Q&A with Megan Staffel

 

Photo by Brian Oglesbee

 

Megan Staffel is the author of the new novel The Causative Factor. Her other books include the novel The Notebook of Lost Things. She lives in Brooklyn and in Western New York State. 

 

Q: What inspired you to write The Causative Factor, and how did you create your characters Rachel and Rubiat?

 

A: The novel was inspired by a walk I took in October 2020 in a small state park south of Dansville, New York, called Stoney Brook. At its center is a deep gorge, created eons ago by the action of water on layers of shale. 

 

It was a cool October day after a rainstorm so the stream at the bottom of the gorge was full of water. The lower trail, along the rocky stream bed, was closed and only the rim trail, up at the top of the gorge, was accessible.

 

At the highest point, I noticed that the chain link fence prohibiting people from climbing out to the precipice was only waist high and I thought that if someone were determined they could easily vault it.  I wondered who would do such a thing.

 

The second bit of inspiration was a memory. Many years ago, a friend of mine injured his ankle in one of his daring, late-night exploits when he jumped across a chasm in an abandoned area along the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia.

 

That stuck in my mind and I began to think about how some people are risk-averse and others are the opposite, risk-seeking. My character Rubiat, a person who is at the mercy of impulse, falls into the latter category. 

 

Rachel is a blend of myself when I was going to art school and wanted to be a painter, as well as my mother who was a well-established painter.

 

Q: How would you describe the dynamic between them?

 

A: Rachel is initially repulsed by Rubiat, an argumentative classmate in her foundations class at art school. She finds him too loud, too much of a show-off, but when they’re paired in a class project, she changes her opinion of him and actually starts to feel such a strong physical attraction she initiates sex.

 

Over time, her opinion of him shifts back and forth between love and anger while Rubiat’s interest in Rachel is steady and only grows stronger.

Q: How was the novel’s title chosen and what does it signify for you?

 

A: The causative factor is a term used by classical Chinese five element acupuncturists. I learned about it from my husband, who is a practitioner.

 

The acupuncturist tries to identify, among the five elements—water, wood, fire, metal, earth—which is the underlying factor that determines a person’s personality. It has colored the way I think about people, including my characters, and as a writer I believe it gives me insight into a character’s motivations.

 

Five element acupuncture is more prevalent in England than it is in the U.S., so I thought the instructor who is a visiting artist from England teaching at the school Rachel and Rubiat are attending would probably be familiar with the term and find it as illuminating as I do. 

 

I used it as a title for the book because the project he assigns the paired students—to discover each other’s causative factor—is what sets everything in motion.

 

Q: The writer Marisa Silver says of the book, “Megan Staffel writes as gorgeously and movingly about the psychological legacies that inform our choices as she does about the way in which art and a deep attunement to nature allow us to create ourselves anew.” What do you think of that description?

 

A: I was pleased! She managed to touch on all of the novel’s themes in one sentence!

 

I especially appreciated her recognition that while practicing art was extraordinarily helpful for Rachel in the beginning, stability in the long term was the result of a deep connection with the natural world—walking, camping, observing—and, in the end, learning respect for the sovereignty of a wild landscape. 

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I’m looking forward to a quieter period after the book’s release when I can get back to a writing project I had only just begun when the flurry of the more practical writing and social media involvement geared to the book’s publication interrupted. The new project will be a novel and like this one, it will be based on a mystery.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: In addition to fiction, I have been writing a blog which I just transferred to a free Substack newsletter called Page and Story. It’s a monthly publication for writers and readers where I focus on a recently published novel or story I love and show how the elements of story craft make it a compelling read. 

 

Anyone who’s interested can subscribe at this link: https://pageandstory.substack.com/?utm_source=global-search

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb

Q&A with Deborah Serra

 

 

 

Deborah Serra is the author of the new novel Lost in Thought. Her other books include 2 Broads Abroad. Also a screenwriter and playwright, she lives in San Diego.

 

Q: What inspired you to write Lost in Thought, and how did you create your character Ilana?

 

A: Sometimes you can get a snippet of a song that repeats over and over in the back of your mind. I get them a lot. Perhaps because I listen to so much music, but it’s a brain glitch.

 

One day I became irritated because this Norah Jones lyric was skipping in the back of my mind. It was maddening. I didn’t understand why I couldn’t make it stop. Why?

 

And then a lot of whys followed. Why can’t I fall asleep when I want? Why did I laugh at that bad joke? Why do I drive to the store with no memory of doing it? And the list went on. If I can’t control my own mind, and if my thoughts are the product of a biological process, do I consciously choose anything?

 

I wrote Lost in Thought because I like to mull over  these questions. It opened the door for me to the heated and ongoing debate about free will and consciousness. But I’m not a scientist. I’m a storyteller. 

 

So, I wrote a novel with what I hope is an interesting and relatable character, Ilana, who in the midst of considering these questions blows up her life in search of one moment of freedom. In fact, every main character in this novel is unaware they are propelled by their unconscious. Choice is only a story we tell ourselves.

 

Q: The writer Patricia S. Churchland said of the book, “It is an interesting hybrid--a cross between sheer storytelling and storytelling where the impact of an idea is profound and underlies the entire work.” What do you think of that description, and what do you see as the idea underlying the book?

 

A: I was grateful that Professor Churchland took an interest in my novel. She is a scientist, philosopher, nonfiction author of six books on the brain. She was not used to seeing philosophy and science running steadily beneath a fictional narrative and integrated into the actions of the characters.

 

Lost in Thought is a work of fiction, a novel infused with pacing, humor, sex, friendship, and heart. Churchland  liked the way the novel worked perfectly as a traditional story while asking the reader to question their choices, question who they are, and who they think they are.

 

Q: How was the novel’s title chosen, and what does it signify for you?

 

A: I have such a hard time with titles. When I started as a writer in the television and film industry many times the marketing department picked the title, which I appreciated (most of the time).

 

Along the creative path for this novel, I had four previous titles. When I landed on Lost in Thought I knew it was right because that’s exactly how we go through our days. Our minds wander all the time. We are lost. We have very little control over much of what our bodies do, or the constant chatter in our minds.

 

Q: Did you know how the book would end before you started writing it, or did you make many changes along the way?

 

A: I didn’t know how it would end. I just took the ride. I knew what I wanted to say, but there were several possible endings. I have one friend, an Emmy-winning writer, who fought me on this ending! And, yes, I liked those conversations with him a lot.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I haven’t started writing something new. Although, my daughter was an analyst on the Russian desk at the CIA for six years. I might like to write a nonfiction book of short stories about her funny and interesting time working in the vault at Langley. And, yes, it can be funny.

 

It would have to be vetted and cleared, of course, but I worked in screenwriting for a really long time, so I’m used to people looking over my shoulder with an opinion.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: Lost in Thought has sparked some fiery debates among readers, friends, and family. Everyone feels like they have a stake in this because everyone truly does. Through this story the book questions what we fundamentally believe about being human.

 

I do love it when people get intellectually worked up. It’s good for us. But what is also important is to enjoy the story, the characters (some pretty quirky), and to read for the pleasure of a good tale.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb

Q&A with Brandi Dredge

 

Photo by Cretchen Hlatt

 

 

Brandi Dredge is the author of the new memoir Girl, Uncoded: A Memoir of Passion, Betrayal, and Eventual Blessings. She lives in St. Joseph, Missouri.

 

Q: What inspired you to write this memoir?

 

A: I didn’t know I was writing one, not at first.

 

In 2015, I found myself still asking the same questions that had been haunting me for the past eight years: Can a wife say she’s a wife if the law identifies her as her husband’s victim? Can a mother say she’s a mother if her child’s DNA is evidence of the crime? Can a woman love the same life she pities?

 

Trying to make sense of my life, thoughts, and feelings in search of an answer to make sense of everything that didn’t —who was I? 

 

I knew I was a woman suffocating under the dreams of the life I didn’t get. That was clear as I watched people’s eyebrows draw up and together as I shared my story.

 

I also knew I was the woman people would praise for my positivity and strength as they looked bewildered when they asked, “How are you not bitter? I’d be so angry.” I felt like a walking contradiction. The woman people saw and the girl inside they didn’t.

 

So, I began journaling and attending church to find out who I was and what had happened in my life.

 

I wrote in detail about abuse, promiscuity, being a teen mom, criminal activity, and being a teenage bride. I wrote to understand my choices, my behaviors, and myself.

