I had decided to retire the literary Would You Rather series, but didn't want to stop interviews on the site all together. Instead, I've pulled together 40ish questions - some bookish, some silly - and have asked authors to limit themselves to answering only 10 of them. That way, it keeps the interviews fresh and connectable for all of us!
Joining us today is Alex
Miller. Alex is the author of the novel White
People on Vacation (Malarkey Books, 2022). He is a graphic designer and
former journalist who has worked at The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, St. Paul
Pioneer Press and Hawaii Tribune-Herald newspapers. His fiction has appeared in
dozens of literary magazines, including Pidgeonholes, Maudlin House and
MoonPark Review. He lives in Denver.
Do you DNF books?
Not really.
I’m crazy selective about what I read, so I usually have a good idea before I
start if I’m going to like it. The last book I didn’t finish was The Tin
Drum, about 15 years ago. It wasn’t a problem with the book; it was a
problem with me. I was at a dumb point in my life where I’d just graduated from
college, and I was working part time at a grocery store and playing a lot of
video games, and I forgot how to sit still long enough to get through a book.
Do you read the reviews of your books or do you stay far far away from
them, and why?
I mean, I
get published by small indie presses, so my books fly under the radar. I have
to beg for reviews, and usually it doesn’t work. In the rare cases when it did,
I read and reread those reviews obsessively and cherished every word.
What is your favorite book from childhood?
Harriet the Spy. It was the book I would reread
every year. I was your stereotypical quiet kid who spent too much time alone
with books. Harriet the Spy resonated
with me, especially the final section, when Harriet loses all her friends and
feels lonely. Looking back, it’s obvious I was a lonely kid, even though at the
time I didn’t realize I was lonely. Reading the book helped me recognize what
my deal was. It also helped me romanticize my own loneliness in a way that
helped me cope, until I grew up a little and started making friends.
What are you currently reading?
For
Christmas, one of my brothers gave me a college textbook on short stories. It’s
great. It’s full of the classics I read back when I was English-majoring my way
through college, and a lot of stories I probably should have read but, for one
reason or another, never got around to. The other day I read The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas by
Ursula K. Le Guin, and it was great. I also enjoyed Saboteur by Ha Jin. Every story in the book is a certified banger.
What genres won’t you read?
No limits on
genre. I’ll read anything as long as it’s good. I guess I haven’t read a
romance novel since high school. My mom and older sister had been reading one,
and they thought it would be simply hilarious if I read it too. They told me
the romance novel would teach me what
women really want. I read it voraciously. The experience taught me an
important lesson. If you want to know what a woman (or, for that matter,
anybody) wants, you can save yourself a lot of trouble by asking them directly.
Are you a book hoarder or a book unhauler?
I used to be
a big book hoarder. I lived in a house full of bookshelves, and I kept buying
books and reading them and filling the shelves until the house looked like a
Barnes & Noble. Then I got offered a job in Hawaii, and I couldn’t afford
to ship all those books. I gave everything away except for a few favorites that
fit in my luggage. Losing all those books was a bummer, because even now I’ll
find myself wanting to look up something, and I’ll realize I don’t have that
book anymore. But it was nice to start over. I’ve been building up the
collection again, at a slower pace. I bought a new bookshelf last month and am
extremely excited to have more space to fill.
What are your bookish pet peeves?
eBooks
What is under your bed?
All the old
DVDs I never watch but won’t get rid of. If you want my copy of Lost in Translation or my Criterion
Collection edition of Seven Samurai,
plan on taking it from my cold, dead hand.
What’s the single best line you’ve ever read?
I don’t have
one single favorite line to rule them all. But the other day I read Sonny’s Blues, by James Baldwin, and
it’s full of great lines.
A great block of ice got settled in
my belly and kept melting there slowly all day long, while I taught my classes
algebra. It was a special kind of ice. It kept melting, sending trickles of ice
water all up and down my veins, but it never got less. Sometimes it hardened
and seemed to expand until I felt my guts were going to come spilling out or
that I was going to choke or scream. This would always be at a moment when I
was remembering some specific thing Sonny had once said or done.
What’s on your literary bucket
list?
Fortune and
glory. Maybe an agent if I’m lucky.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
White
People on Vacation captures the hopes and fears of a generation struggling to
live meaningfully in the era of late-stage capitalism. The novel follows a
group of college students (white) who travel to Hawaii on a vacation (cursed)
paid for by their parents (loaded). Alex Miller paints a sun-drenched portrait
of the young and upwardly mobile as they attempt to leverage generational
wealth and skin color to attain the good life. White People on Vacation is a
beach read for socialists, a swan song for human aspiration in the age of
climate apocalypse.
Buy a copy:
http://malarkeybooks.com/white-people-on-vacation
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