermits-in-the-making looking to take a step toward self-sufficiency, here’s a chance to win one of three copies of the audiobook:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Usually here in the Iambikopolis, it’s our narrators asking questions of the authors whose books they’ve performed. In a table-turning twist best described by your humble bloghostess as “thrilling” (honestly), Robert Freeman Wexler, author of The Painting and the City, sends questions to narrator and actor Robert Keiper. The full interview can be found at Robert Wexler’s internet home, The Laconic Writer.

Don’t forget to enter to win one of 3 copies of The Painting and the City at the end of this post! Or if you just can’t wait, this and all our titles can be had at a 25% discount below by entering the code listen-more between now and the end of January 2012.

An excerpt from the interview:

LC: How does working as a voice artist on audio books differ from performing a play on stage?
RK: The immediacy of feedback on stage is galvanizing, a creative condition when all my resources are simply there without effort. In film work there’s always crew, director and other actors to bring about that same “heightened state.”

Narration is a solitary effort as, I’m sure, is yours. The opening of resource paths requires more and more consistent effort. I am my audience, my admirer and my critic.

But the rewards are delightful and amazingly identical, so long as approbation doesn’t creep in. It’s never about me, it’s always and only about the story.

Laconic Central: I’m pretty thrilled that someone did an audiobook of my writing, and I love how it came out. But I have to say I was pretty apprehensive at first. It was very strange hearing someone else read my words. How did voicing The Painting and the City compare with other narrations that you’ve done?

Robert Keiper: Even though I’d done several books prior to yours, I was still fairly new to this performing art as I started The Painting and The City. So I was making lots of mistakes, backing and filling, getting disgusted with myself and swearing I’d never finish the darned thing. Then I’d come to one of the interesting plot twists and get hooked all over again. I particularly remember the first time the puppet appears in the story, and the galvanizing effect that had on me. I was delighted with the character and my choice for a voice for him—but I knew he would appear again later, so I made a short recording of his voice and kept it handy as a reminder when needed again. Consistent character voices are as fundamental to the story as any other character traits, but when their appearances are far apart you have to take special care.

Here’s the rest.  Now enter to win:

If you haven’t been around on Facebook or Twitter, you might not be privy to the stuffers we’ve been offering for the stockings on your ears.  Our friend at Martha’s Bookshelf, who recently reviewed Graham Storrs’ TimeSplash, just hosted a giveaway of the same, whose results you can see here.  And in the same giving spirit, reviewer Nerfreader, who covered TimeSplash in November, is currently giving away three copies of the book, narrated by the lovely Emma Newman.  And there’s a bonus: the winners also receive access to the mp3 of the prequel short story, “Party Time,” read by the author himself.

Go and enter already!

Mr Storrs also took the time to answer some questions for Nerfreader.  An excerpt:

“Party Time” reminds us that side effects can be more important than the original action. While listening, I thought of the movie Primer, which also follows brilliantly destructive PhD students. Can any good come from time travel or is it something students should be dissuaded from pursuing? Its discovery doesn’t seem to have improved the TimeSplash world.

In film and literature, there is hardly a single instance where time travel actually turns out well. You’d think that would be a warning to us all, yet people keep on trying to make it happen! There are physicists who believe that the Universe must somehow forbid paradoxes from happening, even if time travel was allowed (no matter how hard you try, when you pull that gun on your grandmother, something will stop you). I’m sure there is a great comedy novel in there somewhere. But, even if Stephen Hawking now believes that time travel might just be possible, the mind-bending technologies and staggering energies involved mean it won’t be happening any time soon – unless somebody comes back and shows us how. The thing is, humankind has explored just about everything within reach and we crave that next big adventure. The only places left to go now are Time and Space. And I don’t think any amount of dissuading will stop people trying to go there.

The full interview can be read here.  Thanks to Martha and Nerfreader!

If Iambik were to offer a Residency in Literary Badassedness, well, it’d be a coveted position, and we’d have a lot of authors in the running.  And Lise McClendon would be among them.   She’s written seven novels, another under her pseudonym, is a member of the Thalia Press Author’s Coop, blogs, and as a rule, she writes like she means it.  It doesn’t hurt that her books are good, with a sharp edge and a cunning, lingering use of language.  Here, she chats with audiobook narrators Denice Stradling and Mark Douglas Nelson.