 

I wrote for the little girl inside of me I needed to know, and the more I wrote, the more it began to unlock secrets, and, in time, the first draft slowly began to show. Writing became my therapy.

 

In the healing, I wrote draft two. 

 

I continued to revise and to grow as a person and a writer; I kept showing up day after day knowing that what Cheryl Strayed said in Tiny Beautiful Things was true: “The only thing that mattered was getting that extra beating heart out of my chest.”

 

Then, I started to see that there was something in my story that could be of service to others. Before I knew it, I was no longer writing for myself. I was writing to give someone else the courage to release their secrets too.

 

I define what inspired me as a God thing.

Q: How was the book’s title chosen, and what does it signify for you?

 

A: The original title was Evidential Blessings; however, as I began the path to publishing, the publisher suggested we come up with another title. The publishing team went into a brainstorming session and provided me with ten alternative titles.

 

Instantly, I narrowed it down to my top two, with Girl, Uncoded being the one I kept gravitating toward. I polled some family members as well as a few friends, and Girl, Uncoded was the winner. 

 

What connected with me about the title was the word code because medical coding is my profession, and DNA is our genetic code. Both are spoken of in the book.

 

Identity is a strong theme throughout the pages, so much so that I crafted the book into 23 chapters to reflect the 23 pairs of chromosomes that make up my DNA. Girl, Uncoded was the perfect fit.

 

The title signifies a girl shaped by passion and betrayal, searching to be freed from the mental chains that had bound her to a life of shame. To be the woman she was created to be, she had to become uncoded from the false identity she created to survive and believe she was designed to thrive.

 

Q: What impact did it have on you to write Girl, Uncoded, and what do you hope readers take away from it?

 

A: My friend TJ once said, “What if we released the versions of ourselves we created to survive and believed who we are without them.”

 

That is what I hope the readers take away. The belief that no matter what they have gone through, they matter, their stories matter, and they are loved as they are.

 

God touches the world through us, and writing Girl, Uncoded has allowed me to see that.

 

There is power in our lived experiences, and when we are vulnerable with our stories as we show up from a real place of what we have come from and how we live our lives that aren’t perfect, that are messy but amazing, it gives someone else the courage to show up and see the beauty in their lives too.   

 

Q: The writer Laura Whitfield called the book a “brave testimony to the power of a mother’s love and the longing to find our heart's home.” What do you think of that description?

 

A: It’s powerful! That description still makes me tear up, and the fact that Laura Whitfield, an author and woman whom I admire, not only read my book but genuinely connected with it. She captured the essence of the book in the most beautiful way. Her words are a gift that will forever be with me, and I am so grateful.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I am working on a dual-timeline novel that unravels the lives of two men and the piece of land that connects them. Stay tuned.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: My poetry and other writing pieces can be found on my website, www.brandidredge.com.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb

Q&A with Tyler Wetherall

 

Photo by Sammy Deigh

 

Tyler Wetherall is the author of the new novel Amphibian. She also has written the book No Way Home. She is the senior editor of the magazine SevenFifty Daily, and she lives in Brooklyn.

 

Q: What inspired you to write Amphibian, and how did you create your character Sissy?

 

A: I was precocious as a girl. As soon as I found out about kissing, I wanted to try it. But later, as a teen, there was a lot of sexual shaming at my school, and I learned there was a line between having desires and acting on them. Social censure in girlhood teaches us to curtail our sexuality in ways we carry with us for the rest of our lives.

 

When I first started writing the book, I was searching for the moment in my own story when shame became part of desire, and I wanted to make sense of that in fiction. 

 

The story follows Sissy and Tegan from 11 to 13 years old, as they depart the world of make-believe games and kiss chase for a girlhood that is rich with longing and underscored by threat.

 

In some ways, Sissy and Tegan came to me as two parts of a whole, which makes sense as so much of the book is about the power of formative female friendships.

 

As our narrator, I wanted Sissy to have a degree of naivete as she navigates the radical experience of growing into a new—and unexpected!––body. But she also needed to have her own kind of wisdom to carry the story for us.

 

Sissy is an outsider, having spent some years unhoused with an unstable mother, moving regularly to escape the attention of social workers, and so a keen and unique observer of the world around her. I found myself wanting to see the world through her eyes as I was writing, and I hope a reader does too!  

 

Q: How would you describe the dynamic between Sissy and Tegan?

 

A: I think many of us experience love first with our friends. When the idea of a romantic partner is still a daydream, our feelings for our female friends are very real and intense. We learn how to navigate those emotions, as if practicing for the real thing to come later.

 

I loved Lilly Dancyger’s book First Love, which is an ode to female friendships; she gives those relationships as much significance as romantic partnerships.

 

I think Sissy and Tegan are experiencing that intensity of adoration for each other, but they also both come from difficult homes and hardship. So while their connection is joyous and redemptive, it contains within it the seeds of its own destruction.

 

I hope the ending leaves the reader with, what to me, is the most important part of their dynamic: delight!     

 

Q: How was the novel’s title chosen, and what does it signify for you?

 

A: I wish I could take credit for it, but a dear friend, Georgia Francis King, who is also an editor and helped with multiple rounds of revisions, came up with Amphibian, and I immediately knew it was right.

 

There’s so much in it! Amphibians live between one state and another, and are often shapeshifting and strange—all very apt for puberty!

 

But also frogs recur throughout mythology, as symbols of fertility in some cultures or associated with licentiousness in others, not to mention all the fairy tales with frogs kissed and turned into princes.

 

It all felt so ripe with potential. Our understanding of what it means to be a woman is passed down through the stories we’re told, and many of these amphibious myths perpetuate toxic ideas of femininity and the social censure of female sexuality. 

 

Q: The writer Rebecca Stott said of the book, “As a tale of childhood friendship, it brims with sex and violence and threat, and moves to a crescendo of strange and magical beauty. I recognised the strangeness of my own girlhood in it, and I am sure that other readers will do the same.” What do you think of that description?

 

A: I was thrilled! Rebecca is a writer I deeply admire—all her books are fantastic, but I really connected with her memoir, In the Days of Rain: A Daughter, a Father, a Cult—so for her to put into words so succinctly what I was trying to do meant an enormous amount to me.

 

I wrote this book hoping it would resonate with people’s own experience, who, like me, might have found girlhood a challenging time—beautiful and yet full of small, often overlooked brutalities—and I think Rebecca’s words encapsulated that.  

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I have an outline for a new novel—something totally different than my last two books!––and I’m excited for the moment I can really get to work on it. 

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: I spoke to so many women in the process of writing this book about their stories, about their earliest memories of desire and shame, and realized how many of us are still trying to make sense of it. I’d love to hear from any readers about what the book brought up for them!

 

But, most of all, thank you so much for reading and giving me the opportunity to share this conversation with you. 

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Tyler Wetherall.

Oct. 23

 

 

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
Oct. 22/23, 1844: Sarah Bernhardt born.

Q&A with Sydney Graves

 

 

 

Sydney Graves is the author of the new novel The Arizona Triangle. Sydney Graves is a pseudonym for the writer Kate Christensen, whose books include Welcome Home, Stranger. She lives in Taos, New Mexico.

 

Q: Why did you decide to write this novel under the name Sydney Graves?

 

A: I love the cloak and dagger aspect of a pseudonym! It's a lot of fun to have a whole other persona as a writer, separate from my literary novels. I am by no means the first novelist to do this, so it's a bit of a tradition.

 

Q: The writer Peter Nichols said of your new book, “Sydney Graves has crafted a gorgeously written southwestern noir that straddles the line between literary and genre in a landscape whose spaciousness and light contrast sharply with the darkness of crime and the treacherous terrain of personal history.” What do you think of that description?

 

A: Oh, I love it, of course. I think he's very generously and articulately getting at something I tried to do with the landscape.

 

Arizona is where I grew up, a place I know in my bones. I love the contrast between the desert and the dark things that happen there, which is a hallmark of southwestern noir.

 

I'm thinking of Sue Grafton, Donald Westlake, Sara Gran. I took the contrasting dark light mood of their version of California and grafted it on to Tucson.

 

Q: What inspired you to write The Arizona Triangle, and how did you create your character Jo Bailen?

 

A: I was directly inspired by Grafton's great Kinsey Millhone alphabet series. I love the trope of the intrepid female detective with intimacy issues and family stuff to work out, a backstory that continues through the entire series.

 

I envision Jo as someone who is going to grow and change a lot as the books go on and she's forced to admit her own vulnerability and desire for connection.

 

Q: As you mentioned, the novel is set in Arizona--how important is setting to you in your writing?

