Talk about a great gig … interviewing the Queen of Noir is something very special for me. I first read Vicki Hendricks on the advice of Craig McDonald, the best-read crime fiction guy I know. My first Hendricks read was Miami Purity (my favorite of the collection, although I happen to love them all). By the time I finished the last of the lot, (Iguana Love), I decided to review all four of her novels on my web page.
My wife and I had the great pleasure of meeting Vicki and her boyfriend Brian at the 2003 Sleuthfest in Ft. Lauderdale. Vicki teaches college creative writing and English, and when she’s not grading papers, she’s writing, skydiving, or scuba diving, or sharing time with Brian in Chicago (his home base). I decided to reread Vicki’s works before putting my questions together. They’re wonderful reads the second and third time around … and I suspect will be a forth and fifth time.
CS: James Ellroy wrote a now (in)famous blurb for your first novel that has tended to track you in the intervening years. He said, "this book is an instant redneck savant classic: so gruesome and deadpan outlandish that you wind up baying at the moon like a Florida coon dog." Tired of living up, or down, to that one?
QoN: I’ve answered this question before, but I always feel differently about it. Right now, I’m just feeling grateful! It must be a blurb classic, and I’m proud to be the lucky recipient. I always enjoy anything that mentions a dog anyway, and the visual image of that coon dog baying at the moon over a copy of my book puts a smile on my face. Maybe that sounds sarcastic, but I don’t mean it to be. I can’t take this business too seriously—it’s all for fun when you get down to it.
CS: Saw a bumper sticker on a car the other day: "If at first you don’t succeed, don’t try skydiving." Any thoughts?
QoN: Actually skydiving isn’t as dangerous as it looks, and there are many safeguards. Driving is probably far worse. Unless you’re having a really bad day, chances are you’ll have a hard time killing yourself on a skydive. Broken bones are easier to acquire, but even then, with a little diligence, they can usually be avoided. For a long time, my main fear was that I would lose my mind right in the middle of the skydive and forget to open the parachute. Obviously, that’s unlikely now, at over 550 jumps logged, and I also have an automatic opening device in case of being knocked out, so I’ve switched to a more rational fear, namely running into somebody else in the air during opening or landing. This is probably the most likely thing that can occur without being noticeably negligent. People are much more unpredictable than equipment, and it’s tough to figure out whose fault it was when it’s all over—not that it matters. Of course, you can be safer jumping alone, but that’s not much fun.
CS: You once told an interviewer in Australia that you only started to think of your published novels as crime books when so many others told you they were. What did you think you were writing in those first couple of books? Something literary?
QoN: Hey, what kind of wise-ass question is this? Only you can get away with this one! Of course, I’m writing literary novels! Really I guess it’s all by definition. To me, literary means character-driven, someone trying to fulfill a need and achieve a goal—to put it into teaching terms. Nothing happens to the character that isn’t caused by a choice he or she makes. Character development is more important than plot. The subject matter—crime, love, whatever—is incidental. For me, it’s the depth of emotion and the originality of the character that make something intriguing—that and the sex. I have no interest in solving a mystery, and nobody needs to die to get my attention. The reason I generally have murder in my books is because passion, taken to the limits, often leads there. I read more "literary" novels than I do crime novels, if I dare admit it.
CS: No sarcasm intended … and I did find Voluntary Madness in the literary section of the Lincoln Center Barnes & Noble when I was looking for it. Okay, you told me that Voluntary Madness was turned down by your French publisher who didn’t think it was a crime novel. Can you make a guess as to what that publisher perhaps thought was missing?
QoN: Maybe greed or dishonesty—evil in general. Voluntary Madness is kind of a crime romp, I guess—some food robbery, a little illegal exposure, one case of accidental manslaughter. There’s a rape, but not committed by a major character. Nobody important intends to do any harm, and the major conflict is in the relationship of the couple. Things just get out of hand. It’s tremendously dark, but has a sort of bittersweet ending. I said something to my French publisher last summer about his remark that VM wasn’t crime, and he couldn’t remember saying that—or maybe he said mystery. It’s been a few years. Hell, I could have dreamed it, or he just didn’t like it and didn’t want to hurt my feelings!
CS: Still have an iguana of your own? If so, what’s its name?
QoN: That’s sweet of you to ask. You’ve redeemed yourself from the sarcastic comment on my literary works!
The iguana was named Chinasky—after the Bukowski character—but he’s been dead for almost ten years. He was incredibly beautiful. He would pose under his heat lamp for hours without blinking. I kept his cage on top of the television until he got too big. That way if I was with some guy watching sports, I could gaze lovingly at the iguana and not get bored. Brian never watches sports, so maybe that’s why I haven’t needed another lizard. Of course, Brian watches the history channel, but now that I’m a "real" author, along with teaching, I don’t have time for TV, except to sleep in front of it.
