A Question and Answer Session Concerning the Future of this Substack
By Fyodor Boccaccio
I was able to record my interview with Ruben Bix while a guest on his yacht, Pogarth, as we sailed on an atmospheric river high above Northern California. The following conversation has been lightly edited for clarity and brevity.
Do you think it’s really safe to be up this high in a boat, Mr Bix?
Nothing to worry about. I’ve sailed on these atmospheric rivers for years. In fact, I used to come up here in the days when it was called a “Pineapple Express,” which is the name I still prefer.
But aren’t there bomb cyclones nearby?
We’ll go right up over the top of them! That’s the beauty of it. We might hear some distant explosions, but we’re perfectly safe at this altitude.
Explosions?!
It depends on which TV station you listen to, but lately I’m hearing about atomic, neutron, and bunker-buster bomb cyclones. It seems that Mother Nature is showing some militaristic tendencies that we never knew about.
Considering these natural explosives that surround us, it seems frivolous to discuss literature. I’m sorry, but won’t you take me back down?
Relax! The Chief Steward is bringing cocktails. I’m in the mood for a frank discussion about the relative merits of shaken or stirred, and what’s the best garnish for character-driven fiction!
It’s hard not to spill my drink with the boat listing like this… but I guess the obvious first question is: Now that you’ve finished posting your novel, what will you do with your substack site?
I started out in July thinking The Nature Preserve would be such a huge success that by now my adoring public would be clamoring to see more. I expected spontaneous demonstrations in the streets, and I felt the work itself would somehow evolve into the next great thing. I imagined people might be interested in reading some of my unpublished short stories. Or maybe I’d attempt some new and experimental writing. The reality is that it’s been such a hard slog to coax potential readers away from the plethora of shows and movies and audiobooks that stream through the electronic gadgetry that abounds in every household. I’m slightly less confident than I was before.
You’ve had a whole six months to grow this site. Do you think you could have made more of an effort?
To begin with I emailed every person I could think of, and quite a few I couldn’t think of. I started an Instagram. I tried to promote the novel on Reddit, did some promotional stuff on Linkedin. I hired an atypical guy to post chatty comments about my novel on Facebook groups. I tried to engage with the many uncongenial authors of other Substacks. I made a flier to put in cafes and other places around town. I gave out a little card to people I encountered at my day job where I rub elbows with all sorts of diverse people. Of those tactics, I think I picked up the most subscriptions from the Linkedin posts. I was pretty disappointed with all my forays into social media. I have almost no history of being active in social media so I tried to hire somebody knowledgeable to help me. The few people who answered my ad for a “social media maven” kept suggesting I needed to promote myself as opposed to the novel. I have no desire to do that.
It sounds like your “publishing adventure” didn’t exactly live up to your expectations.
Everything’s relative. I don’t want you to think I feel gloomy about this. I got a whole bunch of readers that otherwise I never would have found, and two or three have been supportive. Getting live feedback on chapters as they emerged was a very rewarding experience. I do wish more people had made more intelligent comments, but still— Look, a vulture! Can you believe it? A buzzard soaring at thirty-thousand feet!
As a writer who employs symbolism in your work, does the presence of a carrion bird make you at all uneasy?
Better than that goofy looking albatross who kept following me around the last couple of years.
I can imagine how that might have been tedious, but let me ask my original question more directly: Are you going to continue with your Substack site or not?
Right now, I’m thinking I will continue it but won’t be quite as active. I’m thinking of putting a new novel up on the site very soon.
A new novel? Isn’t that going to create more headaches in addition to everything you just told me?
Yes, probably. But note what I said before about how the work itself can point the way forward. I still think my work’s good enough to eventually get more attention and bigger, more robust, maybe even prime numbers.
I see…. What do you mean when you say you won’t be as active?
The Nature Preserve came out twice a week with a new illustration for every installment. I simply cannot keep up that sort of pace. I need to make a living. Pogarth’s hull is almost completely rusted out and she needs a major overhaul. I have other responsibilities as well. I kicked a lot of cans down the road over the last six months, Mr Boccaccio. I’m thinking I’ll release one new chapter per week now instead of two, and I’m very unlikely to do an illustration for each chapter. What are you looking at?