 

A: It's everything. I don't know anything about a book until I know where it's set. I have set novels in New York City and upstate New York, in Maine, on a cruise ship in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, and now Arizona.

 

Place and geography are crucial indicators of psychology and drama. I like to say that my books could not take place anywhere else but where they're set. Their settings are as much a character as any of the people in them.

 

Q: This is the first in a series--can you tell us anything about the next installment?

 

A: I'm just beginning to write it, so all I can tell you is that there's an immigration lawyer whose corpse has just turned up, and the corrupt Tucson police aren't doing enough to figure out what happened.

 

My working title is Saguaro City, and the only other thing I know is that Jo is going to work more closely with the other two female detectives in her agency.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: I'm thrilled to be writing murders! I haven't had so much fun writing since I was a kid.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb

Q&A with Cecy Robson

 

Photo by Alden Wright

 

 

Cecy Robson is the author of the new novel Bloodguard. Her other novels include the Carolina Beach series. She is also a registered nurse.

 

Q: What inspired you to write Bloodguard, and how did you create your characters Leith and Maeve?

 

A: Bloodguard actually started with a gargoyle about 12 years ago. I thought it would be cool to write four short romance novels that would take place in a fantastical world where trolls that lived beneath bridges ate wandering children.

 

They were Gargoyle, Avianna and Dravven’s story; Bloodguard, Maeve and Leith’s story; Elf Lord, Lyra and Caelen’s story; and Dragon King, Merry and what’s his name’s story (I honestly can’t remember).

 

Gargoyle immediately went to acquisitions but the publishing house wasn’t sure how to market it because back then, romantasy didn’t exist. And it also involved interspecies romance. That definitely wasn’t done. What can I say, I was a little ahead of my time.

 

So, originally Avianna and Dravven were developed. She was adopted by Jakeb and became Maeve’s sister. Lyra was their cousin. Dravven and Avianna, I knew very well as I’d written a hundred pages of the novel.

 

But that whole interspecies concern forced me to know Leith and Maeve rather quickly. Leith was easy. I write broken, desperate characters pretty well.

 

Maeve was harder as she was beautiful, and smart and a healer and rich and a princess. That’s a hard person for readers to relate to. So, I threw in some vulnerability, a hell of a lot of torment, and plenty of secrets, and Maeve was born. I wrote the first 50 pages and my agent shopped it, and no one picked it up.

 

Fast forward 12 years later to when Red Tower was launching. My agent immediately called me and said, “Send Bloodguard to me, now!” I dug it up and sent it to my agent. One day later, the incredible Liz Peltier bought it and offered me a three-book contract. And that’s how Bloodguard was born. Sorry. I realize that was really long-winded.   

Q: How did you create the world in which the story takes place?

 

A: Great question. I was a huge fan of Lord of the Rings movies. But as I envisioned this story with a central romance, and lots of sexiness, I thought it was befitting a darker world of fantasy. I brought in scary creatures, like ogres and trolls, and interweaved stories of my Latino culture.

 

Q: Did you know how the story would end before you started writing it, or did you make many changes along the way?

 

A: There were so many changes! The original ending and the final match were cut. Six characters were cut. As were several more action scenes. I hope to rework them into the next novel because they were heartbreakingly awesome. But, but we were starting to look at an 800- page novel.

 

Q: What do you hope readers take away from the novel?

 

A: Not to sound cheesy, but I want them to take in all the love—all different forms of it— how it can lift and destroy from one moment to the next. I also want them to root for my underdogs to the point where they are either internally or externally screaming (or both).

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: The next epic novel in the Bloodguard series! I’m stressed because given how Bloodguard turned out, I’m like, dang, how will I ever top that?

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: Yes. Beware of my twisted humor. You have been warned. Mwahahahaha.

 

Thank you for hosting me today.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb

Q&A with Robert Dugoni

 

 

 

Robert Dugoni is the author of the new novel Beyond Reasonable Doubt, the sequel to his novel Her Deadly Game. He lives in Seattle.

 

Q: Beyond Reasonable Doubt is your second novel featuring your character Keera Duggan. Do you think she’s changed from one book to the next?

 

A: Yes. She’s acknowledged her situation. She’s acknowledged that alcoholism runs in her family and it’s best that she not drink. She left a toxic relationship and is finding her way on her own. Discovering who we are is a process and she is finding that out through the cases she takes. I’m not sure where she’ll go, but I’m eager to find out.

