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Ep. 10. Marni Appleton, 'Shut Your Mouth'
46 Plays26 days ago
In this episode, we read the opening of the story 'Shut Your Mouth' from Marni Appleton's collection I HOPE YOU'RE HAPPY. Buy the book from a local indie bookshop, Bookshop.org, or Indigo Press.
Marni Appleton is a writer living in London. She holds a PhD in creative and critical writing from the University of East Anglia. Her fiction has been published in literary journals such as The London Magazine, Banshee and The Tangerine. I HOPE YOU’RE HAPPY is Marni’s first book, and was published by the Indigo Press in February 2025.
Find the transcript and more about the show on Substack. Follow the show on Instagram.
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Produced, hosted, and edited by Chris Lloyd.
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Books Up Close'
00:00:02
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Books Up Close, the podcast. I'm Chris Lloyd, a writer and academic, and on this show I talk to other writers about their work and their practice. This is a show for book nerds, aspiring and established authors, or anyone interested in how texts get made.
Interview with Marnie Appleton
00:00:20
Speaker
In today's episode I talk to Marnie Appleton about the short story Shut Your Mouth, which is the opening story in her new book.
00:00:30
Speaker
I hope you're happy. Marnie is a writer living in London. She holds a PhD in creative and critical writing from the University of East Anglia. Her fiction has been published in literary journals such as The London Magazine, Banshee and The Tangerine. I Hope You're Happy is Marnie's first book and was published by the Indigo Press in February 2025.
00:00:51
Speaker
Well, Marnie, thank you so much for joining me today. Thank you for having me. I'm really excited about this book. I hope you're happy and i've got it here right next to me.
00:01:02
Speaker
but I've got so many questions about that. We can talk about your writing later on Though every time I say this title, all I can think of is Fine Gravity. you know, bit like i have i know it's the time it came out. It was so hilarious. Now everyone just sings it at me, which is great. Okay, so it's not just me then. was like, I don't imagine that was in your brain, but like now that's all I can think of.
00:01:25
Speaker
It wasn't because I hadn't watched Wicked or thought about Wicked for years. And then, yeah.
The Art of Close Reading
00:01:30
Speaker
baby Before we look at the passage from the opening short story, I wonder if you wanted to say a little bit about your thoughts on close reading. Like I know you've done a PhD in creative writing, but how do you feel about close reading as a practice and activity?
00:01:44
Speaker
And how do you feel about doing it with your own work here? Maybe you're used to that actually in workshops. Yeah, well, I love close reading. I think it's just, it's such a kind of collaborative and also creative process between writer and reader.
00:02:02
Speaker
So as a reader, I really love going through and kind of, I feel like you can expand the work, through through your own reading and it feels like a nice, yeah, collaborative process.
00:02:15
Speaker
And I think in particular short stories, they kind of demand that close reading. Like you can't really read a short story once, I don't think, not to put people off reading my book feeling they have to read it multiple times.
00:02:26
Speaker
But I think especially with short stories, you get the most out of them if you read them really, really closely. So it's something that I am a big fan of doing with other people's work. And it's interesting because i was thinking about this question of close reading and I was thinking when I write, I feel like I'm almost doing like a process of close reading on my own work, like going through on that sort of forensic level.
00:02:53
Speaker
However, it's it's different because one of the good things about close reading is that you get like another perspective. So I feel like you almost in a way can't close read your own work, if that makes sense, that you kind of need to do it with someone else. Like it's a project between writer and reader.
Writing for Generous Readers
00:03:10
Speaker
yeah. yeah So I would say, yeah, I'm interested in seeing how close reading my own work goes. Yeah. Close reading for editing versus close reading for reading are probably, yeah, maybe different kinds of activity.
00:03:25
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. Because I think with editing, it's less generous. It's more from a place of what's wrong. Like for for me anyway, like I'm like, how can I make this better? Whereas when I'm close reading other people's work, no part of me, I don't have my editing brain on. I'm not thinking, how can I make this better?
00:03:43
Speaker
I'm assuming that every single word has is in its exact right place. And so I approach it in like a spirit of generosity. And I think that when I write, I write for a reader who is go in to read my work like that. Obviously not every reader will, but I write for the reader who wants to approach it with generosity and kind of try and pick out the meanings. So I think a lot of times when I'm writing, I put in the things that I'm like, maybe nobody will ever get this.
00:04:09
Speaker
I'm sort of doing it for anyone who wants to kind of get that meaning. Like I love kind of double meanings and playing around with that sort of thing. And um I think if only one person gets it it's kind of worth it. Have that little little secret between writer and reader.
Impactful Story Openings
00:04:22
Speaker
close reading as generous feels really like a nice way and and So we're going to talk about the opening short story in I Hope You're Happy. I could have chosen any of them. I spent a long time like deliberating and I was like, okay, in that case, just pick the opening of the first one because it feels like you've put that story at the beginning of the book.
00:04:40
Speaker
for a reason, i guess. So I thought we'd do that. And the story is called Shut Your Mouth, which is a really good title, really strong title. I guess we don't need to know anything about it going in, right? Like and it it is the opening of the short story of the opening of the collection.
00:04:56
Speaker
so did you want to say anything about it or do you want to just go straight to reading the passage? Yeah, I think I'm happy to go straight to reading and then maybe we'll talk about it afterwards. Yeah. Great. Thank you so much. Okay. so this is the opening of Shut Your Mouth.
