The 40 But 10: Kelly Lydick

 

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!

Today we are joined by Kelly Lydick, received a Bachelors degree in Writing & Literature from Burlington College, with emphases in Psychology and Music, and a Masters degree in Writing & Consciousness from New College of California. Her work has been published in literary magazines such as Guernica, Rain Taxi Review of Books, The Rumpus, Tarpaulin Sky, Drunken Boat, Mission at Tenth, Thema, Switched-On Gutenberg, and many others. Her articles have appeared in other magazines including Natural Awakenings, Co Yoga + Life, True Blue Spirit, American Art Collector, Western Art Collector, and many others. She has also been featured on NPR’s The Writers’ Block and the Word podcast, and on iHeart radio. Kelly is the author of the experimental Mastering the Dream, and a contributing author to the anthologies Dreams That Change Our Lives, the IPPY Award winning Are You the Missing Piece?, and My Journey, My Journal. She's also the author of Dream Incubation for Greater Self-Awareness: A Handbook. She’s a recipient of a Professional Development grant from the Arizona Commission on the Arts, a National Endowment for the Arts program, and a past Writer in Residence at the Idaho Commission on the Arts’ Idapost Pen Pal project. Kelly holds professional memberships with the International Association for the Study of Dreams, where she has presented her work on dream studies and served on the board of directors, and the Academy of American Poets. You can find her at www.kellylydick.com.

What do you do when you’re not writing?

It’s so important for writers to have other things besides writing given it’s such a solitary thing. Thank you for asking! I’m not a person who sits down and forces a written quota per day or week. I wrote for a monthly magazine in the past and that deadline driven work was some of the best training in writing I have ever gotten during the course of my career. But I much prefer to court the muse—not race against the clock. When I’m not writing, I’m doing yoga, hiking, editing other authors’ books, taking my son to soccer games, coaching people on empowerment, leading ceremonies of cacao, helping my son learn music and how to speak Italian, journaling about my dreams, cooking, playing games or reading with my son, and spending time with my parents, friends, and family.

 

 

Describe your book poorly.

She’s a nosy girl. A really nosy girl. And she asks a lot of questions, too. If I were trying to keep a secret, I would find her annoyingly nosy. I mean, she’s likable for a main character. And we all have our flaws, her especially, but I still ponder whether or not I would actually be friends with her in real life. I could tell you what she does for a living, but that would be a spoiler alert. I could tell you what her father’s secret project is, but that would be a spoiler alert. I could tell you if her story ends on a high note, but that would be a spoiler alert, too. The main thing is, she’s a strong character. And she’s been heartbroken in her own strange way. Everyone can relate to that, right? And sometimes it takes a minute to morally sort yourself out, especially when your parents have passed away at a young-ish age, and you’re left without good role models. That’s where this one starts. But that’s not where it ends. I cried at the end when I wrote it. And cried again at the end when I proofread it before publication. And, honestly, I hope you cry at the end, too. If you don’t, then I didn’t do my job well enough.

 

If you could cast your characters in a movie, which actors would play them and why?

I so love this question because I often ponder this about all of my writings. And this is a multinational group of characters in Everything That’s Left Behind. It would be:

Rupali Jenga played by Kareena Kapoor Khan.

Nichola Rodale played by Phoebe Tonkin.

John Downing played by Jack Whitehall.

Alice Masterson by Stana Katic.

Rebecca Snow by Nathalie Emmanuel.

Dang Jin by Michelle Yeoh.

Kang & Guerin (both) by Ben Wang.

Alexander Rodale by Henry Cavill.

Deborah Rodale by Catherine Keener.

Roy Dubois by Sean Bean.

Pamela DuBois by Holly Hunter.

Catherine Rodale by Elizabeth Olsen.

Chase Bennett by Josh Hartnett.

Frank Murray by Miles Teller.

Henry Moorehouse by Danny Glover.

David Anderson by Liam Hemsworth.

Commander Williams by Hugo Weaving.

Amina by Halle Berry.

 

 

What are some of your favorite books and/or authors?

Ooohhhh…. So many to name it’s not fair. I will inevitably leave someone out… (Apologies in advance.)

Ray Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes is what made me want to become a writer. So, naturally, Alice Hoffman as well. Allegra Hyde for her prose. Jenny Lawson for her humor. Marianne Wiggins for the longest extended metaphor in literary history; in my opinion at the very least she should have won the National Book Award for Evidence of Things Unseen, not just been a finalist. Jodi Picoult for keeping it real always, and Leaving Time is one of my all-time favorite books. Kristin Hannah for the best first line ever written, in her book The Nightingale. David Mitchell, for re-writing the way everyone sees the soul, in Cloud Atlas. Paul Corman Roberts for leading an example that to live and breathe and embody poetry as life as art in a seamless and inseparable way is absolutely possible. Dobby Gibson for Little Glass Planet. Michael Talbot for The Holographic Universe. And, the late souls who have left this plane, colleagues and mentors David Henderson, Jerome Rothenberg, Neeli Cherkovski, and Akilah Oliver.

 

What is your favorite book from childhood?

A tie between Bunnicula and The Phantom Tollbooth for single titles. My son is in elementary school and we recently read both of these together, and it was so wonderful to revisit these stories in a new context. I gifted him the actual vintage copies of both that I had saved for that exact reason, which was really special. But also, the entire Nancy Drew series. It doesn’t matter to me that the individual books weren’t written by the same writer under the pseudonym Carolyn Keene. I still have all my old original hardcover copies, nearly a complete original set. It’s my childhood treasure.

