christinastoddard.com

In February 2013, the lovely Kendra DeColo tagged me to participate in a self-interview series called "The Next Big Thing." Below, I've answered some questions about my current project.

What is the working title of the manuscript?

Hive.

Where did the idea come from for the book?

Most of the book is set in the Hilltop neighborhood of Tacoma, WA. Hilltop was ground zero of Tacoma's crack cocaine epidemic in the 1980s. After recognizing the existence of an untapped market, the Los Angeles Crips and Bloods pushed north and landed in the port city of Tacoma. It's been 25 years and it's still not safe to walk down the street where my parents live, especially at night.

The poems also take place against a backdrop of Mormonism, the ruling moral authority of my childhood. Beehives are an important motif in Mormon culture. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is structured much like a beehive, except there's a king bee instead of a queen. There's one supreme head honcho in charge and everyone below him exists in a very strict hierarchy, with a prescribed job. And heaven help you if you deviate from your role. But I didn't want to go overboard with the symbol of hives; there are far fewer bees in my book than, for example, you'll find in Plath.

So I had this story of a religious upbringing, which isn't uncommon. But the religion being Mormonism is uncommon, and in the manuscript Christian worship becomes exponentially complicated by poverty and environment. God and violence dance a tango throughout the book.

I didn't quite realize how strong the narrative arc was going to be, however, until the manuscript was about halfway written. I also didn't make the conscious choice to have an overarching speaker. It just turned out that way when I sat down to look at the poems I had.

What genre does your manuscript fall under?

Poetry.

What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?

Although it's not the norm in a book of poetry, this manuscript has a lot of recurring characters with names.

The main speaker is quiet but very acerbic when she wants to be. Mary Stuart Masterson from Some Kind of Wonderful is about the right note.

Then there's the speaker's best friend Maureen, who is fearless. In one of the poems she tattoos another girl with a sewing needle and ink from a ballpoint pen. She could be played by a scrawny Angelina Jolie back in the days when Angelina was wearing a vial of Billy Bob's blood around her neck. In many ways, Maureen is the star of the book.

I totally envision Natina Reed as the speaker's friend Rita. In case that name doesn't ring a bell, Natina Reed plays the East Compton Clovers cheerleader in Bring It On who says "You been touched by an aaaangel, gurrrrl" to stunned little Kirsten Dunst when Gabrielle Union won't let the Clovers give Kirsten a beatdown.

The brother could be played by Mark Wahlberg. Tough, with scars. But pretty enough to get girls.

What is the one sentence synopsis of your manuscript?

Girl becomes disillusioned about a God who would sentence people to lives of misery and violence, and she grows increasingly suspicious that the people who claim to have a Batphone to heaven are merely manipulative—yet she remains on the lookout for good in the world.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

The first draft started to come together in the spring of 2011. I took some of the poems to the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference that summer and Ellen Bryant Voigt told me to keep going with it. By February 2012 I had a working draft of the whole thing.

But a few of the individual poems have old versions that date way back. The poem may have changed a lot, but the idea has been skulking around my brain for a very long time.

What has been the hardest poem to write?

Some of the most difficult poems to write successfully are the ones involving Mormon theology. Unlike with the Bible, I can't rely on general cultural knowledge to fill in basic plot points. If I make a reference to Jonah and the whale or to the plagues of Egypt, people know what that is. But if I make a reference to the Sons of Helaman or the Liahona, people would just be confused if it's not set up properly. There's a whole liturgical vocabulary and mythology that's specific to the Book of Mormon.

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

I'm not sure if I was inspired so much as driven relentlessly by my obsessions to write it. Partly I suppose that the timing was right. I've been writing and studying long enough that I was capable of crafting the poems I wanted to write. Also, thanks to Prop 8 in California and Mitt Romney's presidential campaign, Mormonism has landed squarely in the public consciousness…albeit ankle deep in mud. And of course now there's the Manti Te'o thing. It doesn't shock me at all that Te'o could fall for a fake long-distance girlfriend. Separation by state lines is a good strategy for avoiding the temptation to take off your girlfriend's blouse.

But people have a lot of curiosity about Mormonism, and oftentimes church members don't give direct answers to questions. Mitt was so weaselly about it during his campaign.

Another thing that sets the book apart is that its vantage point on Mormonism is a minority view. Demographically, the LDS church is often perceived as white and wealthy with shady political ambitions. It's weird for me, though, since growing up I had no idea that image of the church existed. I was raised in Washington State in a neighborhood that was and still is very diverse. Our congregation was made of people from so many different countries that the service was live-translated into several languages via headset. All the scripted prayers were said aloud in English, then again in Vietnamese and Samoan.

The first time I went to visit relatives in Utah and saw all these blond girls wearing pressed clothes and shiny shoes, it was really freaky. That was not my usual tribe.

What else about your book might pique the reader's interest?

Ted Bundy and I went to the same middle school. Ted even appears in a couple of the poems. Also the Green River Killer and the 2002 Beltway Sniper in Washington, DC both have ties to my hometown. There's clearly something in the water.

The manuscript has plenty of adolescent angst, lyrical poems stemming from hymns and scripture, and a poem where a woman nails a guy's head into the ground with a stake. God told her to do it, though. Oh, and there's a poem about jellybeans. See? It's not all gloomy.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

Right now the book is making the rounds to contests and presses. We shall see what happens.

My tagged writers for next Wednesday are: