From alpha globin genes to short story magazines: Singularity Magazine (May 2011)

Vincent Tan of Singularity Magazine (the magazine "for curious artists and scientists") was kind enough to interview me for his May 2011 issue...thanks again, Vincent!!

1) Before we talk about your book, The Meaning of Children, tell us more about your work in molecular genetics research.

I did my McGill University MSc with Charles Scriver at the Debelle Laboratory for Biochemical Research, which is a department in The Montreal Childrens’ Hospital. The title of my thesis was Alpha Globin Genes in Quebec Populations. Adult hemoglobin is made of two chains, so-called alpha and beta (two of each, actually). Hereditary anemias—like thalassemia and sickle cell anemia—are caused by mutations (which can be point mutations or deletions) in either gene. Because the normal person actually has 4 copies of the alpha gene (two from each parent), most alpha mutations are due to deletions. So basically I used Southern blotting to analyze how many alpha globin genes there were in people from Quebec groups at varying risk for hereditary anemia. My thesis was deposited in 1987, before PCR technology became widely used. My first job was in Nahum Sonenberg’s lab in McGill’s biochemistry department. He focused on translation initiation; that’s where I became really proficient in DNA cloning and sequencing. From there, I worked with Roy Gravel (who had just come from University of Toronto to head up the MCH’s Research Institute; ’90-‘96). He worked on gangliosidoses—I published work on Tay Sachs disease mutations in non-Jewish populations. And from there, it was back to work with Charles and also Dr. Eileen Treacy (’96-99). I spent 10 months in the lab of Andrea Leblanc at the Lady Davis Institute—working on enzymes involved in programmed cell death, called caspases. From there, I headed off to the private sector, to a now-merged biotech company called Ecopia. They were looking for new antibiotics by scanning bacterial genomes. After three years there, molecular biology and I called it quits.

2) You sequenced your own DNA. What made you do it? More importantly, how did you go about doing it? Can everyone do it too?

I needed a control for a Tay Sachs disease patient whose DNA I was sequencing, so I used my own (probably not a good idea but people do that all the time, or at least did so back then). I don’t think you could do this at home: for one thing, in those days, you needed to use radioactive material. So ordering it and using it safely meant doing it in a laboratory. And it was only short segments of my DNA, not all of it. But it is a true quirky fact that I’ve done it, so it amuses me to include it as part of my biography.

Vincent Tan & alter ego

3) Moving from molecular genetics to fiction writing seems like a big jump. What's the story behind it?

Well, I think I had been moving beyond science for a decade, but gradually. Then something really acute happened: my father-in-law, Gerry Copeman, died of lung cancer in 2003. Gerry and I didn’t get along that well, though we’d made our peace. But when he died, I was plunged into a sort of crisis: I understood—emotionally, as opposed to rationally or intellectually—that my time on this earth was finite, and that I’d better use it doing something I’d always dreamed of doing—which was writing fiction. So I quit working in science and started writing. I have a wonderfully supportive family.

4) The short stories in your book all revolve around children. What's the significance?

I didn’t start out to write stories on any particular theme, beyond that they were about issues that I was interested in, felt strongly about, was moved by. Then, after four or five years, I had written all these stories and I had to find a way to unite them, to put them into a package in some way that made sense other than that they were written by me. I ended up with a book that has three parts—Beginning (which features first-person point of view stories of children), Middle (stories of people in the child-bearing years), and End (which features older people, or stories that take the long view of life). I’ve also been thinking a lot lately of where my two careers intersect. In biology and genetics, evolution by natural selection is as close to written in stone as any concept. But the point of evolution—and selective advantage via sexual reproduction—is to produce a ‘better’ next generation, one more suited to the prevailing circumstances. In other words, it’s about doing your best for your offspring, albeit in an unconscious or extra-conscious way. So children are very central to all of this, or offspring, anyway. I also had three children with my husband while I was doing all that lab work. I’ve been intrigued to experience all those parental feelings on a personal level.

5) Of all the 14 short stories, which one did you find the hardest to write? Why is that?

The hardest ones are the ones that aren’t published yet. Probably because I have yet to get them right!

