The Storyteller: An Interview with Jeff Zentner
Hi and welcome to Issue #6 of The Storyteller!
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Those of you who follow me on Instagram or Twitter know that, from this month, The Storyteller will have two issues out each month (on the 1st and 15th of the month).
I'm thrilled that this is something I can already offer my subscribers and readers - a big thank you to the publishers, publicists, and authors I've been working with and have lined up for taking a chance on a new project, and, of course, I'm grateful as always for the continued support and well wishes from all of you who've sent me feedback and lovely messages about your favourite insights, about discovering new authors you enjoyed, and more.
Today's guest is Jeff Zentner all the way from Nashville, Tennessee - musician, writer for young adults, and speaker of fluent Portuguese from two years of living in the Amazon region of Brazil.
Back in late February, I visited New York City for some work and caught in some much-needed downtime with friends. As it turned out, it would be my last pre-coronavirus journey. I left to go back to Boston two days after the first COVID-19 cases were discovered in NYC. But that's besides the point.
On my bus ride there, I read The Serpent King by Jeff Zentner, recommended by a dear friend (Hi, Therese!). I was blown away—sobbing on a bus—by this painful, brave, and beautiful young adult debut about three very different teens from the rural hinterlands of America as they navigate senior year in high school and try to find their place in the world. There was lyrical writing and a sense of atmosphere that put me in mind of one of my favourite bands, Explosions in the Sky (in one of those quirks of fate, I found out later that Jeff loves them too).
Here's my review about this (rightly) much-lauded, multiple-award-winning book, if you wanted to take a peek. It's one of my top ten reads of the year so far!
Jeff, as mentioned above, lives in Nashville, Tennessee, is the recipient of numerous awards for his work, and has the best FAQ section that I've ever seen. Goodbye Days (2017) and Rayne and Delilah's Midnite Matinee (2019) are his other published works, which I'm looking forward to reading later this year.
Over to you, Jeff - thanks so much for agreeing to this interview!
AN: You've had a very interesting journey on your way to being a writer. Could you walk us through it and elaborate on whether you needed that journey to get to that first published book and finding this sort of calling? I'm interested to know if in writing you feel like you've finally been able to reconcile all those journeys and experiences, and how that factors into the kind of stories you tell. Also, as an aside, I love the FAQ section you have on your website!
JZ: I started my creative life as a musician, which I did for over a decade. I played in bands and solo and toured and recorded albums and on other people’s albums. I had a lot of fun, but by my mid-thirties, it had become clear that I wasn’t likely to make it big in music. So I turned my musical focus to teaching teenagers how to be rock musicians at Tennessee Teen Rock Camp and Southern Girls Rock Camp. This is where I discovered that I wanted to make art for young adults. And because publishing doesn’t have the same informal age limits that music does, I turned to writing. And it turns out I’m a better writer than a musician. I really had to take this journey because for most of my life, I didn’t know what kind of people wrote books, but I assumed it was someone very different from me. I had to fail at one creative enterprise to get over my fear of trying things and failing.
AN: One of the first things I noticed in The Serpent King was the rhythms of the language and the intensity of the emotion. I didn't find out until after I was done with the book that you were a musician and songwriter. Is this something you think about when you write, or something you find naturally and somewhat subconsciously slips into your work on account of all those years in music? Do you listen to music while in the process of writing a novel? (Whether during actually writing or just during the time you're working on a new story.)
JZ: I don’t consciously write in a musical way, but I think my ear is naturally attuned to rhythm and melody in the way the words stack up on the page. What music really taught me is that while I can appreciate all kinds of music, there’s a type of music that I make. There’s a voice with which I speak. There’s a story I tell. And that’s good to know. It’s healthy to understand that while you may love many types of stories, you need to write with your own voice and tell the stories you’re supposed to tell.
AN: Another almost immediate thought that I had when I started The Serpent King (I'm yet to read your other two) was how much the vibe of the writing and the sense of place put me in the mind of Explosions in the Sky (I'm a huge Friday Night Lights fan and their OST is one of my favourites). When I mentioned this to you on Twitter, you shared that you love EITK as well. Do you feel like your work channels all the music you love in one way or another?
JZ: I love music that conveys a certain mood, often indescribable, and EITK certainly does that, as does all of the music I listen to when I’m an intensive writing phase. This music puts me in the frame of mind I need to be in to receive whatever I need to receive. The music is the stage-setter.
AN: Why YA? What draws you to write the stories and the characters that you do? What do you want readers to take away from your stories?
JZ: YA because I wanted to create art for young adults. Why did I want to create art for young adults? Because I’ve always been drawn to coming-of-age stories. I think teenagedom is fascinating in that you have people who have the essential intelligence of an adult, but still see the world as something new and exciting in many ways. They’re on the cusp of adulthood, with one foot in and one foot in childhood. I think that’s an interesting and dynamic time of life. I hope readers take from my stories that you can survive even the things that seem unsurvivable, and your life can improve even when it seems like there’s no hope or promise of improvement.
AN: How do you envision your stories? Does it start with images, or a character, or a plot point; or any combination of these? Did you find that this changed at all in between writing three books? Writing process is such an individual beast, subject to perspective and situation and personality, but I always find it fascinating how writers, or any form of storytellers for that matter, always have a communal foundation of sorts.
JZ: My stories always begin with a fascination. Either with a situation, a particular type of story (often embodied in a favorite piece of pop culture) or with a type of person—usually the latter. I don’t write a word until my characters have lived in my brain for 3-4 months and they’ve spoken to me and told me who they were. I don’t really know how to write novels. I know how to write down what fictional creatures tell me about themselves—their hopes, dreams, fears, struggles, loves, etc. I’ve written four books now (five and a half if you count unpublished), and every time it’s been the same process. I don’t envision that process ever changing.
AN: What's next?
JZ: My new book, In The Wild Light, comes out next summer. It’s my Good Will Hunting meets Dead Poet’s Society boarding school story. And in 2020, I have a short story coming out in a battle of the bands anthology.
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Now for the new recommendations section:
1. What's the last book that you read that you'd recommend and why?
I just read Census by Jesse Ball and found it deeply moving. It’s like The Road but dialed back a bunch and no cannibalism. It’s hard to describe, so I won’t try. But check it out.
2. What's the last TV show or movie you watched that you'd recommend and why?
I absolutely love TV and this year the two standouts for me have been -
Normal People. Based on a brilliant book; the performances are heartrending. The show is gorgeously shot. And the soundtrack is stellar.
What We Do in the Shadows. This is one of the funniest shows I’ve ever seen. Pure comedic brilliance. The cast is unreal.
3. What's the last song you listened to that you'd recommend and why?
I’m obsessed with the song “Lost” by Boy Harsher. So dark and sexy. It reminds me of driving with the windows down late at night in LA.
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Thank you, Jeff for that insight into your work and creative processes and inspirations. I appreciate you giving me so much of your time for the readers and subscribers of The Storyteller!
All of Jeff's social media and buying links are below. Please check them out! All of the authors I've spoken to so far for the newsletter have been lovely, friendly folks, so please don't hesitate to reach out to them if you enjoyed their work. As writers, when you spend so much of your life in solitude writing and redrafting and editing away, it's always nice to know that someone out "there" in the big, wide world found some commonality, some solace, some joy out of it.
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Buy The Serpent King
Buy Goodbye Days
Buy Rayne & Delilah's Midnite Matinee