00:05:11
Speaker
Three minutes past midnight, Tuesday night. A hazy shape, static against the darkness. Ponytail puffer jacket handbag. A girl like a blast of light.
00:05:23
Speaker
The CCTV footage slows as the girl leaves the fried chicken shop. A box of food clutched to her chest with one hand, phone in the other. She taps on the screen as she walks down the road and slips out of shot.
00:05:36
Speaker
A moment of lunar emptiness, a bright crackle, before the door swings open and she steps out into the street again. The clip loops on repeat. I scour the screen looking for something, a tiny detail, an overlooked speck of evidence, eyes glinting from the bushes.
00:05:54
Speaker
There must be something we are not seeing. I returned to the search page and click onto a message board for amateur sleuths. It is full of non-professionals who are, like me, trying to cobble together pieces of evidence to create a fuller picture.
00:06:08
Speaker
I learned that her last text was sent at 11 minutes past midnight. GPS records show that at this point she was on her usual route home, approximately five minutes walk from her flat.
00:06:20
Speaker
Two minutes later, her phone was turned off or destroyed. It has not yet been switched back on. At the bottom of the page, the comments. She can't have just disappeared.
00:06:30
Speaker
She can't have vanished into thin air. Kirsten sweeps into my room without knocking. I snap the laptop shut. Daylight seeps from the sky, the colour of dirty dishwater.
00:06:41
Speaker
She switches on the main light, a bare bulb. It makes my eyes ache.
Defying Genre Expectations
00:06:47
Speaker
really interesting opening and with all of these episodes in my close readings I've been picking the passage and then doing my annotations like 10 minutes before the episode just to like have it in my head and also what do I see new today that I didn't see the first time and while this was in the back of my mind as I was reading the stories like this morning it came to the foreground that you're really interested in genre I think or the stories are interested in genre and
00:07:14
Speaker
ah expectation right so like the opening of this oh oh oh three right like it doesn it doesn't say three minutes past midnight you know it's got that time stampy thing Tuesday night a hazy shape and you're like okay we're in this world of maybe like a crime novel mate or like you know a crime thriller who is giving us this this information we don't know it's in italics right like classic of the genre that the opening passage will always in italics like is this in the past when are we ponytail puffer jacket handbag you've got like the details and then you mess with us you say a girl comma like a blast of light
00:07:51
Speaker
That is not what you get from like a police report or ah or a, you know, detective. So I feel like within the first lines, you're already like, here's a convention, a genre convention, and I'm just going to throw out window.
00:08:03
Speaker
Like, did you intend not intend that? But like, was that something you were interested in? It's interesting that you point that out. So I'm definitely interested in expectation. Like that was ah kind of thematic thing that I was interested in thinking about how expectation versus reality was like a huge thing that I was thinking about while I was writing this collection.
00:08:26
Speaker
And Funnily enough, genre wasn't like, at the it wasn't like a conscious thing, but now looking back at it, I'm aware how much, like what a big role genre was actually playing.
00:08:38
Speaker
I think when I was writing this, I was thinking a lot about, i was thinking a lot about real life crime, I suppose, which is why the, um that how that's kind of crept in. And I was definitely thinking about how we view people in like a detached sort of way. And that's where,
00:08:57
Speaker
that kind of really
Themes of Girlhood and Obsession
00:08:59
Speaker
like clinical report style description came in and ah helped with that. But also while I was trying to show that that's how we think about people, I obviously wanted to be like, that's not what how people are and add a bit more kind of humanity and creativity to it. So, yeah.
00:09:16
Speaker
Right. And just that idea of like a girl, like a blast of light, right. That also tells us something about gender in this book too, right? So many of the stories we're interested about how women are treated or how they identify or how they imagine themselves or imagine each other, like in all of the stories in this book.
00:09:33
Speaker
And I think that's really like a fascinating part of the collection. but the idea of ah this girl as a blast of light is something almost brighter than herself. Maybe all of these stories can't ever quite capture, right? There's something about girlhood or womanhood. Like I know you've got a quote from Melissa Feebos at the beginning and I was like, yeah.
00:09:52
Speaker
And I when I read that, um, see, like, it seems like that's something you're interested in um and how, yeah, like what ways can we describe girls and women and like whether the story can actually fully capture that? Does that make sense?
00:10:07
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. And I think also the like mythos of girlhood as a as a thing sometimes overshadows actual girls. And even though it's it can be really useful to think of girlhood as like a collective experience, often that's that can be quite damaging.
00:10:26
Speaker
um So I was thinking about that a lot, I suppose, especially in terms of light. Like I wrote an academic paper about like light and ah like women as well. So I was thinking about these things in a kind of like academic sense in other people's work. And then those ideas kind of seeped into like in a subconscious way into my own work.
00:10:47
Speaker
But yeah, and i I was thinking as well about how I think with the the idea of like the girl, like a blast of light, like how... when like hyper focused attention can actually make you like blind to something and that's with girls like in general but also with this specific girl it's like you know that this hyper focused attention on what has happened here with this crime and that sort of thing and actually when people get fixated on that sort of thing whether it's a crime or a trend or whatever you actually kind of lose sight of what it is that you're looking at
00:11:19
Speaker
the And then, well, then the next line is the CCTV footage slows as the girl. So like, A, that we're beginning with like looking, right? Like the gaze surveillance runs throughout these stories, right? People look at each other, watching each other for good or less good, i suppose.
00:11:35
Speaker
But also like the girl, right? Like at this point, she still doesn't have a name in the story. And I think that's quite an interesting. Like that is so like crime or true crime centric, right? You can imagine someone narrating this on a podcast. The CCTV footage slows as the girl. Like it feels very much that world.
00:11:52
Speaker
And then, you know, you get the really lovely details of the fried chicken shop, the box of food, the phone in her hand, which definitely puts us in a very particular time and place, I think. And a very particular milieu as well.
00:12:03
Speaker
Right. I don't want to call these stories millennial stories, but they kind of are. They are. I think that the Guardian has called them that now, so it's fine. Yeah. Yeah. If the Guardian said it, then we'll go with it. Sadly, it didn't come out before my book on millennial fiction is out. though i know. We should have included you, but um maybe volume two.
00:12:23
Speaker
And then you get this beautiful line where it's like, she taps on the screen as she walks down the road and slips out of shot. Look at this really lovely like tripling there, but without the commas that I thought was quite nice. Like there's a real rhythm to that sentence that echoes like her moving.
00:12:36
Speaker
And then in this parenthesis with like M dashes, we can talk about those if you want. Well, N dashes, sorry, not M dashes. You then say a moment of lunar emptiness, a bright crackle. So again, we've returned to that kind of like blast of light, but a real shift in the kind of language, lunar emptiness, a bright crackle, like so unlike...
00:12:55
Speaker
She taps on the screen and she walks down the road and slips like all these monosyllables. And then before the door swings open, she steps out the street again. so so again, there's like this tension that's operating at the level of the sentence between like one way of looking another way of looking. And there's always like this back and forth between them that I think is quite fascinating.
00:13:14
Speaker
Yeah, definitely. I think that it's kind of, ah it's the detached voice and then the kind of the more kind of like, I don't know. Yeah, I guess it's like the kind of poetic voice, the writer voice or whatever, trying to keep it um keep it interesting. But also, yeah de tension, I think for me, was the sense between like a a person as an object, like a thing to be looked at and a person as a kind of,
00:13:42
Speaker
hum a fully full human with all the that or that that entails. But this character, actually the girl who is in the this opening, but she never gets a name and we never find out what happened to her which is, I guess, a kind of interesting way to start a collection of short stories that is trying to flesh out these sorts of things. But I think with her being this object of attention,
00:14:11
Speaker
it felt important to almost like not conclude that story. Like, because I think sometimes when people are objects of like hyper fixated attention, no one cares after the moment, the the moment is all that they really care about. And then when it's gone, it's gone.
00:14:27
Speaker
And I felt like in a kind of narrative, you want to like wrap that up, but I really wanted to resist that to be like, well, no, cause the characters, like the main character of the story has forgotten about her. She's moved, she kind of,
00:14:38
Speaker
You know, she's interested, she's obsessed with her for a bit and then it goes and she that obsession gets replaced by something else, which is very kind of, you know, social media. Yeah. So it felt true to kind of represent that the way that, yeah, I guess like trends and interests like shift and replace each other. And actually in that, like humanity gets lost a little bit.
00:14:57
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, for sure. i mean, the the open ending, there's quite a few stories with open endings in this book. There's ah there's a lack of resolution throughout, which I think you must enjoy writing at some level.
00:15:10
Speaker
I know, i love I love writing open-ended things and like ambiguous things. I think the thing with writing a collection of short stories as part of a PhD means that I had a lot of input from my supervisor throughout the whole process, which is obviously amazing way to be to write something, to have kind of like mentorship on the way through it.
00:15:26
Speaker
But because I was so interested in this idea of being stuck in like cycles and things actually not moving, like there being the sense of forward momentum, for actually not moving forward.
00:15:37
Speaker
i I was really like writing all of these stories where like almost like nothing happened, which is not what I not what i think these final stories are like. I was almost like trying deliberately trying to make nothing happen. Like no, there'd be no momentum happening.
00:15:50
Speaker
ah like forward, not momentum, but no forward kind of progress from the beginning to the end. And then we had to kind of have, a we had lots of conversations about like whether that was possible in terms of like, that's kind of being inherent in what you expect in like what you expect from a story and what,
00:16:07
Speaker
draws people to stories and that sort of thing. So that was interesting.
Open Endings and Narrative Obsession
00:16:11
Speaker
And then i think it was more, because I think ah with short stories, there's this kind of like trope that there's like a epiphany at the ending or like a a kind of like a moment, at which I really strongly wanted to avoid. Like I almost wanted to do like an anti-epiphany because because of the ideas I was exploring.
00:16:27
Speaker
So, so yeah, there there was a lot of back and forth about the endings and playing around with that sort of thing. But yeah, I, cause initially I wanted to end the collection with the story, the story I hope you're happy, the title story.
00:16:43
Speaker
which is the only story that has like a vaguely optimistic ending. And then um my editor was like, that's not true to the collection that you've written at all to end it on this kind of like upbeat, forward looking note.
00:16:56
Speaker
And I was like, yeah, that's true. It's just, I think it's hard to shake off that. Like, I think the story structures, like the typical traditional story structures are so ingrained in us because we absorb them everywhere. But it's really hard to, read like, it's so tempting to end a story with,
00:17:13
Speaker
like a resolution or with an answer or with something optimistic and that sort of thing. So, yeah. Yeah. What you said about like repetition without that forward movement, that is like the millennial text in total, right? Like the idea of you've been promised a the good life, right? You've been promised a life plan, yet you're running on the spot and like wearing down. think that's like formally you're doing that.
