At the centre of The Manual of Detection there is a book, one that is essential to the protagonist's quest. In a time where it seems more and more of humanity's history is being stored in cyberspace—a surreal space in its own right—were you purposefully trying to say something about the way fiction is evolving in terms of how we read it?
I wasn’t, though I’ve been thinking about these issues more since the book came out. There are certain gestures in the novel that work only in paper form. For example, one page of the book corresponds to the same page of the book within the book. And the design for the hardcover edition is an approximation of what the fictional Manual of Detection ought to look like. So the book as object is part of the reading experience in this case.
That said, I’m keen to explore the possibilities presented by the evolving forms you describe. Right now I’m working on a story that exists on a pile of index cards that’s meant to be shuffled before reading. Because it’s modular and recursive, the story’s true home may be in cyberspace.
If you could have any three writers over for dinner, who would you choose, and what would you ask them?
Pliny, have you seen anything interesting lately? Emily, you’ve come the twelve miles from Amherst, surely you’d like more wine? Edgar, why are you looking at me that way?
What does writing add to your life that you will not be able to get from anything else?
The feelings of intense anxiety that comes from not writing. I’m sure that would translate to other professions, though. If I were an astronaut, for example, I’d probably feel anxious whenever I wasn’t in outer space or training to be in outer space.
What would you like your epitaph to read?
Whatever the kids spray paint on the headstone while they’re smoking cigarettes and drinking cheap wine by my grave.
Jedediah Berry’s first novel, The Manual of Detection, won the 2010 Crawford Award, presented by the International Association for the Fantastic in the Arts. It is currently a finalist for the Dashiell Hammett Prize and the Strand Critics Award for First Novel. Jedediah’s short stories have appeared in journals and anthologies including Conjunctions, Chicago Review, Fairy Tale Review, Best New American Voices and Best American Fantasy. He lives in Northampton, Massachusetts, and works as an editor of Small Beer Press.
Lynne Jamneck - Lynne Jamneck lives in Auckland, New Zealand. Short listed for the Sir Julius Vogel and Lambda Awards, she has published short fiction in ...
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