Interview with Chris Bohjalian, Author of Skeletons at the Feast

Chris Bohjalian sent out an email a few days ago to announce that this Sunday his latest novel, Skeletons At the Feast, is set to debut on the New York Times Bestseller List. Set during the final six months of WWII the book features a small group of travelers whose rank includes a Prussian aristocrat, a Scottish prisoner and a corporal with a secret past. Click here to read an excerpt from the book.

In light of the success of Chris Bohjalian's Skeletons At the Feast, I thought it might be interesting to present the Loaded Questions interview I did with Chris a year ago.

Kelly Hewitt: In doing some research about you I recently stumbled across "Idyll Banter" a column that you have been writing for the Burlington Free Press in Vermont for the last thirteen years. (The column has been turned into a book of essays that shares the same name...) Despite not having ever set foot in Vermont I found the columns very interesting. Would you share a bit with our readers about what "Idyll Banter" is about? How has it changed over the years?

Chris Bohjalian: Actually, I have been writing the column since February 1992. We are approaching the start of my 16th year.

"Idyll Banter" began as the ruminations of an idiot flandlander who moved directly from Brooklyn to a village of barely a thousand people in rural Vermont. The town in which I live sits halfway up Vermont's third highest mountain.

Over the decade and a half I have been writing the column, however, it has evolved into a chronicle of what I have learned as a father, a husband, and a resident of a community so small that you simply have to take responsibility for how you live your life and the footprint you leave on the planet.

That sounds a tad crunchy, a tad sensitive. Its true. But the column is also a reasonably funny 19 column inches each week. In the last month, for example, my columns have addressed why my wife and I went to see "Jackass 2;" how wistful fall is for everyone -- not just James Blunt; why one woman lives for Halloween and black vinyl; and why the ladies room is such a mystery to men.

To read it weekly, simply visit the front page of my website, www.christbohjalian.com or the Burlington Free Press.

The Columns are also brought to life periodically on the Hallmark Station's "New Morning" program weekdays at 7 a.m. To see the filmed version of "Idyll Banter", simply turn on the speakers to your computer and click here.

Kelly: A couple of profiles of you I have read have painted you as a neat-freak who can't help but write perfectly thought out and tidy novels. Does that ring true? If so, what is your biggest pet peeve as far as neatness goes?

Chris: Yes, I am very neat. Very tidy. I detest clutter, and I simply have to have an immaculate desk and an immaculate library to be productive.

I control the clutter in my library. Alas, I do not control the clutter -- at least with the same draconian vigilance -- in my family's cars. And so I think my biggest "neat freak" pet peeve is the way people view cars as really big knapsacks in which you just toss anything.

Kelly: You are an author who spends a great deal of time researching the subject of your novel. You spent time with transsexuals and their families for "Tran-Sister Radio", learned about the beliefs of gun rights activists for "Before You Know Kindness" and witnessed the birth of a baby for "Midwives". What sort of research went into your new novel, "The Double Bind"? Can you tell us a bit about the new novel?

Chris: "The Double Bind" had its origins in December 2003, when Rita Markley, the executive director of Burlington, Vermont's Committee on Temporary Shelter, shared with me the contents of a box of old photographs. The black-and-white images had been taken by a once-homeless man who had died in the studio apartment her organization had found for him. His name was Bob “Soupy” Campbell.

The photos were remarkable, both because of the man’s evident talent and because of the subject matter. I recognized the performers – musicians, comedians, actors – and newsmakers in many of them. Most of the photos were at least forty years old. We were all mystified as to how Campbell had gone from photographing luminaries from the 1950s and 1960s to winding up at a homeless shelter in northern Vermont. He had no surviving family we were aware of that we could ask.

The reality, of course, is that Campbell probably wound up homeless for any one of the myriad of reasons that most transients wind up on the streets: mental illness. Substance abuse. Bad luck.

I was profoundly moved by the work he left behind, and was inspired to write a novel. The new book is about a young social worker who works with the homeless, the elderly photographer she befriends before he dies, and the images he left behind. In the novel (versus in reality), the social worker realizes the photos are the link both to her childhood on Long Island, the old Jay Gatsby estate (which has since become a swim and tennis club in the 80-plus years since the bootlegger's death), and a violent crime in northern Vermont with which the social worker is all too familiar. The book is a bit of a thriller.

My sense is that we tend to stigmatize the homeless and blame them for their plight. We are oblivious to the fact that most had lives as serious as our own before everything fell apart. And so, long after I had finished the novel, I decided to explore the possibility of incorporating some of Campbell's work into the final book.

Consequently, there are 12 of Campbell's actual photos woven into the fictional text. Obviously, Bobbie Crocker, the homeless photographer in this novel is fictitious. But the photographs you will see in The Double Bind are real.

To see Campbell's photos and read an excerpt from The Double Bind, click here.

