What is the name of the book and when was it published?
The name of the book is No Apologies and it was published in 2014.
What’s the book’s first line?
Well, the first line is a little misleading. This book is a book of…micro-realities, for lack of a better term. I say it’s poetry, but it’s not traditional, lyrical, academic poetry you were forced to read in college. It’s the type of work demanded by the technical age: the pieces are immediately accessible, they tell a story and they are something you can go in and out of and read out of context. How about I share a sample instead?
This gives you a taste of the tone:
kneel
he said
you’ve done it before
but that didn’t mean
i would do it again
so i told him
to get his f*ing hand
off my f*ing head.
What’s the book about? Give us the “pitch”.
As I said, it’s a book that sort of defies definition. On one hand it’s micro-fiction, on the other it’s poetry; on one hand it’s an inappropriate joke at dinner, on the other it’s what you secretly wish you could say, but can’t. This book is as real as it gets, and it’s filled with fiction. It’s like a Jolly Rancher for the mind: it immediately satisfies your fix for the literary and the salacious; the poignant and the ballsy. It hijacks you.
What inspired you to write the book? A particular person? An event?
I’ve been writing poetry, both lyrical and performance, my whole life. I started reading a poetry collection by Michael Madsen, the actor, and his style engaged me, moved me and all of a sudden, this new poetry “voice” was born inside of me. I got up the next morning and wrote my first poem. The entire book took only four weeks to write. To put that into context, one of my novels usually takes me over a year. The poems just spilled out of me like a birthing. As I say in my dedication, my life was the inspiration, all of the light and all of the darkness. I let the reader into places they don’t even go with themselves. My readers come out on the other side with a feeling of liberation. A lot of people claim it’s not poetry. A few people have called it filthy and trashy. That’s okay. That says more about them than it does about me. Plus, I don’t mind filth and trash. We all walk through it. I simply own it.
What’s the most distinctive thing about the main character? Who-real or fictional-would you say the character reminds you of?
The main character is me, the main character is you. I reel you into my world and you walk out of it feeling like you’ve been a part of it. And you might feel as though I spoke right to you in any given piece; that I had read your diary and commandeered pieces of your life. The connection is immense.
What’s the main reason someone should really read this book?
If you have ever read Charles Bukowsky or any other confessional, post-modern poet, you will like this book. No Apologies won “Best Poetry Collection of 2014” in the City Weekly Arty Awards last year, so I think that’s a good reason to get it. Not good enough? How about this: if you ever wonder if you’re all alone, you should read this book. If you’ve ever felt ashamed or isolated in guilt or trauma or heartache, you need to read it. It shines a light in the darkest corners; it explores the profane, the ugly, the beautiful, the sexual, the life-giving and the shadows. It’s as human as it gets. You should read this book because I wrote it for you.