Collaboration Yields Compelling Novel

An an exclusive Authorlink interview
with Silas House and Neela Vaswani

By Ellen Birkett Morris
May 2012

In SAME SUN HERE, authors Silas House and Neela Vaswani create a novel in letters that paints a portrait of modern America from the perspectives of two kids, Meena and River, who seem to have little in common. But Meena, an Indian immigrant living in New York, and River, a Kentucky coal miner’s son, are united by a love of family and neighborhood and a desire to be good stewards of the place they call home. In this interview, House and Vaswani talk about their journey as writers and the creation of SAME SUN HERE.

AUTHORLINK: When did you know you wanted to be a writer?

HOUSE: I always loved to write, but I KNEW when I was in 7th grade, for a couple of reasons. Number one, I had a great English teacher who made me realize the power of literature. And number two; she introduced me to TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, which became one of my biggest influences. Reading that book showed me that books have the power to move and change folks.

VASWANI: As a kid, I was a big reader with a weird habit of reporting out loud to myself on what I was doing: “She walked out the door and stood on the front steps. It was cloudy.” That kind of thing. So, in retrospect, I think I wanted to be a writer before I knew what that really meant. When I was 21 years old, I had to decide how I would make a living—try to land a nine to five job and write whenever I could, or find a part time job with less security, no health insurance, that would allow me more time to write. I picked the route of less stability and spent every spare minute dedicating myself to craft. That was the first time I genuinely knew I wanted to be a writer, the first time I committed to it in a real way.

AUTHORLINK: When did you decide you wanted to collaborate, and how did you develop the premise for the book?

HOUSE: I was already toying with the idea of writing a book from the point of view of a 12 year old basketball star when Neela brought up the idea of collaboration and it just seemed to all rise up very naturally, as if these two voices were meant to go together. The character I conceived originally, River, could have never bloomed properly without expressing himself to Neela’s character, Meena.

VASWANI: I had an idea for an epistolary kid’s book back in 2007. I had Meena’s voice and character ready to go, but I was sluggish in coming up with the other main character. Silas and I had been email correspondents for years and were friends and colleagues who had worked together on smaller projects. I suddenly realized that for an epistolary book, two writers could be better than one. I pitched the idea to Silas, he liked it and said he was actually about to start creating a Middle Grade character who was dealing with mountaintop removal mining. I think having two perspectives, for this book in particular, strengthened things and gave authenticity. We pledged to write to each other in character, to not discuss plot or where we were headed, to print out our letters, walk to the post office, stamp them, mail them (the actual mailing of the letters was Silas’s idea; right off the bat, he felt the book should also be an ode of sorts to the lost art of letter writing). We pledged to keep the story in “real time,” (2008), and to do our best to write one letter a month to each other. We also agreed on the ages of our characters (12 years old). And then we were off and running.

AUTHORLINK: Where do stories begin for you – character, plot, a first line?

HOUSE: It depends on the book or story. Each one is different. But I think that everything depends on the character. Once I get inside a character’s head and heart, everything else will follow -- the plot, the language, the trouble, the resolution. I believe that if you are able to create a memorable character, you have the book.

VASWANI: Sometimes plot, sometimes a first line, but more often than not, for me, it’s character. With Meena, I heard her saying the first line of the book; I felt like her character was contained in that line. When a line comes to me in first person, it generally comes along with character.

AUTHORLINK: How did the book come together? Did you send letters back and forth and respond to each other?

HOUSE: Yes, we wrote letters to each other and actually put them in the mail with a stamp for as long as we could. But later we had to resort to emailing them, mostly because Neela was teaching in India for some of the time and the mail service was too slow to keep our rhythm going. Growing up I wrote letters to everyone—and I had a pen pal in Austria I would love to reconnect with today—so it was nice to be writing real letters again. It truly is a lost art-form, just as Mamaw says it is in the book.

VASWANI: We sent the letters to each other and would always email and say, “Got your letter, loved this part, laughed at this, cried at this, can’t wait for what’s next.” We encouraged each other that way, but we played our own plot and character cards close to the vest. The fact that I didn’t know what was going to happen next in River’s life and vice versa gave the story a natural energy and dramatic tension. I would get River’s letter in the mail, sit down, read it a bunch of times, think about it for a few days, and then respond as Meena. I always responded to what was happening in River’s life and answered questions he’d asked, while also moving forward with Meena’s own story trajectory. I think writing collaboratively is a lot like acting. It’s about listening to what the other person is saying and reacting accordingly.

AUTHORLINK: What was the greatest challenge for you when writing Same Sun Here and how did you overcome it?

HOUSE: I hate to say this because this is almost never, ever true of writing, but this was an easy book to write. Writing it was a matter of reaction. I would receive a Meena-letter from Neela and then I could go into River-mode right away and reply. I never thought like myself when writing the replies; I knew River so intimately when we started the book that the replies would just fall right out of me.