What are you currently reading?

I never read just one book at a time! Currently, I’m reading The Gospel of Mary Magdalene translated by Leloup, The Spiritual Combat by Lawrence Scupoli, and The Saturday Night Ghost Club by Craig Davidson, apropos to summer.

I often refer to nonfiction reference books daily or weekly on a rotation, depending on what I’m doing. Current references are David Hawkins’ The Map of Consciousness Explained, Jose Luis Stevens’ The Shaman’s Book of Extraordinary Practices, and Brianna Wiest’s The Pivot Year.

And, with my son for his summer reading project, Insignificant Events in the Life of a Cactus by Dusti Bowling, which is a really sweet little book, also set in Arizona.

Do you think you’d live long in a zombie apocalypse?

If the zombie apocalypse took place and I were stuck inside a bookstore, I would become quickly infected and die, bleeding all over the pages of bell hooks’ All About Love.

If I were somewhere else with my friends and family, we’d definitely be the last ones standing. My closest friends are Gen Xers, like me. I grew up in Chicago, and my dad was in the military. That’s an impermeable character backstory and a plot set-up to be able to survive anything.

Are you a toilet paper over or under kind of person?

This is so funny! I couldn’t care less. I actually once dated a guy who got mad at me because I put the toilet paper on the “wrong way.” I dumped him during that conversation and never talked to him again. But I admit, that experience crosses my mind from time to time, and I’m so grateful he wasn’t “the one.” I’m waaayyy too much of a free spirit to be worrying about the way my toilet paper hangs.

I also have several more books to write.

What songs would be on the soundtrack of your life?

I love this question, too! I’ve always lived and breathed music since I started piano when I was 5. I stuck with it in various forms over the years—played the flute in band, sang in choir, and had a music concentration in college. I LOVE to sing. This list is looooonnnggg and varied. How could it not be with more than four decades of history?

Van Morrison “Into the Mystic”

Tom Petty’s “Wildflowers”

Talking Heads “Once in a Lifetime”

Lionel Richie “Sail On” & “My Love” & “You Are”

Lindsay Buckingham and Stevie Nicks “Crystal”

Fleetwood Mac “Storms” and “Silver Springs”

Keith Garret “The Koln Concert”

Dave Matthews Band “Ants Marching” & “Lover Lay Down” & “I’ll Back You Up” & “Stay or Leave”

Patty Griffin “When it Don’t Come Easy”

Yazoo “Only You”

Kenny Rogers & Dolly Parton “Islands in the Stream”

Christopher Cross “Sailing” & “Never Be the Same”

Alanis Morissette “You Learn” & “Thank You” & “Uninvited”

Radiohead “Everything in Its Right Place”

The Doors “Riders on the Storm” & “The End” & Indian Summer”

Led Zepplin “Fool in the Rain”

Omkara & Gotama “A Prayer”

Grateful Dead “Ripple”

Yaima “Rebirth” & “Pellucidity”

Rage Against the Machine “Mic Check”

Peter Gabriel “In Your Eyes”

The Cars “Drive”

Crowded House “Don’t Dream It’s Over”

Duran Duran “Ordinary World”

George Michael “Careless Whisper”

The Outfield “Your Love”

Heart “Alone”

RJD2 “Ghostwriter”

Wu-Tang Clan “CREAM”

GZA “Shadowboxin’”

The Roots “The Next Movement”

KRS-One “Step into a World”

Jedi Mind Tricks “The Three Immortals” & “The Deer Hunter”

Mazzy Star “Fade into You”

DJ Taz Rashid “Cloud Nine” & “Deep Sweet”

Justin Timberlake “Mirrors” & “What Goes Around Comes Around”

Ed Sheeran “I Don’t Care” & “Shivers”

Dua Lipa “We’re Good”

Justin Beiber “Holy” & “Ghost” and “Daisies”

Jay Sean and Lil Wayne “Down”

Sage 808, Ruby Chase & Equanimous “Kairos”

Khruangbin “People Everywhere”

Amistat “Seasons”

Enigma “Return to Innocence”

Everything Beethoven.

Okay, I’ll stop now.

Do you DNF books?

I never used to do this. Especially in college and grad school. If I started it, I was committing to finishing it. But as time has gone on, I feel like reading a book is an investment. It takes time that could be spent doing other things. I got really lean with my time and focus of energy after I became a mom. So now, if I don’t like something, it doesn’t resonate with me right away, or I struggle to engage, I disengage and move on to the next one. And I don’t feel weird or guilty about it either. It just wasn’t for me, or the wrong time for that particular story and resonance. And sometimes when it’s just that the timing and mood is off, I circle back to a book at another time and it’s the perfect book later.

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Out now! 

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Nichola Rodale has followed in her father's footsteps, joining an elite team dedicated to creating a sustainable future for humanity. But when she stumbles upon information suggesting her father—a renowned scientist and brilliant puzzle maker—may not have died during The Great Drought as everyone believes, she begins to question everything, including the organization for which she works.

 

Determined to discover the truth, Nichola embarks on a perilous journey across the desolate American Southwest. Her search takes her from the remnants of Phoenix to an underground rebel café and, ultimately, to the legendary Valley of Fire—a place whispered about but believed by most to be nothing more than a myth.

 

As powerful forces close in and the lines between friend and foe blur, Nichola must stay true to her heart to navigate a world of loyalty, power, and betrayal. She will have to risk everything—including her own life—to protect her community, secure its future, and survive long enough to expose the truth about her father's work and uphold his legacy.