Mark Connelly was born in Philadelphia and grew up in New Jersey. He received a BA in English from Carroll College in Wisconsin and an MA and PhD from the University of
Wisconsin-Milwaukee. His books include The Diminished Self:
Orwell and the Loss of Freedom, Orwell and Gissing, Deadly
Closets: The Fiction of Charles Jackson, and The IRA on
Film and Television. His fiction has appeared in The
Ledge, Indiana Review, Cream City Review, Milwaukee Magazine, and Home Planet
News. In 2014 he received an Editor’s Choice Award in The
Carve’s Raymond Carver Short Story Contest; in 2015 he received Third Place in Red Savina Review’s
Albert Camus Prize for Short Fiction. His novella Fifteen Minutes received
the Clay Reynolds Novella Prize and was published by Texas Review Press in
2005.
Mark’s latest book is the literary fiction/humor/satire,
Wanna-be’s.
About the Book:
With his new girlfriend – a soccer
mom with a taste for bondage – urging him to “go condo,” failed screenwriter
Winfield Payton needs cash. Accepting a job offer from a college friend, he becomes
the lone white employee of a black S&L. As the firm’s token white, he poses
as a Mafioso to intimidate
Praise for
Wanna-be’s:
This book right here! What can I
say about Winfield Payton...is he the most unlucky pasty or most unlikely fall
guy...what a schmuck...I laughed so hard at this,for this guy....with this
guy....every character described in this book will immediately remind you of a
real life joker in the in the 24 hour news cycle on all of the Major networks
and cable television channels regurgitating skewed facts benefiting them and
lining their pockets....it's hip and fresh writing which could easily become a
HBO series....or Starz..maybe..anyway get this book....I laughed so
hard...almost popping my recent stitches from surgery...Mr. Connelly...thanks
for making my recuperation fun...this book is not for the faint of heart..or PC
sensitive readers...
-- Lynda Garcia Review
For More Information
Thanks for this interview, Mark. Can we begin by having you tell us about
yourself from a writer’s standpoint?
I began writing
poems and short stories in high school but did not get anything
published until
I was in college. I love writing
fiction, but have mostly published
academic books –
textbooks and literary criticism. I have
published books about
George Orwell,
Saul Bellow, and the IRA on film. But my
first love is still fiction.
When not writing, what do you like to do for relaxation
and/or fun?
Work out,
travel, read, watch good films.
Congratulations on your new book! Can you give us the very
first page of your book so that we can get a glimpse inside?
INSIGNIFICANT
OTHERS
Winfield Payton awoke to a mother’s
voice. Not his mother—but someone’s
mother. It was the commanding yet compassionate voice mothers develop, stern
but apprehensive. It was a voice rarely
heard in Downer Estates, a brick apartment complex housing the usual collection
of upscale “singles” who live within Frisbee range of urban universities,
attend jazz concerts in the park, practice safe sex, drive alphabet cars (BMWs,
SUVs, VWs), cybersex on company laptops, faithfully recycle Perrier bottles,
and sip low-cal cappuccino in Starbucks while
checking the fates of their mutual funds.
It was a suburban voice, a beach voice, a picnic
voice. The voice of a concerned mother
directing her brood. “Now, look, Brandy,
I told you before. Mommy will be home in
just a little while. You can have
cereal. Where is Heather? OK, tell Heather to give
you some raisin bran.
Take your vitamin. And don’t go near
the pool until I get back. Do you understand? Don’t go swimming until Mommy
comes home.”
As
yet Win had not opened his eyes; he was too exhausted. Confronting daylight would be painful. Feeling the……
Would you say it’s been a rocky road for you in regards
to getting your book written and published or pretty much smooth sailing? Can you tell us about your journey?
Wanna-be’s started as a series of
related short stories featuring Winfield Payton,
a classic
fall guy hero in a satirical send-up.
Payton is a mashup of Fitzgerald’s
Pat Hobby,
Bellow’s Augie March, and Larry David’s Curb
Your Enthusiasm
character. Like Winfield, I was
briefly the lone white employee in a black
enterprise. As the company’s
“chicklet” – or token white – I had some amusing
experiences
I thought could be exaggerated and expanded into a satire about our
wanna-be
culture. I added more stories until I
thought I had enough for a book.
After the
first story was published in a magazine, I realized I could reorganize the
stories to
form chapters in a novel. Although there
is a single narrative plot, each
chapter can
stand alone like an episode in a TV series, something my first
reviewer
remarked on.
If you had to summarize your book in one sentence, what
would that be?
Whether we
want to admit it or not, all of us are wanna-be’s.
What makes your book stand out from the rest?
It does not
avoid being politically incorrect. It
takes on all the stereotypes and
plays them
for laughs. Insightful laughs I
hope.
If your book was put in the holiday section of the store,
what holiday would that be and why?
Halloween. Everyone in the book is wearing a mask
whether they know it or not.
Would you consider turning your book into a series or has
that already been done?
I’m already
concocting new adventures for Winfield Payton with titles like “Too
Much
Information,” “It’s Complicated,” and “Friends w/o Benefits.” I want to
explore new
themes and take him to a broader landscape.
What’s next for you?
I’m working on
a novel called Newman’s Choice. It’s a departure from Wanna-be’s
because it a serious literary
book. Three parts of it have been
published, so I am
anxious to
complete it.
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