Jim Krusoe

Author of Girl Factory (Tinhouse)

Read the review here.

Please visit Jim's page at the Tinhouse website here.

When did you start reading, and what did you like to read as a kid?

I can remember the very first moment I became a reader. On Sunday evenings my parents used to read me the comics before bedtime, and one night, when I had just turned four, they took so long in arriving that I just decided to read them myself. To my amazement, I could. After that there was no stopping me, especially for books about animals. My first library book in Cleveland was about a bobcat, and then, years and years later, in California, one came down from the hills behind our house to eat our kitten.

When you were growing up did you have books in your home?

Surprisingly, I can't remember very many books just lying around, but there was a lot of reading, and especially when I was sick, which was pretty often, and then I remember my father reading me stories from adventure magazines. The magazine covers usually depicted scantily dressed women in the hands of Nazis or Communists or, well, anyone. The stories though, were mostly about warding off the attacks of tigers or water buffaloes--in other words, still pretty good.

When did you think about becoming a writer? Was there someone who got you interested in writing?

The moment I believe I first thought consciously about becoming a writer was in the 7th grade, when I was thrown out of English class for making fun of Silas Marner. The teacher, instead of punishing me, had the brilliant idea of sending me to the school library instead, with the proviso that I choose a book and write a book report. To spite her I picked the fattest book I could find: Thomas Wolfe's Of Time and the River, which is about being a young writer. Of course it's horribly excessive these days, but that was the first book I ever read where the characters (for once no longer animals), got drunk, threw up, and were full of existential angst. I was sold.

How do you write? Do you have a daily routine? What's good about it? What do you hate about it?

When I'm writing a new book my favorite place to work is in my car while I'm driving with a notebook propped up on the steering wheel. I'm alone, and the traffic is just enough distraction to force me slow down in between transcribing sentences from thinking them. Amazingly, I've never had an accident working this way, although while I've just been plain driving without a notebook I have hit several stationary objects. When I'm revising--a process that is about twenty times longer than making a first draft--I can do it anywhere, because I like being interrupted, and also getting back to the work.

Any particular story to tell concerning the writing of this book?

Only that it started out to be something entirely different: the story of an insane person who believes his therapist is running the world. How it got from there to a guy who works in a yogurt store is a source of never-ending wonder to me, anyway.

What some good advice that you've received concerning writing? What's some advice that you could offer young writers?

The best advice I ever got as a young writer I hated. I was in my twenties and, like a lot of people in those days, tried to guess my future by means of the tarot and throwing the I Ching. With this latter the only ideogram I ever seemed to get was the one for Perseverance, and it used to make me furious because what I wanted was Conquering, or Overcoming All Obstacles, or Brilliance (I'm guessing these; my I Ching has been long since given away). But no, all I would get was Perseverance. Now, all these years later, I realize what a gift that was. I had no particular talent, only the ability to hang on to an impulse and be willing to change it. So perseverance, and remembering to listen to what others tell you (and of course to read widely) are the advice I would give, all the while remembering that I could never hear anyone's advice until I was ready.

How did you find the publisher for this book? What has you experience as a publisher been like?

The publisher of this book found me because we are old friends. This book was written in several versions, all of which were original in various perverse and unproductive ways. Throughout all the many drafts (and rejections), my friend Lee Montgomery, who was at Tin House Books, would say something like, "If you ever are willing to make some really major changes, I'd like to see it." It took me about four years to become willing, and then another two to begin to see how the changes she wanted might be done. Even after she agreed to take the book we made at least three serious revisions--far more than anyone else I can think of would have had patience for. Thinking back on it, certainly I would have been reluctant to encourage a book that had as many problems as Girl Factory did in its early stages. And even if I was tempted, I don't think I would have taken the chance that the writer could actually correct those difficulties. Without Lee I don't believe the novel would have been published. That's why the book is dedicated to her (and also because she is a terrific person).

What are you working on at the moment?

I'm working on two more novels that, more or less coincidentally, form, along with Girl Factory, what I think of as "The Resurrection Trilogy." All are concerned with, among other things, the attempt to bring people back from the dead. The next in line is about a guy who gets a postcard from his dead mother in Cleveland, saying she needs to see him right away.

What are you reading?

My most favorite book of late has been War and War, by Laszlo Krasznahorkai, but of course I'm always reading.