6) If you had to write a children's book, instead of a book revolving around children, what is the first idea and storyline you think of?

I’d love to write more funny stuff, so I’d want to write something about misunderstandings or kids getting into mischief. Science mischief, maybe, I hadn’t thought of that before, so thanks for this. I feel that I may have written too many sad or dark stories. Maybe I just had to get them out of my system, though.

7) Where can we get more information about you and your book?

You can read about my triumphs and tribulations by finding me on Facebook, ‘liking’ my book’s Facebook page, or on Twitter at @Beverly_Akerman.

"What would an American do?" How I keep my "emerging writer's" career moving

I was just re-reading this interview and I thought I would post the whole thing. Thanks again, Meg Pokrass & Fictionaut!

 

(The Meaning Of Children now available on Kindle!)

Fictionaut Five: Beverly Akerman

Mar 16, 2011 in Fictionaut Five

After over two decades in molecular genetics research, Beverly Akerman realized she’d been learning more and more about less and less. Skittish at the prospect of knowing everything about nothing, she turned, for solace, to writing. Of The Meaning of Children, 2010 David Adams Richards Prize winner, The Globe & Mail said, “This isn’t the invented childhood of imagination and wonderment…[here] children both corrupt and redeem: each other, family relationships and the female body.” Other recent honors: nominations for the Pushcart Prize in fiction and nonfiction, and for a National Magazine Award. Credits include Maclean’s Magazine, The Toronto Star, The National Post, The Montreal Gazette, CBC Radio One’s Sunday Edition, myriad literary and scientific journals and other publications. Strangely pleased to believe she’s the only Canadian writer ever to have sequenced her own DNA. She is seeking US and UK agents or publishers for The Meaning of Children.

Q (Meg Pokrass): Have you had mentors? Do you mentor? Talk about the mentor relationship if you will, its importance for a writer…

I consider all of my teachers/workshop leaders to have been mentors–though mentorship is really more about the one-on-one longer-term relationship. Most of the training I’ve been lucky enough to access was through a local group, the Quebec Writers Federation; I’ve taken many of their workshops, led by accomplished local writers: Colleen Curran, Tess Fragoulis, Mikhail Iossel, David McGimpsey, Neale McDevitt, Monique Polak, Lori Weber, Joel Yanofsky. I also was a­ccepted to the QWF’s formal four-month mentorship program with Robyn Sarah. At the Kenyon Writers Workshop, I worked with Brad Kessler and Nancy Zafris, and briefly with David Goodwillie; at Oregon’s Fishtrap, had a stellar experience with Luis Alberto Urrea; and at The Banff Centre for the Arts, I spent a residency working with Greg Hollingshead, Edna Alford, and Isabel Huggan. Some of these were 8-week-long interactions, others shorter or longer. It isn’t always about quantity–it’s more about intensity and emotion, whether they inspire. I’m grateful to them for their generosity, for reading and commenting seriously on my work, and those of the others in the group. Teaching is an incredible gift of oneself–knowledge, experience, sensibility, and confidence. I was invited to lead a QWF workshop for the first time last fall; it’s quite a responsibility. But my most consistent mentors/supporters/co-conspirators are my writing group: Pauline Clift, Julie Gedeon, Kathy Horibe, Maranda Moses, and Heather Pengelley. We’ve been working together since 2006. It’s incredible to have trusted people to give you feedback.

What do you do when you feel stuck or uninspired… suggestions for unblocking creativity?

I’m a big believer in getting out of your comfort zone–I’ve traveled to workshops/fellowships/residencies in Alberta, New Brunswick, Manitoba, Ohio, and Oregon. When I’m unsettled, my emotions are closer to the surface, and I highly recommend it. I’ve even written naked in the Super 8 Airport Motel in Portland–one of my favorite stories poured out there when, after a bad dream, I got up and started writing instead of turning over and trying to get a little more shuteye. I wrote for a couple of hours, made my plane and kept on writing in the stopover at San Francisco (don’t worry: I was clothed by then). Other suggestions: go to art galleries, watch movies, get in touch with nature, take long walks, ride a bike, visit your old neighborhood, join a choir, look at old photos–your own or even strangers’. Whatever it takes to stir yourself up. And work at finding things that make you happy, that make you laugh.