00:17:38
Speaker
And actually after that long, beautiful sentence we just described, the next sentence is the clip loops on repeat, right? Which, which might be even, you know, that's the, the, the collections description, right? Like this, clip this thing we're stuck on is just on repeat, whether it's like people in relationships or not throughout the book, really different kinds of relationships too, I should say, not just romantic ones, but familial ones and friend ones and,
00:17:59
Speaker
Yeah, how we get out of that. And then the next line, we suddenly get the I voice, right? Like we we've been denied that for for a few couple of lines. I scour the screen looking for something, ah tiny detail, an overlooked speck of evidence, eyes glinting from the bushes.
00:18:16
Speaker
So suddenly we're like, oh who is this? i We thought we were in third person, but actually we're not. We're in first person. Again, like a few of these movies where you're like, no, we're goingnna we're going to do something different from what you thought or what you wanted. There's also loads of sibilance there as well that I think is quite striking that stands out from the other sentences, right? We're suddenly in first person and then scour screen something, spec, evidence, like...
00:18:41
Speaker
bushes eyes like it really runs through this real softness there must be something we're not seeing again like the s the s as though like voice is suddenly thee now part of it that actually the the first person perspective is the one that we have to think about that's not doesn't that doesn't quite make sense but i'm i'm interested in how you've moved tonally or yeah narratively i guess in these couple of lines yeah i think with the again, sort of thinking about the idea of like object to be viewed and then audience. I think often you don't think about the audience for other things, like it especially because this collection as well is quite interested in social media and how that works. And I think when you view something on social media, even if you know it's really popular and loads of people have seen it, you don't think about them viewing it. You think about, it's it's like a very, it's like a very one-on-one experience. It's like reading, isn't it? It's like you and the
00:19:35
Speaker
no matter how many other people read it, it's you and the book. And it's the same with social media. It's like you and the whatever it is that you see. So it can feel sometimes that there's lots of other people. there's is' like, you know, it's a ah trend that lots of people are getting involved in. But at the same time, it's that kind of almost like direct relationship between what's on the screen or like the person who's putting something on the screen and the person who's viewing it.
00:19:59
Speaker
So, yeah I wanted to play around with that a little bit. And I think I just I liked the idea of in the opening, and upending as many kind of expectations as I could, kind of like playing around. And I think this is one of the reasons why I liked it is the opening for ah collection ah the I wanted to invoke these things and then kind of play with them.
00:20:20
Speaker
And especially, I think the idea of scouring the screen and looking for evidence in the sense that she, the main character has these expectations of what's happened that she's projecting onto this ah CCTV footage and the interest that she's showing in the case, I think is clearly not like purely motivated by concern. Like it's also ah bit of titillation or like just, you know, there's almost like a, there's almost like a thread of excitement going underneath it, which is like really counter to what really, if you actually break it down and step back that you should be thinking when somebody goes missing.
00:21:02
Speaker
However, You know, I was thinking a lot about, you know, real life cases of people who have gone missing in the last couple of years. And there has been like a sort of sort of like a social media frenzy over it. And you think, is that really concern for, because always women, is it really concern for the women who've gone missing?
00:21:19
Speaker
ah are you almost like hoping that something bad's happened? Like when you're like looking for eyes from the bushes, it's like, why are we immediately jumping to these conclusions that something awful has happened and is it partly like a kind of sick desire for something awful to have happened so that a good story I helped organize an event this week on true crime actually and that was like
Social Media and Reader Perception
00:21:40
Speaker
one of the things that came up uh there was at the British Library and it was like a it was interesting in American studies in particular but like true crime is this American genre or form and so much of it was about like
00:21:51
Speaker
what what do we go to true crime for or crime stories in general like what do we get out them what resolution do we get from something like a crime novel right which always ties things up versus the true crime which you know they were invested in in particular ways and yeah like I scour the screen looking for something a tiny detail like she's doing close reading right like but of the screen also and yeah you're right screens crop up throughout these stories I think it's even in the second story right like someone is looking at the partner's Instagram, like to see what she is saying about the person the narrator is interested in, right? So like, you know, it's not though that we go to any length to like find the detail that will prove something when we know actually the detail doesn't prove anything.
00:22:34
Speaker
and And maybe part of your upending expectations is part of that too, right? Like, oh, you've got this detail, you think you've got a hand on it? Actually, no, I'm going to give you something else actually Yeah, for sure. That's so interesting. I hadn't really thought about that. But I guess, yeah, on social media, I think there is such a ah desire to read a lot into, especially people that we know in real life, but also people that we don't, like influencers and celebrities and that sort of thing.
00:22:59
Speaker
But to read into, to find something from... that that isn't there, like a ah ah tone or ah ah something that's going on behind the scenes.
00:23:10
Speaker
And yeah, so that's a kind of close reading that we do, but it does, I don't think it, like it doesn't, that doesn't necessarily lead anywhere except into an unhealthy spiral.
00:23:20
Speaker
yeah
00:23:23
Speaker
No, that it's in a book by Robert Eagleston, actually, on like about reading, about what literature is and why we do it. And he's like, we all do it every day. You you closely read a text from your friend.
00:23:35
Speaker
You pay attention to the commas. Is there an exclamation mark? Is there an emoji? Why didn't they use capital letters? You know, all of these things that we're so used to doing it. But when it comes to literary texts, we have a very different feeling about that.
