AE: I was always writing poems and short stories. I met my soon-to-be-ex-husband here, while he was in graduate school at UT for the film program. I started writing movies for him that he shot while he was in the program. And we actually co-directed one of them.
AC: Wow.
AE: Yeah, not a good idea. Actually, though, that was probably our best film, but still not a good idea. But that was my first experience with the form. Then I went to graduate school for fiction writing.
AC: How did you make the transition from short stories to a novel?
AE: Well, I didn't want to. I only did it because my agent told me to. He said, "If you want to have a serious career, you can't just write short stories." I didn't like it. I did not like writing that novel. It was depressing. I don't even think three years is that long, but to me, that seemed like forever. I just found it daunting. All these characters. You can't drop the ball, you have to keep everybody's storyline moving along. You have to figure out who they are. I had some idea of who they were, but there were a lot of people to figure out. And you have to have a plot. You have to make something happen, and you have to be relaxed enough that all you're doing is character stuff and letting plot grow directly out of it.
My husband was my editor; he's an amazing editor. Even after we separated, he stayed committed to it. He was a great cheerleader. We had developed this language, this way to edit, and he would know when to cheerlead and when it was time to come in and say [that something was off]. This is the worst thing about losing my best editor. He would know when I had taken a wrong turn and he would say, it's right here, and you have to get back to it. I would do anything that David said because I trusted him so much.
The thing that's hard right now is I don't have that, so I take a lot more wrong turns. I knew I was cheating to have someone who knows that much about my stuff and can tell me when I've f*cked up. So now I have to take many more breaks from the work. I have to get constant distance. If there's a problem, I take three days off. That never would have happened before. I don't like it. I like to be more productive. But in a way I think it's better for me. I'm older. I can't work like I used to. I would write eight hours a day -- he worked full time to allow me to write full time. I can't keep that schedule anymore. Well, you relax. You build your career. The career is built. It's started, and then you can relax a little bit. Though I feel busier now than ever.
AC: The novel expands on themes that you wrote about in your short stories: coming age, ending up in the wrong relationship, or getting into relationships for the wrong reasons. But with one exception, "Bikini," you don't write about being an Arab American and that experience. What made you want to turn to that theme for Towelhead?
AE: Well, I only had one idea for a novel. I had always had this idea, this what-if scenario. My mother did send us to live with our father in Houston when I was eleven and my brother was nine. Not for the reason in the book...she was having difficulty and she thought he would do a good job. I think he was really overwhelmed by parenting. He had a very important new job, which is why he was in Houston, and he just didn't do a good job. It just didn't go well. So she came down and got us around Christmas time. We thought she was just coming for a visit, and we wanted to go home; I especially did. So she said one night, "Do you want to move back home?" And I just started crying. I couldn't believe it. I didn't know she was going to do that. I said, "Daddy won't let you take us back." And she just said, "Oh, Daddy."
She was never afraid of him. I was terrified of him. I was jealous that she wasn't afraid of him. I wanted to be like her and not be afraid of this man. I mean, they could fight and she would yell at him. He wasn't someone who hit women. He hit kids. He punished kids by hitting them. Predominately me. He rarely hit my brother. I don't know if he ever did. I don't know if that was a girl thing or if it was because I was the older child and he thought I should have been more responsible in certain ways.
So then we went back with her and as an adult I always would wonder, how would I have turned out if I had stayed living with him? The what-if scenario is this idea, what if I'd stayed living with him? It seemed meaty. It seemed like something I could really do something with. And that was it. I didn't have another idea. I don't know that I have an idea now. I might, but I don't know.