What inspires you?

Kindness and compassion. How much some do for others. The feeling of being in this together, the ol’ John Donne thing. Seeing kids enjoy things. My mother used to take my kids to see plays put on by a local theatre–the rapt look on the faces in the audience used to make me cry. Probably still would. Luckily, my kids are grown and I don’t have to humiliate myself in public that way quite as much anymore. But I’m still trying to move people.

Where do stories come from? What makes them happen… for you? Talk about recurring theme or themes in your own work here…

No doubt, many of my stories come from my subconscious, from unresolved issues in my own life. Preoccupations. Grains of sand that irritate and ingratiate. Recurring themes in my work include children, of course, and religion–I’m Jewish so many of my characters are, too–but one of my characters has an epiphany at St. Joseph’s Oratory, a Montreal landmark, Canada’s largest church. Again, I look for emotional triggers. Survivor guilt turns out to be a big one–that has to come from the Holocaust, where I lost half my family. Foster children are a recurring subject–I grew up with several over a 10-15 year period, and I realized after rereading the collection several times during a very compressed production schedule that I must have been pretty grief-stricken when they left to resume life with their families (or to other placements). This was all when I was quite young–to my recollection, my parents were very concerned about whether or not the foster kids were ready to move on; about the reaction of me and my sibs, not so much. Of course, memory is not objective.

How do stories grow for you?

My stories often grow themselves during the writing, like crystals coming out of solution. Sometimes I’ll start with just one idea, sometimes I’ll know the whole thing beforehand–Athena bursting from Zeus’ forehead, fully armed. I’m pretty flexible; I’ll take advice if I think the result is better (as an experiment–my old research scientist persona poking through) but I won’t alter a story for politically correct considerations. In “The Woman with Deadly Hands,” some early readers felt the ending was anti-feminist, that a woman shouldn’t be redeemed through pregnancy. To me, that wasn’t the point of the story at all: the story is about whether it’s possible to do too much reading. There isn’t a writer in the story, but it’s about writing. At least, it is to me. But I didn’t set out to write that. I horked it up like a hairball and then tried to figure out what it meant.

Can you talk about what led to the conception and creation of your collection “The Meaning of Children”?

I’d been in molecular genetics research for over 20 years, but I’d always thought I’d be a writer “some day.” In fact, one of my early delusions on enrolling in graduate school was that after the 3^rd semester, I’d no longer pay per credit and so be able to take all the English courses I’d always wanted to–guess how much time I had for English or writing courses while pursuing a research MSc in genetics?
I did a lot of things in the interim–had 3 kids, worked mostly in McGill affiliated labs. And then, in 2003, my father-in-law, Gerry Copeman, died of lung cancer. Gerry and I didn’t even get along that well, though we’d made our peace. But when he died, it affected me: I understood–emotionally, as opposed to rationally or intellectually–that my time on this earth was finite, and that I’d better use it doing something I’d always dreamed of doing–writing fiction.
And so I switched gears, started taking writing and taking workshops. My first stories were published–online and in print–in 2006.
I’ve been writing and submitting like mad since then. By 2010, I had some 20+ published stories. I began submitting a collection in 2009 or so, but it wasn’t until I’d had several rejections that I realized I needed some over-riding structure. I renamed and reorganized it: there are 3 sections: ‘Beginning’ features 1^st person POV children’s stories; ‘Middle’ is about those in the child-bearing years, and; ‘End’ has stories about older people, or that take the long view of life. I won the David Adams Richards Prize for a version of the unpublished collection and I think that and several other prizes–and persistence–paid off.

Are there favorite writing practices/exercises that you can share?

From Nancy Zafris, current editor of the Flannery O’Connor awards series: read Stephen Holden’s NYT review of Hirokazu Koreeda’s 1998 film, After Life and then imagine memories that you (or your protag) could take with them into eternity. The second was suggested by Luis Urrea: write about what the hands know. The two of them together led me to “Pie,” a prize-winning and much-appreciated story you can read right here on Fictionaut.

Best advice you ever got? Words of wisdom… What helped you as a young writer?