Kelly: Maybe you get asked this a lot and if so, so I'm sorry, but what is like to be the author of a book selected by Oprah? Some readers are turned off by the Oprah book club but it seems to like its a way to get people reading and literacy is always a good thing. Did the experience change you as an author?

Chris: Unlike some authors selected for Oprah's Book Club, I was never conflicted. I don't think anyone has done as much to remind people of the great pleasures to be found in a book as Oprah Winfrey.

And I have always been honored to be on a list with the likes of Ernest Gaines and Alice Hoffman and Joyce Carol Oates and Andre Dubus III and Toni Morrison and Sue Miller.

Kelly: Does your last name get misspelled often? If so, what kind of strange concoctions do telemarketers come up with?

Chris: My favorite? Crystal Jellian.

Kelly: What are some of your favorite books and authors?

Chris: A lot of books -- probably no surprise there. And I have at least 42 different editions of books by or about Scott Fitzgerald.

Loaded Questions: "World Without End" author Ken Follet

Eighteen years ago Ken Follett wrote a 1,000 page novel based the building of a great cathedral in 12th century Europe, The Pillars of Earth . It was a change of pace from the thrillers that he had written in the past. After the The Pillars of Earth Follett Ken went back to writing the mystery and thrillers that he had previously been known for. Over the years, though, his book based in medieval England continued to sell and grow via word of mouth. It became so popular that people were constantly asking for more. As of a little more than two weeks ago, Ken Follett's sizeable book that could has become an Oprah Book Club selection.

Ironically enough, Oprah's selection came just weeks after Ken had responded to the many requests of his readers to provide a sequel to The Pillars of the Earth, and so we have World Without End. The place is the same, the town of Kingsbridge, but two centuries have passed. The beautiful Gothic Cathedral built in the first book has become a place solely for the elite and wealthy. World Without End has been receiving praise from fans and reviewers alike. I am happy to present, Loaded Questions with Ken Follett.

World Without End by KEN FOLLETT
Oct. 2007, 1024 pages, $35.00



Kelly Hewitt: World Without End takes readers back to the same setting that you wrote about in The Pillars of the Earth but two hundred years later making it, in many ways, a sequel. Some of your readers have noted that World Without End can also be approached as an independent stand-alone novel. Do you think that's the case? What familiar settings, characters, and themes can fans of the first book look to find in the second book?

Ken Follett: World Without End is set in Kingsbridge, the fictional town that is the focus of The Pillars of the Earth. Readers will recognise the cathedral, of course, and the monastery next to it, plus the main streets and the river. The neighbouring town of Shiring may be familiar, and the Earl's seat, Earlscastle. However this story takes place 200 years later, so none of the characters are the same. Nevertheless they are the descendants of characters in Pillars, and sometimes retain inherited characteristics that readers with good memories may recall.

Kelly: It has just been announced that Oprah Winfrey has chosen The Pillars of the Earth as her next book club selection. It is a major success and a tribute to the continued increase in the popularity of this book. What does if feel like to find out that Oprah has selected your book?

Ken: I'm thrilled that The Pillars of the Earth has been selected for Oprah's Book Club. Oprah is a unique cultural leader who has a special place in the hearts of people all over the world, and I have enormous respect for what she has achieved. Her endorsement will bring my work to the attention of her many millions of fans, and for that I am very grateful.

Kelly: You have written some very strong female characters in World Without End. I read another interview in which you said that women largely paid lip service to men in the medieval period and still served in merchant, religious and leadership roles. This English historian in me thought, "Exactly!" How much time have you dedicated to the study of history in the 14th century? Is there a particular piece of history that appeals more to you?

Ken: I have been an amateur enthusiast of medieval history for about 30 years. What interests me most is the building of the great cathedrals--although that interest has led me to study many other aspects of medieval life including, as you note, the role of women.


Kelly: You have written historical novels but have written even more successful thrillers. How does the process of writing the historical novels vs. thrillers differ? Do you intend to return to writing thrillers after having written World Without End?

Ken: A thriller is like a snapshot of a group of a characters taken at a moment in their lives when they are in great danger. A novel like World Without End tells the entire life story of each major character, from childhood to old age. The main difference is that there is so much more that has to be invented!

Kelly: Was there any nervousness on your behalf when it came to World Without End being touted as the biggest sequel of the year?

Ken: I was nervous about writing WWE, because of readers' high expectations. By the time it was published, it had been read and enjoyed by enough people to calm my fears.

Kelly: Is there another historical era or a particular historical character that you could ever see yourself writing another novel about?

Ken: I'm sure I will return to the Second World War. It is still the war we look back on as the great battle of good and evil. There are thousands more stories of real-life heroism to inspire writers such as I.

Kelly: Your two big novels Pillars of the Earth and World Without End are called "epics" do you think that's an accurate way of describing them?

Ken: "Epic" is a word I would take as a compliment!