Field Recordings welcomes Scholastic Press' Jeff Hirsch, who is currently blog touring in support of The Darkest Path. You can read my review of The Darkest Path here, originally published by The Broadkill Review.
Jeff Hirsch
Most recent title published: The Darkest Path
Love that Cal is a dog catcher in the first act, how that shows us how dehumanized he is. Couple that with the brutal way he is beaten, and we start off with a hero who doesn't have a chance. You put him through the wringer. He continues to go through the wringer. What were you thinking in terms of heroic feats with this young man?
Well, the most important thing to me is that he wasn’t a hero, at least not at the beginning. I think Cal’s just a kid who wants to get back home and is willing to do whatever it takes to get there. In a way he’s as much of a fanatic as anyone in the Path, in that this single desire overrides everything else in his life. I think his journey is about moving away from self-obsession and seeing that he has a role in and responsibilities to other people and the larger world. Once he realizes that then he’s able to do things that are more heroic.
The Path. Tell me you didn't enjoy playing around with the fanaticism of the metaphor. What went into that recipe?
You know how you often hear people say, when talking about a politician, (usually a fairly extreme one) “I don’t agree with everything he’s saying but at least you know where he stands.” I was thinking about that a lot. The world is a chaotic and dangerous place and we have a tendency, as a country, to be pretty fearful. So it’s incredibly comforting to see someone who doesn't seem conflicted, who seems to know what they want and where they want to go. Someone with a plan. It can be so comforting that sometimes we’re less curious than we should be about the details of that plan. If it seems like it’s something that can take chaos and make it into order, or take complexity and make it into simplicity, we’re ready to sign up. And in a way it’s hard to fault people for that. It’s a normal human desire it can just lead to some pretty awful things.
You have explored being an outsider through the lens of family, of race, of belief; your characters are often outsiders, what is so fascinating about being on the outside looking in? There’s so much dystopian drama out in the world. What popular entertainment are you watching? What is it about the rags of the world that we find so fascinating?
Honestly, I read and watch almost none of the sci-fi dystopian stuff out there. After The Road, Hunger Games, How I Live Now, Rootless and Y: The Last Man, I got my fill. Most everything else, even when very well written, seems like a retread.
Why do we find that stuff so interesting? A lot of reasons I think. One is that it puts characters right on the edge so it’s tailor made for intense, high stakes storytelling. Outside of that I think we’re in a place right now where the world feels overstuffed and overstimulating and so mediated by technology that a lot of us feel like we’ve lost touch with basic human needs. Food, water, fire, shelter, human connections. Look at the DIY movement going on now. People are canning and knitting and sewing and cooking again. I think we feel this urge to put our hands to our own survival. Post-apocalyptic and dystopian literature feeds into that desire by stripping away the modern world and giving us one that seems simpler or at least more straightforward. In these worlds characters have to rely on themselves, on their skills and their bodies and their wits to survive. As dark as a lot of these worlds are they’re wish fulfillment in a way.
As for popular entertainment I’m a huge fan of Colbert, Breaking Bad, Mad Men and Game of Thrones. Also really looking forward to Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., mainly because if Joss Whedon is involved, I’m there.
Tell us about Hill, what went into this man’s psyche? Did you model this character on any contemporary figure?
I wanted to make sure that he was a guy who was absolutely certain that he was the good guy in the story. He sees what he’s doing as the only way to save a badly broken world. He sees himself as acting out of love, not anger or hate. I hoped to create a guy who was smart, sensitive and thoughtful, a guy you would love to hang out with, all the while he was doing absolutely monstrous things.
I was reminded of the Odyssey reading this book, perhaps all of the Ithaca references, did you model this book on The Odyssey or Conrad’s Heart of Darkness?—the suffering reminds me of how one can never go home again…
I was definitely thinking of The Odyssey. It’s actually a large part of how I conceptualized the story in the early days, to the point that many of the incidents in TDP were directly inspired by incidents in the Odyssey. The part with the theater kids at that luxury compound came from The Lotus Eaters section of Odyssey, the part where Cal and the kids have to walk through the war zone was inspired by Odysseus in Hades. It ended up that those incidents are so loosely adapted that it’s unlikely anyone would ever notice, but that’s where the seed of the ideas came from.
Drone strikes. I love the fact that this book is both futuristic and topical. What’s your take on the use of drones? Is this more abuse of power?
Ugh. Drones. I’m conflicted. On one hand, I’m a realist. We’re going to be getting into violent conflicts with other countries and when we do I want as few of our people to die as possible. That said, the idea of war that can be waged without consequence to us, without any of our blood in the game, is incredibly dangerous. It just makes it way too tempting to lob bombs at problems. So while I can totally see their utility, I fear that using them requires more thoughtfulness and restraint than we seem to have.