Denice Stradling, narrator of Blackbird Fly: First, Lise, I truly felt honored to narrate this book. When I was prepping it for narrating, I would find myself forgetting that I needed to be reading for characters, pacing, etc. … I found myself getting lost in the story, and having to remind myself to get back to the business at hand!

Narrator Denice Stradling

Something that really resonated with me about Blackbird Fly was the subtext of forgiveness. This is so NOT part of the basic premise of the book or one of its major plot points – murder, mystery, romance — but factors a little into the self-knowledge/’adult’ coming-of-age that Merle experiences. I’m specifically thinking about the ending, vis-à-vis, the Thanksgiving dinner – and that’s all I’ll say, because I don’t want it give it away! But I loved that. It’s so not what seems to be the norm in our society these days, and I found it so refreshing and lovely. How did you choose for Merle to go this route? Why was it important for you to have this in the book? I mean, it didn’t have to be there, but it meant so much.

Lise McClendon: First of all, I love it, Denice, how deeply you’ve thought about Blackbird Fly. That is one of the joys of this whole audiobook process. So thank you. Interesting that you bring up forgiveness. In families, whether your nuclear family or one you make for yourself as an adult, there are often issues that you get stuck on, things you can’t get past. For Merle Bennett, she not only has to forgive her dead husband — difficult because he’s gone — but also she has to forgive herself. That’s the ending of the book, really, that she is a bigger person because of her journey. She can say to herself, yes, you screwed up, he screwed up, but life goes on and let’s make the best of it. Also her story is mostly about the past, the things she should have done but didn’t. So the ending of the story is about the future, a brighter, more hopeful and loving one.

Author Lise McClendon

DS: Something else I really liked was Merle’s relationship with her sisters, how she shared caring and loving, but very different relationships, with each one of them. And how distinct their personalities were. I see a very modern-day Little Women here, albeit, not so little! Is this something that grew out of your own sibling relationships? And because they were so distinct, especially Annie, I could so see them having stories of their own. Any chance that this might happen?

LM: I based Merle somewhat on me because I am also the middle sister in a family of daughters. But mostly the five Bennett sisters are based on Pride and Prejudice’s five Bennett girls, the dynamics, the respect and support they have for each other despite their (vast) differences. Pride and Prejudice is one of my favorite novels. I tried to make each sister an individual the way Jane Austen did. I hope to write a book about each sister, a series of linked stand-alones — sometime, some day. That was the original plan. Hasn’t happened yet but I never say never.

DS: This novel is so visual: the beauty of France, especially the Dordogne, the house, the village, the wonderful and colorful characters of Malcouziac. Your excellent writing makes it all so easy to visualize. And because of that, I can so see this as a film as well. Would you have any aspirations for that? Have you ever thought of writing for that medium?

LM: I have written a few screenplays, and have a background in film and television, so thanks for the encouragement! I made a short film called The Hoodoo Artist, based on one of my short stories. So much fun. I can definitely see Merle’s story as a movie. Now to whisper in a Hollywood ear or two…

DS: And then there’s Pascal … so easy to fall in love with!! The ending of the book couldn’t be more perfect, but still… any chance that his and Merle’s story/ies might continue at some later date?

LM: Oh, definitely! Pascal is one of my favorite characters. He served his purpose in this story, which is to help Merle get past her problems, to feel lovable again, to get back to her life. But he deserves a little story of his own, don’t you think? I can still see him running around France, drinking wine in his black t-shirt. Lots of ideas, thanks, Denice.

Mark Douglas Nelson, narrator of One O’Clock Jump and Sweet & Lowdown: The books go beyond simple detective stories, including issues around race relations, abortion, and class privilege. Is this something you set out to do? And does setting the books in early World War II make it easier to do this?

Narrator Mark Douglas Nelson

LM: To write a story set in the Depression, with characters who are as real as you can make them, you have no choice but to write about the horrific problems of that era. Some problems we still have, like those you mention, Mark. To make the story relatable to a modern audience I felt I needed to make Dorie a full character. She’s been to reform school, she doesn’t have the money to continue her education, she’s lost her family: these are problems that happened all over this country, to regular people. It’s easier to look back at an era and see what the social problems were at the time, but those issues really haven’t been erased. One thing I love about mystery fiction is that you can learn about something, a time in history, a culture, whatever, while following the fun narrative of whodunit.