00:23:48
Speaker
when i've When I've told people about this podcast that aren't like big readers or hated English at school, they're like, oh, because like the curtains are blue because the character's sad. I'm like, kind of. But that's not like that's not really like that's the hyper focus. Right. But rather think about what language does, like what effects language has, not just saying her lips are red. Therefore, she's like a harlot. Right. Like.
00:24:11
Speaker
I think it's almost like close reading is like the opposite of that, isn't it? It's like the lips are red. That's gotta be something really deep and meaningful. And then you think, but actually sometimes the writer's just chosen red lips for some reason. But I think it, that's what I guess I mean of with the kind of collaborative thing that like you bring what you bring to the table and so it isn't even necessarily what the writer meant to bring to the table, but that doesn't mean you're wrong.
00:24:34
Speaker
That means that it's kind of the text is living and moving in a whole different way, which is, you know as a writer, that's like the best thing you can hope for. i think Yeah, um I like that.
00:24:44
Speaker
and And here, even though I should probably should say like, we've got the first person voice, but we still might think it's a police person, right? Like we still might be in that world. And we don't know for sure who who we are, who we're listening to, who we're reading. But then I returned to the search page and I click onto a message board for amateur sleuths. Like, oh, so does this person think they're an amateur sleuth? Like, is that what they that what they are?
00:25:04
Speaker
and we realized that's not what they are. and I should say this story doesn't go the direction you think it's going to go by the way right like this sets up something that actually it goes in a whole other direction that I found quite bizarre in a great way like a very unexpected way in terms of genre but yeah like here we're setting up yeah I think it's interesting because she kind of is an amateur sleuth even though she what she ends up sleuthing is not this murder case she's sort of like she's sleuthing other things in the world but she's a a character who's very much kind of observing things and she's like...
Amateur Sleuth Culture and Comment Sections
00:25:41
Speaker
She's not like actively trying not to get swept up in stuff because click clearly she is from this opening, but she's sort of, yeah, she's interested in the things that are happening around her, but yeah, she's getting caught up in them as well.
00:25:55
Speaker
So she's definitely an amateur sleuth, not a good one. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I like the next slide, like it is full of non-professionals. That's such a great way to describe yourself. like you're just very online, babe. Like you're not like, that's like that's non-professional, I guess.
00:26:10
Speaker
ah That's so true. But that's, I do think that, well, there are actually, these are and unsurprisingly, I went on these websites for the um the story and it's full of people who are, you know,
00:26:22
Speaker
I don't even know what, that they don't say what they do or whether what their perspective is and this sort of thing, but they will be like, I have found this piece of footage or i know that somebody drove past the the spot of the crime at this time.
00:26:39
Speaker
And, or I managed to find like a Instagram story of somebody who was near, but like all these like really tiny things things that I was like, it's interesting because to an extent it's, you think like, as a ah non-professional myself, you're looking at it going, well, this is quite impressive. Like, is this useful? But then I think the truth is that like a real detective would be like, no, that's not like, that that's not what we're looking for. That's not like the whole, it's, it's like almost that you're looking in the wrong direction. Like you're looking, the things you're looking for
00:27:10
Speaker
are not the things that matter because the people on these boards are going in, they they already know the ending and the ending is that she's been like kidnapped and murdered, which is what they kind of, they want some kind of horror story like that.
00:27:23
Speaker
They're not actually looking at the full range of possibilities of what's happened. Again, like that hyper detail you were talking about, right? Like so fixated on the one thing, but that you're missing like the wood for the trees kind of. Yeah.
00:27:38
Speaker
They're like interested in finding evidence to support what they've already decided is going to be the outcome rather than looking at the actual, like going into ah with an open mind. Which is, again, a very terrible version of close reading, right? Like that yeah that's why, you know, but that's why we have the death of the author, right? But it's like, if you go into a book being like, I know X about the author, so therefore the text is about X. He was like, well, that's the problem. Like you'll cut you're bringing too much of that world to the writing. Like what does the language say? what does what is it What is the text doing?
00:28:07
Speaker
And your your ideas are getting in the way. of what the text is doing and yeah that seems quite interesting how we're drawing that link between detection in this story and like figuring other people out and then the act of writing the act of reading as well at the same time you know we're cobbling together pieces of evidence to create a fuller picture like that's what we want right we want to do that with other people like I want to know other people more and so many of these stories show us frustrated attempts at that like you think you know this other person but you really don't
00:28:37
Speaker
Even like, I hope you're happy. I think it's really funny um on the back of the book is like, I hope you're happy is more a warning than a wish. um Which is, I don't know if you wrote that line or whether publishers wrote that line, but there's something about like the extending something to the other and being like, yeah what you do with that is another, I don't know.
00:28:55
Speaker
Right. Like really hope you're happy, but I have no say over a what you do with that line. Exactly. Yeah, I think that's why i kind of latched onto it. Cause I actually wrote the line, i hope you're happy in a story which is called triangulation where the character works icing cookies and she gets an order a cookie that just says, I hope you're happy on it. And she's like, that's so bizarre.
00:29:16
Speaker
And then i became really interested in that as a title for another story. And then it became the title for the whole collection. But what I think interested me about it is that when you read, I hope you're happy.
00:29:28
Speaker
for me anyway, I don't think, I don't read it as i actually hope you're happy. You read it as like a kind of, um Yeah, like, I guess it's like a sarcastic comment, isn't it? That's how I, and it's is it always like, is that me being really ungenerous?