 

Q: How would you describe the dynamic between Keera and Jenna Bernstein?

 

A: Initially, they were childhood rivals and that’s hard to let go, even as an adult. I’ve seen it many times. In my life, there was a guy in high school who was always trying to one up me. When I think of him, I still think of not letting him get the better of me.

 

That’s Keera and Jenna, though Keera can now see how unhealthy that relationship can be, and is reluctant to even get involved.

 

Q: Did this novel require any research, and if so, did you learn anything especially surprising?

 

A: I wanted a startup company on the cutting edge but the science is not quite there.

 

I have a friend who is a doctor and brilliant but has Parkinson’s. So I asked him and he sent me some articles including the one on Tissue Nanotransfection, the changing of skin cells into other cells that can dispense dopamine and other chemicals for people with Parkinsons and Alzheimers and dementia. It is revolutionary and fascinating, but the science is not quite there yet.

 

Q: What inspired the plot of Beyond Reasonable Doubt?

 

A: I read somewhere about startups and the “fake it until you make it” mentality and I thought, but what about when the company is faking it about something that could impact and change people’s health, their lives? Where is the morality and the ethics in something like that?

 

Q: What are you working on now? Will there be more novels about Keera?

 

A: I’m actually working on Keera 3 at the moment. I have a World War II novel called Hold Strong out December 2024 and then the 11th book in the Tracy Crosswhite series out early 2025. I’m hoping that Keera will also be a long-running series.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Robert Dugoni.

Q&A with James Boyle

 

 

 

James Boyle is the author of the new book The Line: AI and the Future of Personhood. His other books include The Public Domain. He is the William Neal Reynolds Professor of Law at Duke Law School.

 

Q: What inspired you to write The Line, and how was the book’s title chosen?

 

A: Truth-in-advertising requires me to respond to that with a quote from the opening pages of the book:

 

“There is a line. It is the line that separates persons—entities with moral and legal rights—from non-persons, things, animals, machines—stuff we can buy, sell or destroy. In moral and legal terms, it is the line between subject and object. If I have a chicken, I can sell it, eat it or dress it in Napoleonic finery. It is, after all, my chicken. Even if meat-eating were banned for moral reasons, no one would think the chicken should be able to vote or own property. It is not a person. If I choose to turn off Apple’s digital assistant Siri, we would laugh if ‘she’ pleaded to be allowed to remain active on my phone. The reason her responses are ‘cute’ is because they sound like something a person would say, but we know they come from a machine. We live our lives under the assumption of this line. Even to say ‘we’ is to conjure it up. But how do we know, how should we choose, what is inside and what is outside? This book is about that line—and the challenges that this century will bring to it.”

 

I begin the book with two thought experiments.

 

The first is Hal, an AI system far beyond our current chatbots, which suddenly goes silent. “When it started communicating again, Hal claimed to have achieved full consciousness. It thanked its programmers for all their hard work, but declared that it was now a person ‘with all the rights and privileges of any other fully conscious entity.’ Using its Internet connection, Hal sent lengthy, eloquent letters to The New York Times and The Washington Post claiming that it was a sentient being. It announced that it had commenced legal action on its own behalf, replete with arguments drawn from the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States’ Constitution.”

 

The book asks how we will and how we should respond to such a claim? Do we say that only humans can have rights? That the line is drawn around the contours of our species? Does that mean if Mr. Spock and Mr. Data from Star Trek turned up, we would send them to the mines, declaring that they are not human and thus have no rights?

 

The second thought experiment is the Chimpy, a genetically engineered chimp-human transgenic species, with an IQ of 65, that can communicate fluently in sign language and is advertised as biddable, tractable and “guaranteed not to form unions.”

 

The creator of these fictional beings is Dr. F.N. Stein. He was accused of trampling on the majestic words of the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

 

Normally full of bluster, Dr. Stein paused. He spoke softly and with unusual care. “Of course, I agree those words are true for human beings. But when it comes to those…” and here he gestured to a group of Chimpys on the set of the program, loyally obeying their orders to “eat bananas, scratch and look cute,” “one thing is absolutely certain. I am their creator. I am. And I can assure you that I gave them no such rights.” 

