“It felt far riskier to sit down and
finally get the book done than it did to train for triathlons or bike rides.”
By John Newlin
Patricia A. Smith’s widely acclaimed debut
novel, The Year of
Needy Girls (Akashic Books 2017), uses abduction, abuse, and murder;
same-sex relationships, homophobia, and community paranoia to construct a book
that immediately grips the reader.
A
veteran teacher of fifth graders, high school, and college students, Ms. Smith
has experienced first-hand how a single incident can create an atmosphere of homophobic
hysteria. Her novel shows how
devastating the fallout can be for innocent LGBT members of those communities. Ms. Smith has taught eleventh grade English
and Creative Writing at Appomattox Regional Governor’s School in Petersburg,
Virginia since 2006. She is working on a
second novel.
JN:
As a teacher who happens to be lesbian, have you experienced any of the same
attitudes your protagonist, Deidre Murphy, does in your novel?
PAS:
Well – I haven’t experienced exactly anything that Deirdre has, but yes, in my
early days of teaching, I definitely experienced homophobia in the school where
I taught (it’s pretty well chronicled in One
Teacher in Ten: Gay and Lesbian Educators Tell Their Stories -- Alyson
Publications). In the early days, I
was made to feel that coming out to the students would be a liability for both
me and the school. Luckily, around that time, I met Kevin Jennings who founded
GLSEN. I was able to get involved in that group from the beginning and doing so
saved my teaching life. (I also chronicle that in the new One Teacher in Ten in the New Millennium: LGBT Educators Speak Out
About What Has Gotten Better…and What Hasn’t—Beacon Press). I have faced
some similar attitudes from parents, too, but mostly, I feel pretty lucky.
JN: Your novel has many threads to
it. One of them is the relationship
between SJ and Mickey, the neighbor who sets up the kidnapping of Leo Rivera. What was your goal in doing that?
PAS: I was interested in playing with the idea of
these characters both being misguided—SJ, for example, having a difficult time
believing that Mickey could be guilty of such a horrific crime and at the same
time, not quite believing in Deirdre’s innocence. Both Deirdre and SJ see the
world in misguided ways, too—they each have blinders on and seem incapable of
seeing what is truly right in front of them.
Plot-wise, I wanted a way for Mickey’s path to cross with Deirdre’s and SJ’s,
and after interviewing a police detective and finding out that many criminals
are narcissistic, I thought of having him learn to read so he could find out
what was being said about him. Once SJ becomes his reading teacher, she finds
it terribly difficult to imagine that the same guy who is learning to read can
possibly be the same person who has lured Leo Rivera to his death. There was a
point in writing the book that I had SJ’s and Mickey’s relationship go even farther
than it does, but I felt SJ was becoming much too unlikeable and so I cut it
back.
JN: What was the process you used in creating the
character of Anna’s mother, Frances Worthington?
PAS: Hmmm…well, she is a very familiar “character”
to me after having taught in two private schools. One thing that is very familiar
to me is Deirdre’s feeling out of place in a private school. I very much felt
like that when I taught at The Pike School in Andover. I didn’t know anything
about that “private school life” though I attended Wesleyan University (where I
also often felt out of place). And though I truly think that most of my
discomfort stemmed from my own insecurities, there were definitely people—often
mothers—who exacerbated this feeling in me. That’s how I think of Frances
Worthington.
JN:
This novel, you have said, was several years in the writing. Would you take us through some of the major
benchmarks of that process? Was there a
turning point when you knew you’d finish it?
PAS: That’s a great question. I’m not sure I can
pinpoint the benchmarks. But – because I teach full-time, I did a lot of
writing in the summers, and for many years, I made sure that I had a writing
“retreat” of some sort to attend, often of my own making. I spent a couple of
weeks in New Mexico with writing friends a few years ago and that summer, I
figured out the structure of the novel—a huge accomplishment that allowed me to
move forward. Another summer, I spent a couple of weeks in the mountains in
Floyd, VA, and wrote most of the second section, “October.” At some point after
that, I realized that if I really wanted to have a book out, it was up to ME to
finish. (Crazy right? Like, why did it take me so long to figure this out?)
Years
ago, I wanted to participate in a triathlon. I had done lots of cycling, but
I’m not an athlete by any stretch of the imagination. But I trained and I
completed a few triathlons and then several century (100 mile) bike rides and
long-distance, multi-day rides. I started to ask myself: why I could train for
those events and complete them, but I couldn’t manage to have the discipline to
finish my book? Certainly all that training also required discipline. What was
different about the book? And I think that because I’m not an athlete, I gave myself permission to fail. I knew I wasn’t ever going to win a triathlon. And simply completing
the long-distance cycling was good enough for me; my time didn’t matter. But
because I did see myself as a writer, I think I was too scared for a long time
to finish the book—because what then? What if people hated it? It felt far
riskier to sit down and finally get the book done than it did to train for
triathlons or bike rides.