00:29:42
Speaker
but Like thinking that that's that's how I read it. But then, you know, in Wicked, that's how it is as well. It's like a sarcastic, ah it's not actually, I hope you're happy. However, inherent in that kind of sarcasm is a a sense of like, well, you've made your choice.
00:29:57
Speaker
i hope you're happy with it. because i'm i'm I'm out now kind of thing. Like this is, you're kind of on your own. But yeah, I was just super interested in the way, different ways that it could be read, but also the idea that hoping someone else is happy is like a stupidly futile hope.
00:30:13
Speaker
Like you can't, but you know, striving for happiness is a really difficult and complicated thing to strive for. But especially like just opening that out to someone else, you just think, OK, what am I going to do with that? Like you hope but it it also it feels like an expectation as well.
00:30:29
Speaker
Like I think when was thinking about like parents and children and when you hope someone's happy, you almost like hope that they will express happiness because it makes you relieved of a certain responsibility.
00:30:40
Speaker
but Like you just expect that. Yeah. In them showing this positive feeling that you can just go, don't have to do anything like my job's done. The speaker of I hope you're happy is only thinking of themselves. They're not thinking about the other person at all. Yeah, exactly.
00:30:55
Speaker
Well, it's like, I hope you're happy. It's like, it's ah ah for me, like, I will be happy if you're happy, which is a kind of relational statement, which... yeah, is not ah but in any benefit to the person who's the happy one, really. So it's, yeah, I mean, maybe I'm overthinking it, but I was really like, I'm interested in like unpacking all the different ways that I thought about that statement. I hope you're happy. And yeah, my obsession with it kind of made me think it has to be the title. Like it's got so much in there. There's no overthinking here. This is a close reading podcast. Like, it's fine.
00:31:30
Speaker
the The passage then goes on again. We've got like, I learn that her last text was sent 0011. eleven Right. Like, again, like she's talking in this, this perceived voice, right, of like how she should be talking. Right. Like that's that's how people talk about, like when someone goes missing GPS records show.
00:31:49
Speaker
approximately five minutes walk from her flat. Like she's really trying to like ape the someone else's language. We can tell that it's not hers, right? It's not her way of speaking and thinking. Like, you know that already. Two minutes later, her phone was turned off, brackets, or destroyed.
00:32:03
Speaker
And that's the moment where you're like, no, maybe this is the narrator now, right? Like we're hearing her... the phone was turned off, which feels so passive versus violence is right at the, or the center of things, if you like.
00:32:15
Speaker
um And the threat of violence is run throughout these stories or like, if not violence, you know, threat, danger, the unknown. And that destroyed, I think gives us a real insight into her mind there.
00:32:27
Speaker
It has not yet been switched back on again, like that wish, right? That that someone's going to find it or that she's, the woman is alive or something. Yeah, definitely. I think, the yeah the character, this this character and lots of the characters in the collection are trying to be different people, like trying to figure out how to be. And in doing that, they're borrowing from other people.
00:32:53
Speaker
So here she's, You can see she's like absorbed the voice of um this kind of investigative voice has come from the forum rather than i think it's not even necessarily that it's come from like a police report. It's come from being like, OK, we're doing this, we're doing that. And there, you know, it's almost like so she's putting on something that somebody else is putting on, like they're affecting this police style, like, you know, rap report.
00:33:19
Speaker
And she is then putting on their voice to convey that. So it's almost like it's that even further of a remove from who she actually is. She's just putting on the trend that she's involved in.
00:33:32
Speaker
And then with the, or destroyed, yeah. With that, I was definitely thinking about how interesting it is that she's almost like, she's almost not hoping that this woman has been killed because I think she's, there is fear there, but it's like, it it's the fine line between like fear and that she's sort of like,
00:33:50
Speaker
oh, what does this mean? This is a, oh gosh, if someone's, you know, this it's it becomes more of a a story, I suppose, if some if something has happened rather than if it's just like, oh she just didn't call anyone, but she's fine.
00:34:03
Speaker
You know, like she was hoping for that to be like an exciting ending and she was projecting that. And yeah, sort hoping that there would be, yeah, I think and and later in the story, she's almost like hoping that she can uncover something herself. Like she goes to the chicken shop almost think, could I find a piece of evidence, which is like so misguided. But, you know, I guess if you're part this group, it kind of warps the way that you're thinking you're in this group thing.
00:34:29
Speaker
Maybe we can actually solve this. And so she, yeah. And she is among the comments, right? At the bottom of the page, of the comments. She can't have just disappeared. She can't have vanished into the net. I'm like, oh no, the comments.
00:34:40
Speaker
Like, yeah that is so of our moment, right? but But the comments then come into real life when she goes to the chicken shop. Like, there are other people there too, right? The guy behind counter is like, oh, you as well, right?
00:34:53
Speaker
um That it becomes like a tourist industry almost. that Like, people but fascinated by this story. It seems more about them being there than... wanting resolution for this woman right or like wanting her to be okay like as you were saying but yeah the the comments like that really that really got me the comments I know it's like it's a fear thing now isn't it you're like oh god the cop what did the comments say it's like it's never going to be anything good in the comments is it it's never going to be anything like ah on rare occasions perhaps but in general you know whoever's commenting is adding something that you don't want to hear yeah
00:35:25
Speaker
Right, which, you know, like a comment is, you know, it's just like a throwaway line, right? But the comments has become like a proxy for the commons, right? like that Like this is where people get to speak.
