Page 31 - Reader's House magazine

into his creative process, his literary influences, and his unflinching exploration of the human condition. It is a conversation not to be missed. How has your upbringing as an “army brat” influenced your writing style and the themes you explore in your books? Rootlessness is the word the comes to mind. For me, moving often from place to place instilled a sense of instability, and moving from place to place as a black family in the 60s meant anxiety. You never knew what kind of reception you’d receive at a new school as an individual, or, in many cases, as a black one. My characters are often trying to make environments safe for themselves, trying to construct a home, using the only tools they’ve been taught—tools that include violence. There’s also the question of authority: I’m generally against it, and I’m only half kidding. Son of a military man with a very military mindset, my own bent runs toward exploration and constant questioning. I always chafed at “that’s the way it is,” responses. My characters tend to do the same. My New Orleans south- ern roots instilled a sense of the gothic and overripe, so I write larger than life characters often in life and death situations, and most of them are trying to rewrite the worlds they live in, upend the established order, often to create world they’re comfortable calling home. Bourbon Street is deeply rooted in the atmosphere of New Orleans—how did you capture the city’s essence, and what role does setting play in your storytelling? The time I spent in New Orleans is par- ticularly vivid for me, and not necessarily for good reasons. I took that sense of place from my young memories and built the story around it. “Bourbon Street” is my love letter to film noir, and novelists like Jim Thompson and Patricia Highsmith. Setting in my books is al- ways an outgrowth of character. You might say my characters project the world around them. The characters and the world they inhabit reflect and feed off each other. Your work often delves into themes of race, identity, and societal expectations— how do you balance historical accuracy with creative storytelling in your historical novels? When I read historical fiction, I am rarely impressed with writers’ showing off their research. I’m more drawn to a distinct sense of cultural and emotional place within that timeframe. What is this author’s vision of the old west, or Edwardian England? As with memory, historical information will always be filtered through our personal lenses. In historical fiction, I write to immerse you in my take on that period as reflected through characters. I’m less interested in the objective Your novel A Memory of Fictions (or) Just Tiddy-Boom has been described as both temporal details. And I don’t think I deal with “identity” per Leonce Gaiter is a literary force, se. I think my characters exist within their identities. There’s a difference. When I write crafting unforgettable characters and immersive settings with unparalleled vision, emotional resonance, and intellectual daring. lyrical and bold—how did you approach blending memoir and fiction in this work? Several times I’ve recalled an event to my sibling who has then shared a radically different reading of the same event. We filter D R A F T Leonce Gaiter’s A Memory of Fictions is a powerful, postmodern exploration of race, sexuality, and identity. Through experimental, evocative prose, it portrays Jessie Vincent Grandier’s struggles with societal and familial expectations. Bold and intimate, this black characters, I don’t write about them unforgettable novel blends honesty, being black, which is one definition of writing from a white frame. I write characters who tenderness, and redemption in a are black. And those black characters assume masterful, genre-defying narrative. power. They take for granted they have the power to alter the world around them, and they act to do so with the same sense of right- eousness that any white person would. You’ve worked in film, music, and tech— how have these experiences shaped your approach to writing and storytelling? I sincerely hope working adjacent to tech has not influenced me in any way whatsoever. With respect to film, I’ve been told my work our memories through our emotions, prejudic- is very cinematic, but strangely unfilmable. I es, and other factors we can’t even identify. I think the world-building of film—particularly knew anything I wrote that touched on events classical Hollywood films—really influenced in my own life would be inaccurate, so I me, but I project that influence through the leaned into that and used some events in my writing style. I guess that’s the unfilmable part. life as a foundation for an intimate, yet expan- sive tale that traces the personal, intellectual, and sexual coming of age of young man from the civil rights ‘60s through the Reagan ‘80s. I am a jazz fanatic and this book in particular references that obsession. Jazz is so exciting because it’s dangerous. It’s held together by sheer talent and with a lapse the whole thing could fall apart. It’s unpredictable, and it is emotionally kaleidoscopic. There is no one “tone” in jazz, or in much of African What do you hope readers take away from your exploration of complex characters and morally ambiguous narratives? First, I hope readers are entertained. I hope they see worlds they’re not accustomed to, peopled with fascinating characters who live in accord with this new world. I hope they take from my work the memory of unique charac- ters sprayed on a larger-than-life canvas. American music. It can be sad one second, ironic the next, and mocking right after that. I think this book is called “bold” because it, too, is emotionally and structurally kaleidoscopic. Reader’s House II 31