MDN: Your characters go far beyond just having a couple of quirks. Amos Haddam, Dorie’s boss, has an elaborate backstory of his own. On one hand he’s a fairly progressive guy for 1940, but he’s hampered by his physical problems, family worries, the War, often leaving Dorie to fend for herself. A disabled British WWI veteran in Missouri isn’t exactly a stereotype. How did this character evolve?

LM: I love the way you portrayed Amos in the audio version, Mark, with that semi-posh accent. It gives him so much life. He is a displaced person, much like Dorie. They have both lost their families though in Amos’s case it’s because he moved to America. He is sort of a father figure to Dorie — who definitely needs one — but they have to take care of each other. The Depression was an era of great upheaval. The two main characters, Dorie and Amos, reflect different aspects of that. With Amos, because he’s British, we get a connection with World War II as it breaks out in Europe, before America is involved. I wanted to try to get a picture of how America dealt with the war on the home front, before we plunged into the thick of it.

MDN: Dorie Lennox is a person no one cares about from a town no one cares about trying to solve crimes no one seems to care about, but her. She clearly has a soft spot for fellow under-dogs. Personally, I found her a more interesting person than, say, Kinsey Milhone. Is someone your model for the Dorie Lennox character?

LM: Dorie has a lot of baggage, doesn’t she? I love rich characters; they give the writer so much to deal with. She has hopes and aspirations despite her past where nothing seemed to go right. She has her own strong view of her future, she stands up for herself with or without her switchblade, she never forgets the people she’s loved and lost. She’s everything I would hope to be, in her shoes. I love Sue Grafton’s Kinsey Milhone myself. Dorie has more on her plate than Kinsey, for sure. The Thirties were a time of the individual, when the family unit, the family farm, was often upended and people were cut loose without any support. Dorie is a free spirit, an individual, who like every good heroine sees a bigger picture than the rest of the characters and tries to help people in her life to the best of her ability.

Miette Elm: Did you have any reservations or concerns about having your books made into audio? What was the experience like for you? (You can be honest; you won’t hurt our feelings, even though the experience for us has been nothing short of delightful).

LM: The major worry in having your novel made into an audiobook is will you like the narrator’s voice. I once did a straight-to-audio short story in a western collection and have never forgotten the somewhat shocking first listen of that. With Iambik Audio the writer gets to choose from the narrator from the auditions and that makes all the difference. I hadn’t really thought of having a male narrator for One O’clock Jump and Sweet and Lowdown, but once I heard Mark’s audition I knew it was right. I love this model of all of us working together to get the best quality audiobook possible. It does mean more work for the writer; listening and proofing the audiobook takes time. But it’s all to the good.

ME: You also write under the pseudonym Rory Tate. Do you have other pseudonyms or top-secret pen names?

LM: So far Rory Tate is my only super-secret pen name! Rory’s new novel Jump Cut is out now. It’s a sexy, modern thriller set in Seattle. It would be a fun audiobook!

ME: What are you working on next? Anything that might translate well into audio?

LM: I’m working on a mainstream novel and another thriller. I’m also the co-editor of a new crime short story anthology, Dead of Winter, that would make a fun audiobook because there is such a mix of stories.

ME: Who else writing biting-edge crime fiction today is creating works that you think would work in audio? Any favourite contemporaries come to mind?

LM: I love the Casey Jones stories by Katy Munger. We need to get her into audio! A few more are Gary Phillips, Kate Flora, and Sarah Shaber. All published by small presses and in need of audio. I love audio!

Lise McClendon’s Iambik titles can be had for $6.99 each.  BUT!  It’s the season for giving, so from now until December 31, 2011, get all three books for $15.73 (that’s 25% off, for the maths-challenged).  Just add all three books to your cart, and enter the code mclendon-audio when prompted for a discount code at checkout.

Publishers Weekly says of Sweet & Lowdown: This is a book to be savored read it too fast and you might miss something.

Check them all out:  Blackbird Fly.  One O’Clock Jump.  Sweet & Lowdown.