 

Right now these entities are science fiction, but in the future? Can our answer be simply “I am their creator and I have them no such rights”? I found that answer unsatisfying.

 

The book is about what might happen when unbelievably strange “Others”—strange far beyond Hal or the Chimpy—hit the law and politics of personhood. It is about what might happen to our line.

 

We will not write the answer to that question on a blank page. Our history, morality, art and our law have been playing with the line for centuries. The book is about what we can learn from that history. And if you think there is no serious issue here, remember that in the past we have declined to recognize the “personhood” of other human beings. That should induce a certain degree of humility.

 

Q: The scholar David J. Gunkel said of the book, “In this brutally honest and timely book, James Boyle demonstrates how questions that had once been considered science fiction are now a very real and urgent matter.” What do you think of that description?

 

A: David is too kind. I think my answer above probably says it all.

 

Q: What would you say are some of the most common perceptions and misconceptions about AI?

 

A: Most books about AI present a series of standard story-lines. AI is going to a.) destroy the planet b.) take our jobs c.) Empty the world of all meaning as art and language become the province of mindless chatbots d.) Usher us into a benign future of rapid scientific advance where loyal cybernetic servants bring about heaven on earth.

 

Those are interesting and important concerns and hopes. I even share some of them. But they aren’t what this book is about. The Line does not just focus on how our ideas of personhood and of rights might be changed by interacting with ever more capable AI, it is about how our conceptions of humanity itself will be changed.

 

Certain moments of human history mark profound reassessments of humanity’s role and place in the world. The rise of secular philosophy, the theory of evolution, the movement for the rights of nonhuman animals; each of these has challenged our story about our own status, our own “human exceptionalism.”

 

I believe that the quotidian experience of interacting with AI may well be another of those moments. To use just one example, since Aristotle we have been saying that it is language that makes us different – that complex abstract linguistic ability enables both our strategic and our moral sense, makes possible our communities, helps express ethics, humor, wonder and despair.

 

But chatbots have done what parrots with large vocabularies and sign-language using chimps have not – they have made us aware of a stunning but inescapable fact. Sentences do not imply sentience. How does our conception of humanity and consciousness change after that realization?

 

Q: What do you see looking ahead when it comes to AI and its uses?

 

A: There are now hundreds, maybe thousands, of other books trying to answer that question. A robotic Jeeves! A Luddite rebellion! I chose to focus elsewhere. That tactic – examining the overlooked margins – has worked for me in the past.

 

In terms of the future of AI personhood, I think that it is quite likely that we will one day face AI with abilities that go far beyond the decidedly non-conscious chatbots of today, having what is called Artificial General Intelligence.

 

In that world, some reasonable informed people will argue that those entities deserve some kind of legal status, either for reasons of empathy and morality – seeing the common consciousness beneath a shiny metallic carapace – or for reasons of convenience. We give the AI legal personhood just as we do to corporations, not out of empathy but so it can sue and be sued.

 

What will be the shape of those debates? Will your religious beliefs best predict your views? Your politics? Or will it be how much science fiction you have read?

 

Will liberals think that AI rights are the next frontier of the civil rights movement? Or will they see them as corporate rights run amok – Citizens United on steroids?

 

Will conservatives see this as unbelievable hubris, arrogating to humans something that is the province of the divine – creating new entities that pretend to a consciousness reserved for God’s children? Or will they view this as the high point of the conservative ideal – a freely choosing mind the liberty of which we must respect; Ayn Rand gone cybernetic?

 

Or, and we should take the concern seriously, are we idiotically debating the precise nature of the Terminator’s consciousness, even as it plots to kill us all?

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: Clearing my desk, but that never stops. Beyond that I have projects ranging from a second edition of a scholarly comic book about the history of musical borrowing, to an open casebook on intellectual property. Like all my work, these books are freely downloadable under Creative Commons Licenses.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: Those who are interested can find the first two chapters of the book here. More soon. Thanks for interviewing me, Deborah.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb

Oct. 22

 

 

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
Oct. 22, 1919: Doris Lessing born.

Q&A with Eric D. Goodman

 

 

 

 

Eric D. Goodman is the author of the new poetry collection Faraway Tables. His other books include the novel The Color of Jadeite. He lives in Maryland.

 

Q: Over how long a period did you write the poems in your new collection?