1. Don’t be afraid of rejection, it’s a fundamental to the process. That’s a really hard one at the beginning, because many of us are trained to avoid rejection at all costs, me included. But, as the cliché goes, to make an omelet, you gotta break some eggs.
2. Closely related: that persistence is as important to success as talent. I somewhere developed this notion that either you were a genius at something or you shouldn’t do it. Anyone who ever pursued a sport or played a musical instrument had one up on me: they already knew how much better one becomes through practice, that Malcolm Gladwell notion of the 10,000 hours. I somehow missed that lesson as a youngster.
3. Learn to squelch the inner critic. Very hard, but start by giving yourself short holidays from it. Tell yourself you’re going to impersonate a very confident person for a while (I tend to ask myself “what would an American do?” when writing queries or asking for help, Canadians being known for being self-effacing…)
4. Finish what you start, even if you don’t think it’s any good. See number 3 above–because it’s mostly about rewriting, carving and honing.
5. Then there’s the standard stuff, the most important being find a writing group, and reading your work out loud while editing.

I was never really a young writer (except in my head). Advice I wish I’d gotten: don’t worry about employability (I never really made much money, anyway). Be fearless enough to do what you love (”like an American would,” lol!)

The Fictionaut Five is our ongoing series of interviews with Fictionaut authors. Every Wednesday, Meg Pokrass asks a writer five (or more) questions. Meg is the editor-at-large for BLIP Magazine, and her stories and poems have been published widely. Her first full collection of flash fiction, “Damn Sure Right” is now out from Press 53. She blogs at http://megpokrass.com.

On being edited...

An emerging writer lives on a high wire, where self-confidence—the bulwark against frequent rejection--counterbalances humility, because who doesn't have a lot to be humble about? The struggle to maintain equanimity was never more obvious than the first time my work was edited seriously.

I'd had over 20 stories published, most without even a comma displaced, so I was shocked when a publisher returned my fiction collection covered in chicken scratchings. The putative editor, a prizewinning author in her own right, was much younger than me, and had a Google-invisible editing history.

After a week or so, I finally forced myself to flip through the thing. And it was worse than I'd feared! For instance, “Montreal” and “Quebec” had morphed to “Montréal” and “Québec.” My first story, a prizewinner itself, took place in the late '60s in anglo Jewish Montreal, where Jeanne Mance’s given name was pronounced like a synonym for dungarees...and this Torontonian had shtupped in all those aigus? Were all her other corrections equally ill-informed?

When in doubt, do nothing, I decided. Besides, the publisher had offered me bupkis, contract wise.

A few more rejections passed. I finally calmed down, read the edited manuscript, and contacted the publisher: they were only suggestions, he said. Use those that seem useful and forget about the rest. Ultimately, I realized most of her changes were printer’s instructions, and several of her propositions were sound. So, I followed them and found the result an improvement. Perhaps I’d been skimping on the humility side of my balancing equation.

Editors can't turn a sow's ear into a silk purse; but hand them raw silk and you may get a better story altogether.

###

Canadian Beverly Akerman started writing fiction in 2005. Her first book, The Meaning of Children (Exile Editions), was just released to critical acclaim: “Each story [is] a reminder of what an optimistic endeavour it is to parent…Akerman holds up our greatest fears, not to dwell on them, but to marvel at our commitment to life, especially to passing it on to others.” Anne Chudobiak, The Montreal Gazette.

(Originally published in QWrite, a publication of the Quebec Writers' Federation.)

A Writer's Gratitude

Follow @Beverly_Akerman


As a confirmed evolutionist, I know my unfortunate tendency to see bad news like THIS while good news meanders across my brain pan in a lower case way, was hammered into human DNA through the ages. After all, recognizing danger must surely confer a stronger evolutionary advantage than non-stop partying (or so I rationalize. Always possible I’ve just caught a case of incipient Presbyterianism).

So you won’t be surprised if I admit to sometimes having to force myself to dwell on the positive, rather than succumb to my default attitude (accentuating the negative). But I do know, deep down, that I have much to be thankful, especially as 2010 draws to a close. So I hereby declare today my gratitude day, a day to look over the year’s accomplishments, to goose my sunny side to the forefront, as it were.