What’s next for you? What’s cooking in the kitchen?
A lot, happily! I’ve got a book for younger kids coming out in January, called Breakaway. It’s the second book in the final run of the 39 Clues series. Other than that I just finished the first draft of another YA book, currently titled Black River, that I’m hoping will be out next fall. Can’t say too much about it yet other than it concerns a small town that has been quarantined for a very strange reason….
What are your rituals with regards to writing (ex: Must have tea, a cat on the lap, etc)
I actually try very hard not to have any rituals. Sometimes a deadline demands that you write in a hotel room or an airport, or on a train so I think it’s a good idea to need as little as possible in order to write. The only thing I like to have is my headphones and a good connection to Spotify so I can drown out the world with my writing playlist, which is mostly ambient/classical background music, lots of Phillip Glass, good move soundtracks etc.
Describe your writing process:
Does fumbling in the dark count as a process? Seriously, I admire/am incredibly jealous of writers who seem to have a set process. It must be so comforting to know that if you do X and then Y and then Z you have a book. For me I get a general idea and then work out a rough structure of how I think the story will go. Once I start though that outline largely gets tossed out the window. For me, the first couple drafts are all about figuring out what the hell the story is about, who the characters are and what I’m trying to say with it. The next drafts are all about deepening and sharpening those things as best I can.
What do you when you begin to revise? What's the first thing you do during that process?
The first thing I do is step away. Ideally I’ll set the book aside for a couple weeks and work on something else. (I’d like to set things aside for longer, but after two weeks I get seriously jittery and dive my wife crazy) The goal is to get it out of my head to the point that when I come back to it it’s this strange half remembered thing. Once I come back I always tell myself that I’m going to sit down and read the whole thing without making an changes or notes. Just experience it. I never actually do this. I always start at the beginning and work my way through it, applying insights I had over the course of writing the book to earlier scenes, cutting out the obvious bits of flab and sharpening character and relationship arcs. It’s a long period of refining, little by little, draft after draft.
When revising, how many drafts do you go through before you feel comfortable with the final product?
Honestly? I’m never satisfied. I could rewrite forever. I’m a big believer in that old adage about how a book is never finished only abandoned.
What writers are you currently reading? I’m all over the place lately. I just finished the most recent Game of Thrones book (pretty good but largely felt like place setting for what’s to come) and am now reading Leviathan Wakes, a big space opera that so far is pretty great. Looking forward to reading Tom Perotta’s book of short stories, Reza Aslan’s Jesus book and Jason Mott’s The Returned.
What writers do you strongly recommend a reader to discover?
I think I’m more an advocate of books than writers. If you’re interested in getting into really good YA I’d suggest: Eleanor & Park (Rainbow Rowell) How I Live Now (Meg Rossoff), Black Helicopters (Blythe Woolston) and Endgangered (Eliot Schrefer). I’d also say that you should read anything by MT Anderson, David Almond, David Levithan, KL Going and E. Lockhart.
Where does your inspiration come from (music, film, other books)?
So far all of my books have been inspired, in one way or another, by the political state of our country and the world. I watch the news, read the papers, and get angry to the point that I want to write something. The funny thing is that my books themselves aren’t all that political but often that’s where the spark comes from.
Favorite title (you wish you had come up with): The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness. Sure it’s a really good book, but that title, man. It’s so unexpected. I love how the hardness of the first half flows into the more vulnerable, emotional second half. It’s a perfect little poem.
Advice you would like to pass on to other writers:
The screenwriter William Goldman once said about the movie industry: “Nobody knows anything.” What he meant was that no one, not even the most savvy and experienced movie execs, ever really knows what will be successful. Movies with everything going for them flop and huge successes come out of absolutely nowhere. The same is true for books. So given that no one can ever tell you for sure what readers or agents or publishing houses will want the only thing to do is write what you want to write. Maybe it’ll connect with people and maybe it won’t but at least you’ll succeed or fail on your own terms.
What you would discuss with your pet if your pet could talk:
Well, for one thing I’d talk to the cats, not the dog. Dogs aren’t very mysterious. With the cats I’d really like to know how they see the relationship we’re in. What are me and my wife to them? Surrogate parents? Companions? Strange hairless apes who sometimes forget to clean the litter box and make them SO MAD!? Do they love us in their weird kitty way? Are they happy? I think mostly I’d like to know that, if they’re happy.
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