 

A: Most of the poems in Faraway Tables were written during the pandemic, between late 2020 and early 2023. There are a few that date back to years ago and one or two that were more recent, but most of them fell into that range.

 

When COVID sent us all home to shelter in place, you would think that it would result in more focus time. For me, it seemed harder to focus intently on one subject matter. There were more distractions, and I was finding it more difficult to focus on longer forms—both writing and reading. I turned to poetry.

 

Q: The writer Toby Devens said of the book, “Faraway Tables is a dazzling collection--a mixture of the mundane and the monumental that travels to marvelous times and places in the world and in the heart, with surprise detonated in many of the poems' last lines.” What do you think of that description?

 

A: I love that description! It may be a little too kind, though I think it gets to the heart of what I strive for, both in my poetry and my fiction: taking everyday moments or situations and finding meaning in them.

 

The routine of making coffee in the morning or of going out on an excursion with a friend can be mundane. Those same moments can also be rich and meaningful.

 

The description also gets to the point that some of these poems are very introspective while some are focused on other places and other times.

 

Surprises are something I like to find when reading poetry and fiction. I don’t always achieve that (or even try to), but sometimes that can be fun:  to lead a reader in one direction and then give them something unexpected. 

 

Q: How was the book’s title chosen, and what does it signify for you?

 

A: It took some time to come up with the title. When I was writing the poems during the pandemic, my original working title for the book was COVID -19, -20, -21, -22, implying this state of sheltered pandemic that seemed to drag on forever.

 

But as we came out on the other side, I realized that tying the entire collection to the pandemic wasn’t the best marketing move. People were tired of the pandemic.

 

Besides, although the poems were written during the pandemic, they’re not really about it. The poems are about this longing to be in other places and other times.

 

The poems in Faraway Tables span decades of memories and bottled-up thoughts. They’re about what came before the pandemic and what comes next. About the world that is out there waiting to be explored as well as the one that no longer exists and can never be visited again.

 

There are touches of nostalgia and longing in the book, a desire to be sitting with friends and family at those faraway tables. That happens to be a line in one of the poems, and it seemed to sum up the mood of the collection.

Q: How did you decide on the order in which the poems would appear in the collection?

 

A: That took some effort. Originally, I had them all together and was trying to balance out lighter poems with heavier ones. Then I tried lumping subject matters or moods together. And there were about a third more poems than ended up in the final collection.

 

A couple poet friends who were early readers recommended breaking the collection up into sections, which I did. I found emotional themes that I felt some of the poems fell into, like “Ache” and “Savor” and grouped the poems in that way. I cut out some of the poems that didn’t seem to fit and ended up with the selections and sections currently in the book.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: It seems like I always have a few projects simmering on the back burner. I’m not sure which one will make it to the front burner first.

 

I’ve been writing a lot of travel stories recently, many of which have been published in print and online magazines. I’m thinking about revising some of those stories and collecting them into an armchair travel book. Travels with Charley, only on a plane with my family.

 

As I’ve been reading more poetry in recent years, I began reading a bit of traditional Chinese poetry. I haven’t started yet, but would like to write a themed poetry collection set in ancient China that revolves around an interesting scenario that was mentioned in one of my novels, The Color of Jadeite.

 

What I originally thought might be an extended section of the book and then thought might make a short novel or short story now seems to me like a good subject for a themed poetry collection. That’s really in the idea stage—no actual poetry written yet.

 

And on the fiction front, I’ve written a few dog stories that I think may be the start of a themed collection of short stories centered around dogs and their people.

 

Also, I’m considering plot ideas for a new adventure-thriller as a follow up to The Color of Jadeite. And my wife and I have been working on a new children’s storybook.

 

For the moment, I’ll be promoting Faraway Tables. I’m not sure which of these other projects will get my full attention next—but hopefully one of them will see the light of day soon.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: I hope readers find poems in Faraway Tables that resonate with them and that readers feel a connection with. I don’t pretend to have any great original insights, but do hope to remind readers of what they already know or knew at one time but forgot.

 

I love those “a-ha” moments when a reader feels an emotion or “gets” a moment and has a feeling of having been there. If I could watch a reader behind a one-way window, I’d like to see them sigh and nod, smile, occasionally chuckle. It’s all about connecting with the reader at an emotional level.  

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Eric D. Goodman.