Devoted HMB readers, while you wait in desperate anticipation for the upcoming issue of Hot Metal Bridge, please enjoy this brief excerpt from an interview with novelist Stewart O’ Nan that will run in full in the Spring issue. Like any good teaser, this one ends on a cliffhanger, and if you want to find out how it all turns out, you’ll just have to be patient and check out the complete interview on March 31st when the issue goes live.
Hot Metal Bridge: Most of your books are grounded by a very tangible sense of place. What is it about setting that is so important to you as a writer?
Stewart O’ Nan: People are where they come from and where they live. They’re defined by the culture around them, down to the weather and the land. Even a manufactured culture like the culture of the workplace–the [Red] Lobster, for instance. Setting determines what’s possible, what’s probable and what’s inevitable for a character.
HMB: What is your process of writing like? Do you write everyday? Is there something you do beforehand to warm up? Do you ever read fiction before you begin?
O’ Nan: The process of writing for me is fitful at the start, steadier toward the middle and nerve wracking toward the end. I try to write everyday, though more and more I find myself taking weekends off. Before dinner I print out whatever I’ve written that day, then at night I’ll revise the pages. The next morning I’ll type those changes in and discover more changes, and that gives me a running start on the day. Though at some point I’ll bog down and wander around the house, looking out the windows, brooding, taking a book off the shelf and reading a passage or two. After a good day, I’ve got a page and a half, double spaced. Sometimes two.
HMB: Your latest novel, Last Night at the Lobster, chronicles the final day at a chain restaurant. Did you find that writing a book with this tight a plot progression any easier or more difficult than writing something with a more sprawling time span?
How will Stewart O’ Nan respond? Check back in on March 31st to find out.