CS: Hey, anybody names anything Bukowski-related is a right dame in my book. What do people in your hometown think of the books you write? Do you ever hear from them?
QoN: Two years ago I met somebody from Cincinnati at the Bouchercon Conference who wanted a book signed and said he’d read all of mine, but no old friends have ever turned up. I can’t say I’ve kept in touch. However, I once heard that my father’s side of the family had a copy of Miami Purity that they were passing around among ten or fifteen of them, but I never heard if anybody liked it. I generally take that as a "no."
CS: Have you ever written something you decided was too over-the-top and had to throttle back? If so, what?
QoN: Not that I can remember. Maybe my natural censors kick in and I don’t notice! Of course, there was the dog-licking scene in Miami Purity that Sonny Mehta suggested I take out, and my British publisher Serpent’s Tail heartily recommended that I cut the first several pages of Iguana Love, where Ramona was smothering a detective by squatting on his nose and mouth. An early version of that excerpt is available in the Quixote Quarterly, 1994, if anybody’s interested. I have a box full! Other than that, I can’t remember any self-throttling. I’ve been invited to do a chapter in a British erotic "round robin" novel edited by Maxim Jacobowski—Casanova transported to contemporary times who meets the infamous "O"—and Maxim has already outlawed bestiality, so I might have to show some self control on that!
CS: Any other writers working today—male or female—you see as kindreds?
QoN: Hmm. I’ve never heard it put that way, but writers usually appreciate my stuff more than the reading public. Then there’s you, Charlie, yeah?
CS: I’m not sure I agree. Everyone (and I mean everyone) I know who’s read your stuff before not knowing about it has become a fan. Do you write to music? If so, what kinds?
QoN: Not usually. However, as an experiment, I listened to Santana’s "Supernatural" regularly when I was writing my latest novel Cruel Poetry. The book’s not published yet, so I’m unsure of the result. Actually, the CD repeated and repeated, and I heard very little. I’ve always been comfortable writing in rooms filled with people talking, a TV blaring—lately, Brian swearing at his computer—so I guess I just block everything. I wrote most of Sky Blues at the drop zone between jumps—talk about a party atmosphere! I never needed a "room of my own," like Virginia Woolf. I think it would freak me out to have my own time and space.
‘Hank was drunk and he slugged me—it wasn’t the first time—and I picked up the radio and caught him across the forehead with it. It was one of those big boom boxes with the cassette player and recorder, but I never figured it would kill him.’ (Miami Purity)CS: The first two sentences of Miami Purity instantly hook the reader. At the start of the next paragraph we learn that Sherise spends a couple of days in jail and that the law decided she "wasn’t to blame." Did you start the novel from that jump-off point or was it something you went back and weaved in?
QoN: Geeze, can you tell? Actually, I added a few paragraphs to what had started with Sherri waiting for the taxi. This was the result of my consultation on the first two chapters with the recently deceased, wonderful Southern writer Larry Brown at Breadloaf Writers’ Conference in ’92. Money well spent! Larry didn’t tell me what to do, but something he said—can’t remember what—made me think I needed more back story. I’m always running short on that. I had already used the novel as my thesis for my MA in creative writing, and I was still working on it, having been turned down by an agent or two. Eventually, the first sentence of MP was inspired by The Postman Always Rings Twice, the model for my novel. "They threw me off the hay truck about noon" was transformed into "Hank was drunk when he slugged me." I guess the similarities between those sentences aren’t particularly obvious, but somehow that’s what happened.
CS: Payne & Sherri and momma Payne … what a threesome … Daniel Woodrell does some wonderfully dark stuff with incest. I often think some of your characters and his are interchangeable (and I mean that in the best possible way). Was pushing the incest between Payne and his mother a way of maneuvering Sherri into a more sympathetic role or just the great twist it read like (or was it both)?
QoN: It was all a matter of consciously choosing what I thought I would enjoy writing about. I didn’t really know Sherri yet. I just wanted a love triangle, as in the classic definition of noir, because I was in love with Cain’s writing and wanted to emulate it. I also wanted the main character to be an aggressive woman, and for the plot, something more original than the usual married couple plus one. Incest, as one of the few taboos left in our society, kept my attention as soon as I thought of it. I didn’t know till later that Cain also touched on the subject in one of his other novels. I forget which one. I need to go back and reread!
