Are We What We Write? David Homel Considers Desire Lines

Montreal writer (and a friend from way back, I must admit) is Writer-in-Residence at the Pointe Claire Library right now, and is posting a blog series of musings about writing.  Today he was reflecting on my short story collection Desire Lines: Stories of Love and Geography. This pleases me, but I'm also a little surprised at what he says.

Here's part of it:

Mary is "something of a mystery. You won’t find her hanging around after meetings or other events, trying to continue the action at the nearest watering hole. A private person, I guess you’d say. And that’s just fine.

"In Desire Lines, Mary Soderstrom shows herself to be a writer of domestic events, though all her books are not like that. In these stories, there is much about people living under the same roof, or about to, or having just finished doing so. The dramatic events are under the surface, or in the next room, or off screen entirely. This is an effective way to work, because it communicates to readers that they shouldn’t think they know all about what’s going on, or even very much. And that the truth is always elsewhere.

"Maybe that style is like the writer herself: you know her enough to know that there are loads of things about her that you don’t know. That can be a situation of great charm – even seduction, I’d be tempted to say, though it would be seduction without the elements of duress. Sensing the secrets behind a person’s façade is a very compelling thing; everybody loves a good mystery."

Mystery woman?  Rather like that, but I've always thought that what you see with me is what you get.   Would be interesting to see if anyone who's also read the book and who knows me would comment.

As for David, here's how he ends up the piece:

"Then I had to wonder about how much of myself I give away without knowing it in the pages of my novels. That sentence, that paragraph – who could have written it? The authorship seems distant from me because I’m probably distant from myself. Anyone who knows me a little is saying to himself or herself, “There goes Homel again, doing that thing he’s always doing…” I shudder to think. Like most people, I prefer to remain a little bit hidden."