VASWANI: When you collaborate, you have to take into account the other person’s schedule, temperament, work habits, sense of time. You have to find balance. If life gets in the way when you’re working on something on your own, it’s unfortunate, but you can always set work aside and go back to it later. When collaborating, that’s not really an option. You have to push through strife and focus because you have a responsibility to another person and another character, because you’ve committed to working towards a shared goal. My motto with collaboration is to always think about the greater good.

AUTHORLINK: Tell me about your research. What resources did you draw on when developing the novel (including personal experience)?

HOUSE: It was very helpful that the book was written in real time because when we’re talking about Obama’s campaign for president, for example, we could just look to that day’s news. So the research was very much real-time. And since River’s big issue is mountaintop removal I felt pretty well-versed in that since I’ve been involved in the environmental movement for almost a decade now. I’ve marched on the EPA and lobbied at the White House on the issue. But then there is also the very personal research of knowing what it’s like to have a grandmother you adore, or living within a family that is struggling to stay together.

VASWANI: I’ve had first-hand experience with the miseries of “gentrification” and rent control in Chinatown and Chelsea, NYC. Some of it personal, some of it observed in the lives of students and friends. I did a lot of research on the situation in Chinatown, talking to people and grassroots organizations. I reread A Tree Grows in Brooklyn because Meena was reading it. It was wonderful to walk around in my daily NYC life and take in details that I could later give to Meena-- weather, politics, people-watching. I saw the city with fresh eyes through her.

As for India, I know Mussoorie well as a place from my childhood and schooling, but it also helped that I was teaching there while writing three of Meena’s letters. My Indian grandmother was raised in Mussoorie. When she lived with my parents and me in Vermont, when I was a kid, she would stare at the Green Mountains in the distance with a wistful expression. I’ve always remembered that. How the mountains of Vermont were comforting to her when she was so far from home. I drew on those memories of my grandmother, and also of my Irish grandfather on my mother’s side, who lived with us from when I was born till he died when I was 18 years old. He raised me as much as my parents did and I think a lot of what Meena feels for her grandmother, I felt for my grandfather.

I also researched immigration law, which has changed from when my father came to the States in 1971, and from when my cousins came to the States in the 90s and 00s. At one point during the writing of the book, I was teaching a Cultural Studies class at Knox College. We were doing a unit on immigration and I gave my students the questions from the official U.S. Citizenship Test to try out—the same questions Meena sends to River. The students found the test hard (as did I), and we had a great conversation about what it means to be an American. That bit of teaching-research was when I knew I had to put the questions in the book.

AUTHORLINK: You both teach creative writing. What advice do you offer your students about writing?

HOUSE: My main piece of advice is to teach yourself how to see and hear and feel and smell like an animal. A writer must be a person of heightened senses.

VASWANI: Write from your gut. Write about things that move and affect you. Read widely in terms of genre, style, nationality, and content. Pay attention to the world around you. Pay attention to language. Embrace revisions. Don’t take yourself too seriously. Turn off your cell-phone. Hulu is delicious but RESIST, RESIST!

AUTHORLINK: What advice do you have for first time novelists about breaking into publishing?

HOUSE: Be very, very patient. Educate yourself as much as possible. Take classes, go to workshops, read writing books like A POETRY HANDBOOK by Mary Oliver (good for fiction writers as well as poets) or BIRD BY BIRD by Anne Lamott. Lots of people seem to think that anyone can sit down and write a book. People often say to me “When I retire and have time I’m going to write a book, too.” I want to tell them that it takes more than time to be a writer. It takes years of practice and hard work and education. And a writer has to learn about the industry, too. That’s one of the main things people don’t do. Learn what editors and agents want formatting-wise, learn who the right agent is for you, etc.

VASWANI: Be determined, be patient. Most important of all, write something good. Writing something good is worth so much more than creating a face book presence, having an agent, a website, a catchy marketing pitch--the glitter and pomp writers are encouraged to engage in these days, and that have become a necessary part of being a writer in contemporary times. At the end of the day, if you haven’t poured your whole soul and being into what you’ve written, you have nothing. So focus on craft, on character, on story, on being the best writer you can be. Everything else will come from that, and after that.

AUTHORLINK: What are you working on currently?

HOUSE: I’m working on a novel for adults that is about a man who unfairly loses custody of his child, so he kidnaps his son and hides out with him in Key West. The book is all about being a parent, and how far we will go for our children.

VASWANI: An adult novel that centers around a hospital, I’m also developing ideas/notes for a sci-fi-esque YA novel. I’m in the midst of a few collaborations, too—a co-written article, a co-edited anthology. And I just finished a first draft of a screenplay.

Silas House is the author of four novels: Clay’s Quilt (2001), A Parchment of Leaves (2003), The Coal Tattoo (2004), Eli the Good (2009), two plays, The Hurting Part (2005) and Long Time Travelling (2009), and Something’s Rising (2009), a creative nonfiction book about social protest co-authored with Jason Howard. House’s young adult novel, Same Sun Here, co-written with Neela Vaswani, was published by Candlewick Books in early 2012.