00:35:36
Speaker
But actually it's not, right? Like it's a very warped version of who is speaking. It's not everyone speaking. It is just like a particular slim area of people that have come to this thing to say something, right? Right.
00:35:47
Speaker
But also like she can't have just as big she can't like that repetition, this real desire for it not to be true. But at the same time, like, again, like their desires, these people, the narrator's desires are irrelevant really to the storyline. Like that's not you know're going to get it back from just these desires.
00:36:03
Speaker
And then, and then the the best bit is like passage, new paragraph, Kirsten sweeps into my room without knocking. you like a real kind of another jolt, right? I snap the laptop shut.
00:36:15
Speaker
Again, he's like really, like I snap the laptop shut, like the P's and the T's and the S are that crisp sound of like the thing, which I love. But also like, who is this Kirsten? Like, why is she coming to the room? Like more invasion, right? Like we're in, like someone is invading someone else's space. Daylight seeps from the sky, the colour of dirty dishwater.
00:36:33
Speaker
We can talk about pathetic phallus if you want, but you know what mean? Like that's there. And then she switches on the main light, a bear bulb. It makes my eyes ache, which is such a lovely callback to the blast of light right at the beginning, the opening or the bright crackle.
00:36:46
Speaker
that actually this bright bulb is is not that, right? This bulb is shining too much light on things. The light as as harsh rather than as full of energy or light or something. the Yeah, and I was thinking about like all the different kinds of lights. Like, so she's literally staring into light. If she's looking into a laptop, she's like staring into a light source, but it's the bulb that's too much because it's like, that's the thing that she's been seen essentially, which is like she was doing the seeing.
00:37:15
Speaker
And she didn't want to be seen, which is why she's snapping the laptop shut. And she's like, whoa, because she's been caught. Because Kirsten is like her friend who is also very interested in, or in fact, more so interested in trends. But she's very much like, stop it with the the dead, the missing woman.
00:37:32
Speaker
It's almost, yeah, that kind of thing of having this, almost wanting to keep it to herself. from the people in the real world, but she's more than happy to share it with the people in the comments section, which I think is a a very, yeah, like a very contemporary thing that people often, you know, there's all these groups for various things, like, I don't know, like trying to conceive or like best way to clean or um just all sorts of different things. So you can, you can really like dive in to these questions with a pool of strangers and even almost like be,
00:38:05
Speaker
more open than you would with people in your life and have these like obsessions or interests that you don't really like divulge or speak about in the kind of real world because they are stuck in your virtual world. So yeah, I was interested in that the difference between almost like who the character is online and who she is but with the, you know, her actual housemate.
00:38:30
Speaker
That's a great place to end that, actually. I was i was waiting for it I was like, actually, that's a really good line. Our online selves and our in-person selves, like anyone that knows me, it's like that's one of my overriding obsessions and interests of the way that as millennials, we've grown up through different kinds of, you know, online world and social media and all that kind
Marnie's Writing Process
00:38:49
Speaker
of stuff. So I'm really interested how that fractures or intensifies identity in certain kinds of ways.
00:38:54
Speaker
I want to talk to you about your writing, though. Given that you did a PhD in creative writing, like how was that experience? like Did you have a set writing pattern? are you Do you have a different one now, like post-PhD? Did you have writing amounts each day? Are you doing on the computer by hand? Do you have rituals? all that I want to know all the kinds of stuff.
00:39:13
Speaker
Yeah, so I love writing by hand for like first ideas and that sort of thing. And then I write, usually write on the computer. And I am very much a ah person who tries to get the first draft of whatever it is down really quickly.
00:39:31
Speaker
So whether that's like, and this is for all of my writing. So if that's a like an academic article or a a short story or a novel or whatever it is, I'm like, try and get it down as quickly as possible. And then you've got something to work with.
00:39:46
Speaker
And then it can change loads. But I find it much easier having like the words and like a structure to change rather than sort of having nothing. which was then really hard with the PhD because obviously you can't just write a PhD really quickly. You have to like, you know, that it does take a long time. And I sort of started my PhD as I think many people do going, well, I'm just going to write it. Like I'll get the first draft done in like a year or two or whatever. And then it's like, no, actually it takes a lot longer than that because you have to figure out what you're writing about while you're doing it. Whereas with...
00:40:21
Speaker
with the I think with the stories I would I did I did do loads of like you know i half write a story or I'll like hand write something and then it will check so but by the time I get putting it on the computer I will usually have like an idea of what it's about and where I want it to kind of start and finish and then all of the like ideas and you know the the detail the the stuff that you close read I write that once there's kind of big structures already there, like those things come out in that kind of closer process.
00:40:52
Speaker
But yeah, I write quick. Yeah. Write quickly and edit slow is definitely how I do it. I like that. Write quickly, edit slow. Are you doing it like a desk? you doing cafes? Are you library person?
00:41:06
Speaker
I'm like a firm believer that you can write anywhere. So I do it. I do it anywhere. The only thing that I struggle with is I don't, I find it hard to write in like smaller snatches of time. So i feel like, which which I think is partly in my head, but i if I sit down and I've only got like an hour, but i find it hard to be like, okay, I'll get into it because it's then so frustrating when you get stopped, when you're like in the flow.