CS: Your women don't let life happen to them. Some of their choices aren't ideal, but we respect them for having made their own choices. Juliette is determined not to conform to expectations and meets each new day expecting surprises. Yet she makes a death vow with her lover, Punch. Is she selling-out or hoping she can convince Punch to alter their suicide plan?
QoN: I’m so unlike Juliette that it’s tough for me to understand her, but I think she is completely taken in by Punch and believes in the necessity of their plan together to the point that she will go to extremes to make it happen, although her feelings are sometimes against it. However—as in every literary story—she grows and develops, through her relationship with Isis. By the end of the story, Juliette doesn’t really want to follow the plan, but she has also promised and other factors have come into play. To say more would give the ending away, but basically, she’s the most innocent of my female characters and has a lot to learn about men.
CS: Ramona’s marriage is falling apart in that quiet, but with extreme prejudice, way. I found that to be the glue that endeared her character to me—someone trapped in a bad marriage and struggling to find a way out. Then her husband whacks a neighbor’s snake and it all comes together for her (what she needs to do). Anything symbolic going on there?
QoN: Surely, I needn’t get into snake symbolism for this crowd! Aside from fun sexual imagery, the book is mainly peopled with reptiles, cold-blooded creatures, unable to manufacture their own warmth, lacking the ability to love or understand love, but not the need for it. I see Ramona’s husband, somewhat normal, as lucky to escape so early through an act of passion that fuels Ramona’s disgust. I don’t think there can be any such thing as a good marriage for Ramona, and anybody foolish enough to fall for her looks and passion is in for big trouble. In early versions of the novel, she has several other lovers, but since they seemed to be just further examples, I combined them into the few guys that are left.
CS: I know I’ve asked you about this in the past, and you can call it penis envy, but here goes again. When do one of your women fall for a guy with a less than humongous penis? How about one with a less than average penis?
QoN: Yes, Charlie, you are obsessing over this! (Or else you’re just trying to spice up the interview.) My second short story, written in graduate school, is about a woman on vacation in Greece, who meets a guy with a 3-inch penis, and rejects him. This probably isn’t what you have in mind! I’ve never tried to get that story published, because I think it has some irreparable flaws—being based on such a superficial issue, for one thing—although it made for wild class discussion. When I wrote it, I had recently been to Greece, as you might guess, and the details of place and an incident with a pet fox might be worth resurrecting, so if I get back to it, I’ll try to come up with a happier ending, and I’ll dedicate it to you!
CS: I say go crazy and give the guy with 3 an extra 1.25 and have the entire female population of the Greek island fall for him. Onward … Desi is a thrill seeker, but she kind of knows better than to engage with a badass. Yet she does. The forbidden apple factor is what I liked most about Sky Blues; that sense of someone being sucked into trouble for the sake of a thrill. I’ve read where you’ve lived a much more normal life than your characters; that you haven’t had the "hard life" experiences your characters have had. Are you living vicariously through your women?
QoN: You haven’t known me very long, and I try to keep my real life in the background, but I’ve had quite a few extreme relationships. I wouldn’t call it a "hard life," just craziness of my own choosing. Most of my past relationships are best used as "material," but then what would I do without them? This is where my characters start, but then they go beyond. Hopefully, I have enough stored up, because since I started skydiving, I find most of my excitement in the air, and I’ve already written that book. Back to Destiny, though—she’s intelligent, but that doesn’t control her emotions. Not everyone agrees with this internal separation, it seems—some people have the obsessive gene, and others don’t, I guess, so they reject it for everyone. This is a source of criticism for all my novels. Women, especially, who haven’t experienced sexual obsession, just don’t believe that it exists. None of my characters so far have chosen happiness, wealth, sanity, or safety over passion, but maybe someday someone will.
CS: Which brings us back to Charles Bukowski and the last sentence of the answer above … think the Barfly screenplay (based on his novel Hollywood, I believe) … "People who never go insane … what horrible lives they lead" … or something like that.
Well, Queen of Noir, milli grazie … by the time this hits the Noir Originals web page, you and Brian will have partied in New York with a couple dozen of my best friends … and we’re all looking very forward to it.
Copyright© 200
5 Noir Originals***
CHARLIE STELLA writes most of his novels extremely fast. He is an opera fanatic and a theatre lover at heart. He relies on dialogue to tell his stories and is currently working on screenplays as well as new novels. After enthusiastic reviews for EDDIE’S WORLD, Carroll & Graf bought JIMMY BENCH-PRESS (Carroll & Graf, December 2002) and CHARLIE OPERA (Carroll & Graf, December 2003). CHEAPSKATES was published by Carroll & Graf in March, 2005. Charlie looks forward to a day when writing and teaching are all he might do to earn a living.