My year in publishing started with February’s “Now It Can Be Told: The Hardboiled Stress Of Being Santa,” appearing on Joyland.ca. David McGimpsey, Joyland’s Montreal/Atlantic Editor, is the man who tried to teach me humour at a Quebec Writers’ Federation Workshop. Making people laugh…now THERE’S the kind of work I’d love to have!

My story follows intrepid tabloid reporter Renta Yenta as she susses out the secret links between dirty letters written by Santa, cash payments to former Prime Minister Mulroney, a Guess Who reunion tour, randy goats, sustainable development and Gilbert Gottfried. Quite the high wire act, but when, while writing it, I caught myself laughing out loud, I knew I was on to something. David called it hilarious and said he loved it! So I’m grateful for all of that, and I think you’ll find it’s just what Canadians need to read as we contemplate the tortures of the upcoming Xmas season (e.g. sharp-elbowed crowds and the endlessly looped, pan pipe version of “The Little Drummer Boy,” coming soon to a department store near you…).

Not long after that, I finally received my “printed” version of the prizewinning and honourable mention stories of The Binnacle’s Sixth Annual Ultra-Short Competition. The word limit was 150. I was expecting a typical print journal issue, though someone I’d met during a writing residency in Banff last year had hinted it would be a bit out of the ordinary. What I received was a box with 56 business card sized versions of the winners and other honoured stories, my “After Katrina” being one of latter.

What does a 150 word story look like, you ask? In answer, may I present, for your delectation,

After Katrina

My sister Darlene, she ain’t never been what you call reliable. I was the one ended up seein' to Mama after Katrina hit. The whole thing give her a heart attack, but I found her safe in hospital.

She didn’t want me going to the house. “Try and stop me,” I said. It was the only home I’d ever known.

Everything was a total write off. Papers everywhere, like Scarlet O’Hara’s discarded handkerchiefs, like drowned doves. And the smell! Eau de outhouse.

Only managed to fish out Mama’s marriage license and our birth certificates. Discovered Darlene wasn’t really my big sister.

At the hospital, Mama said, “Find anything?” her gaze red-rimmed steel, her lips like dried worms. Skeleton fingers plucked the sheet. This old woman. Lied to me my whole life entire.

The heart monitor hiccupped, the IV dripped its silvery drops.

“No ma’am,” I said. “Didn’t find nothing.”

For those interested in such things, the story arose from a prompt of Nancy Zafris’ at the Kenyon Review Writers Workshop of 2008—to date, three of my published stories germinated under her skilled attention. Does she think writers are hothouse flowers? Hardly! But her green thumb left faint traces as well on my multi-award-winning flash story “Pie”--which has just made the Commendations List in the UK's Aesthetica Magazine Creative Works Competiton--and on “What I’ve Prayed For,” the latter published in The New Quarterly this spring. All these stories came from this movie review prompt in the New York Times. So please let me hereby express my gratitude to Nancy and also to The Binnacle’s Gerard NeCastro, The New Quarterly’s Kim Jernigan and The Lists Issue Guest Editor Diane Schoemperlen (thank you, thank you, thank you squared…).

And maybe this would be an appropriate time to thank all the incredibly generous and talented creative writers whom I encountered as writing workshop leaders and mentors over the past six years of my journey to published-authorhood: (in temporal order) Colleen Curran, Greg Hollingshead, Isabel Huggan, Edna Alford, Robyn Sarah, Joel Yanofsky, Monique Polak, Lori Weber, Luis Urrea (also instrumental to “Pie”), Mikhail Iossel, Brad Kessler, Tess Fragoulis, Robin Marantz Henig, Guy Lawson, Neale McDevitt, and Ilona Martonfi.

Whew! They say it takes a village to raise a child; it appears to me that it may take a small town to raise a writer. And sorry if I’ve forgotten someone (I probably have; but I’m even grateful for fallibility—it reminds me to be humble).

Well, this feels like enough gratitude for today…Besides, I think I like the idea of stringing this out over several entries.

Wishing you all peace and love (oh, I am so not a hippie!),

Bev