00:41:28
Speaker
So it's almost like, what's the point of summoning the flow if you're then just going to have to cut it out? So... I find that hard. But yeah, if I've got a long stretch of time, I can write in a cafe, i can write a library, I can write at home.
00:41:43
Speaker
I can sometimes write on a train, but weirdly, I always fall asleep on trains, so... Yeah, that's fascinating. And I, I mean, I would love to write academic work quite quickly, my word.
00:41:54
Speaker
um i need to channel some of your energy. I think it's because with academic stuff, you write like the abstract or whatever first, don't you? So you can't, you're, you almost like write yourself like a plan of what it's going to be.
00:42:05
Speaker
And I know that then when you get into it, it's not as easy as the kind of the ah the abstract that you've kind of promised. But because I've I think once you've done the work of having that little like promise of what it's going to be, then I'm like, I just want to realize that promise. I kind of just like, yeah, let's get it, get it down. And it does change loads. and then you have to do some research and that sort of thing. But at least I try and get like a ah plan down So I've got some, some like ideas and words to work with. Cause I find the the blank page is the thing where i that stresses me out the most. And I think with academic writing, I the i could just sit there and look at that for a long time.
00:42:43
Speaker
Do you have early writing memories? Do you remember when you first were like, hey, I'm a writer, there I can do that. That's the thing I want to do. i do. I was thinking about this when you ah when I saw the questions and I remembered that when I was I think I was about five or six, I wrote a retelling of The Three Little Pigs and I was sent to the head teacher's office at primary school.
00:43:05
Speaker
And I remember being so confused because I thought I'd done something wrong. And it was only when I got there that they were like, this is excellent work for a year one or whatever it was. but i had so I have this with my first kind of like, I have that weird mixed memory of being like, am I in trouble for writing?
00:43:22
Speaker
But I think it's interesting that i was so compelled by writing from so such a young age. I think it's because i was I've always been such a big reader and it was like the desire to do that, like something that I love and like I loved reading. And then I was like, well, I want to do that. I want to tell those stories. So, yeah, I've always written stuff.
00:43:44
Speaker
Basically, I would say my whole life from when I could write. but you know various things like when I was in my Avril Lavigne phase I definitely I was songwriting and uh I've definitely had a poetry phase but I was not a good poet but I think it's you know it's nice to have tried my hand at all these different things so young so I feel like I've got a good sense of um yeah just writing in such like a wide scope of things um Yeah, yeah.
00:44:11
Speaker
And also i like the rewriting of Three Little Pigs. I'm imagining like a much darker version of that. Like, I feel like Marnie comes in is like, actually, think it's from like the point of view of the fo of the fox, the wolf or something. So I think it was quite, I think it was as dark as a six-year-old can do. Look, you were doing Angela Carter before you even knew who she was, so...
00:44:34
Speaker
Are there any useful essays or books on writing that have like been useful to you in your
Influences and Recommendations
00:44:41
Speaker
work? Like any things you've gone to do you thought this is really productive? Yes.
00:44:45
Speaker
um So that probably my favourite, oh no, I've just knocked over a pile of books, but A Swim in the Pond in the Rain is my like, yeah, I think that's my go-to writing book.
00:44:57
Speaker
I mean, I don't, I read it, I don't know if I necessarily read it to write, but it's the one that I found most like, breathtaking and surprising I suppose like when I read it I was like whoa this is guess because it's kind of like close reading this book it's like well it is close reading like a very kind of close but with an eye to thinking about how you craft your own stories so yeah I love this book other than that I think I don't know that I have anything in particular that i return to craft what and what I mainly do honestly is pick up books that I love and read them and that's my
00:45:33
Speaker
that's how I try and figure out how to do things like if I'm like how do I get from this point to this point I will pick up a book and be like how does this person do it and then use that as my way to figure out yeah I like that well given that we're there that's my last question always like what are your book recommendations they can be old things new things stuff not yet out like what ah what ah what should listeners go read to Well, I brought a pile of books with me because i every time people ask me this question, I go, ah can't even remember any books that I've read. You know, my mind just goes blank and I'm like, I can't remember.
00:46:06
Speaker
um I've got The Office of Historical Corrections by um Danielle Evans, who is just like an incredible short story writer. um Daddy by Emma Klein, which I think Emma Klein is probably my favorite short story writer. Like I love her writing. I also brought Girlhood by Melissa Feebos because I, yeah, this is,
00:46:25
Speaker
just such an incredible book like I love it so much and she's just such a great writer like I wish I could write non-fiction like oh but don't we all I know and I brought The Hours which is like one of my all-time favorite books by Michael Cunningham um yeah really beautiful Yeah, really beautiful and a book that I think I've returned to quite a lot to look at how how it's done just on a kind of sentence level.
00:46:54
Speaker
So yeah, those are my top recommendations. Those are great recommendations and I will obviously link them on the sub stacks so people can go and buy them and read them.
00:47:06
Speaker
Marnie, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate your time today. It's been a joy. Oh, thank you. It's been so much fun.
Closing Remarks
00:47:16
Speaker
Thank you for listening to this episode. Please subscribe if you haven't already, leave a review and share with people you know. You can also follow the show and me on Instagram at booksupclose and on YouTube. And if you can, please do fill out the feedback form linked in the show notes.
00:47:32
Speaker
It's really helpful to us. You can show transcripts and more information by subscribing to the Substack. This show is made possible by an Impact Accelerator Award from the University of Hertfordshire and the Arts and Humanities