JN:
You use a shifting limited omniscient point of view to tell this
story. Did you ever consider employing a
different point of view, or even focusing entirely on one character, Deirdre,
for instance?
PAS: I think I always wanted the book to be told
mainly from both Deirdre’s and SJ’s points of view. My hope was to show the
reader their blind spots they both have. I like reading multi-POV books!
JN:
One major challenge for a writer is how much introspective material to
use in writing a novel or story. How did
you create the balance you did in writing Needy Girls?
PAS: Hmmm…again good question, but I’m not sure I
can answer that specifically! I wrote many, many, many drafts and read them all
out loud. I tried to be conscious of pacing, to make sure the introspection
doesn’t weigh or slow down the story, so I hope I achieved that here. I also
follow the advice to write the book you love to read—and I definitely love
reading about characters’ inner thoughts. For my Fiction I class, I use Janet
Burroway’s The Art of Fiction and I
read and re-read the section on balancing scene and summary and tried to apply
that to scene and action vs. introspection.
JN: I hope
it’s all right to say so, but though your subject is vastly different, I was
reminded of the writing of Jodi Picoult, many of whose novels are also set in
New England, and whose work frequently focuses on families. Have you read her work? If so, did it have any influence on your own
writing?
PAS: I have read some Jodi Picoult – and there was
one novel in particular, Salem Falls,
about a teacher and his students that I read while I was writing The Year of Needy Girls. I’m not sure if
it influenced my writing directly but I’m sure I kept the experience of reading
it tucked away in my head while I wrote. I do admire her ability to keep the
story moving.
JN:
It’s clear from the outset that Mickey Gilberto is one of the
perpetrators. What prompted you to
reveal that on the first pages of the novel?
PAS: I never conceived of the novel as a
“whodunit.” My plan was always that the book would be about the result of Leo’s disappearance. Because
this is Deirdre’s story, ultimately, I didn’t see the need to withhold Mickey
Gilberto’s identity or his innocence or guilt.
JN:
As a teacher of writing myself, I’ve always struggled with how to assign
and evaluate student writing in ways that encourage students to be as
productive as possible without overwhelming me as their teacher. How do you deal with that challenge?
PAS: How do I deal with the dilemma of what to
assign students? Well—I’m not sure I deal with it well! I teach both Fiction I
and Fiction II—and my Fiction II students write 100 pages (that’s their goal)
in one school year, so roughly 25 pages a quarter. I teach six writing
classes—my American lit classes are also dual enrollment composition classes—so
at end-of-quarter times, I’m crazed, reading portfolios and papers.
Well, OK, here’s one thing I do: in my Fiction II class, they have 750 words
due to me every Tues (class meets Tues/Thurs and every other Fri). I don’t
necessarily read those. Students must email them to me by class time on
Tuesday. If they do it, they get 100. If they don’t, they get a zero. Keeps it
simple. The idea is to keep them writing. The 750 words can be part of their
“novel” or not – it doesn’t matter. I just want them to write.
JN: One of your reviewers said she hoped you’d
write a sequel. Can you tell us anything
about the new novel you’re working on?
PS:
I’m working on a book about two women—one a Senegalese woman named Fatou
N’diaye and the other an American woman named Erin O’Rourke. The book opens
with Fatou walking back from getting water at the well near her village in the
Casamance region of Senegal, when she steps on a land mine and loses a leg. As
a result, she is flown to Mass. General Hospital, in Boston, for her rehab and
her prosthetic leg.
Erin O’Rourke
grew up in Newton, MA, the only daughter of a career military man. She has
three older brothers. Erin goes to MIT and becomes an engineer. She works for
Accudyne Technologies in Cambridge, MA—a military contractor and maker of the
timing device used in the landmines. Her path will cross with Fatou’s. That’s
as much as I can say right now!
JN: Thank you so much. I know a great many of us are looking forward
to your next book.
*****
John Newlin, an MFA graduate of Converse College, is
the Review Editor of South 85, an online journal. His story, “First Date,” recently won an
award in Short Story America. His essays and reviews have appeared in Independent School Magazine, South 85, and Night Owl.
Find the book
on Amazon
and via Chop
Suey, an independent bookstore based in Richmond that offers signed copies.
