The Next Big Thing

Recently, poet Erin Keane tagged me in The Next Big Thing interview project, where writers talk about their recent or forthcoming book(s). Since I have a book coming out soon, I'm excited to participate in this interview project!

1. What is the working title of the book?
The title of my forthcoming book is The Eyes the Window, which will be my first collection of poems.

2. Where did the idea come from for this book?
This question is hard to answer. Basically, I wrote a book-length manuscript while studying for my MFA in Creative Writing, then threw it out after I graduated. (Well, I didn't literally throw it out: all the poems are still on my computer, but I decided not to send it out for publication as a book.) Many of the poems in my forthcoming collection are inspired by science, especially theoretical physics, because that's what I was reading at the time I wrote the poems. Most of the poems also turned out to be centered around the idea of perception, about how we all perceive and experience things differently, and many of the poems consider questions of faith and perception. Is there one truth even though we all perceive truth and experiences differently? If there isn't one truth, where does God fit in? Questions of that nature. While I was writing the poems I wasn't often consciously trying to write on these themes, but these are the things that started to come up a lot, and that I noticed ran through the manuscript as a whole when I put it together.

3. What genre does your book fall under?
Poetry

4. What actors would you choose to play the parts of your characters in a movie rendition?
It's difficult to image any book of poems being turned into a movie, though I'd be happy to entertain any offers! Somehow I imagine the actors/characters from Being John Malcovich would work.

5. What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?
"If you believe in me, I'll believe in you," -Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass

6. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your book?
About three years, though I think most of the poems I wrote during the 15 or so years before that were all leading up to the poems in this book.

7. Who or what inspired you to write this book?
Various physicists, the dictionary, the Bible, William Blake, Lake Michigan, childhood experiences, the music of Sigur Ros, friends from my MFA program.

8. What else about the book might pique the reader's interest?
The awesome cover, which is a painting my daughter Lucy made when she was seven or eight years old. She wants to be a writer herself, and like a true professional, when I told her about the cover, she was happy, but immediately asked, "but will my name appear in the book?"

9. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
The book won the Powder Horn Prize for first books, and will be published by Sage Hill Press.

Tagging:

David Wright
Matt Minicucci