Those extremely dark clouds. I must insist you take me back down to earth, Mr Bix!
It’s in the nature of sailing the Pineapple Express that we’re only able to descend at certain locations. Our next opportunity is over a thousand miles away. Please try to just admire the view without becoming agitated.
I hope the “responsibilities” you speak of include getting me safely back to earth!
Calm down, Boccaccio. What’s the next question?
Your readers are used to getting eight or nine posts per month. Don’t you think they’ll give up on you when they see such a dip in production?
Would you care for another martini? See that big brass bell over there? Ring it please. Where is my Boatswain? Where’s my Steward? Will the readers give up on me? Is that what you asked? I guess I’ll find out. I have five chapters of the new novel in a fairly finished form and a few more chapters roughed out. I’m excited to see if people will like it. In the mean time we’re still waiting for our cocktails.
I’m assuming it’s a sequel?
No. It has nothing to do with The Nature Preserve.
Is it something you wrote while you were busy getting all those chapters out?
No. It’s something I started a few years ago and abandoned because I couldn’t figure out what the point of it was.
Well? Have you now figured out what the point is?
I’m not sure if that matters so much to me right now, but yes, in a vague sort of way, I see a theme emerging—and it’s something that might resonate with a lot of people.
It seems like you’re saying this is a serious work of literature or something.
‘Or something’ would be the correct category for this newest work.
What’s its genre?
I don’t know what its genre is. Frankly, I hate genres and I hate the idea of genres. I’ll simply say, this one’s more grounded in everyday life than The Nature Preserve was, but it’s also pretty absurd. Is absurdism allowed to be a genre?
I don’t know, but nothing gets published if you can’t say what the genre is.
I get that. Every genre is its own salt mine where writers go to labor. And agents always want to know which latest genre bestseller your work most resembles. It’s a wonder anything new or original ever arises these days.
Are you saying your new novel is somehow original?
It’s fashionable to say nothing’s original, but I guess I refuse to believe it. All I know is, when I started looking through my files—I have three partial novels on my old sputtering computer—Real Voices was the most original. It’s also the one I think I’ll enjoy working on the most.
Real Voices?
That’s the title: Real Voices.
What’s it about?
I’m going to let the reader decide what it’s about. I’ll simply say it takes place in San Francisco. Actually, it’s more like a pseudo San Francisco. There are San Francisco qualities but a number of things are different. I’m imagining people dressing in a way that isn’t quite what’s happening right now. I’m visualizing sidewalks denuded of turds and syringes. There will be taxicabs in my novel! A number of things are a bit off kilter and sort of visually stylized. I think there’s some really good characters in this one too. When I read it again recently, it was funnier than I remembered it being.
A crowd pleaser?
I don’t know. Probably some people won’t like it. Some people might be offended. There will be people who don’t get the humor. You know how it is. This was all true of the Nature Preserve too.
How will publishing an offensive novel help your cause?
I didn’t say it’s offensive! How can it be, since I’ve never had any intention of offending anyone? I simply said, some people might be a little put off. As you know, we live amongst people who seem to take a sort of irrational enjoyment in feeling offended. Plus, I’ve come to realize not everyone shares my sense of humor. Aren’t you going to drink that martini?
I’m afraid I don’t think I can with all this rocking. Plus, I’m feeling a little sea, I mean, air-sick.
It takes a few hours to get your atmospheric river legs. You’ll soon be right as rain.
How would you typify this humor you’re worried about?
I’m not worried! But I felt some people didn’t get the humor in The Nature Preserve, and this reminded me of when I used to go see David Lynch’s, Eraserhead, which is the only film I ever paid to watch six times. (It used to play at the midnight movies when I first lived in San Francisco.) Some people who went with me thought it was disgusting, a number of them thought it was stupid, while the whole time I was laughing out loud with tears running down my cheeks. But I hasten to say: Real Voices isn’t at all like Eraserhead. Real Voices is a totally different animal.
When will you start releasing Real Voices?
In a couple of weeks I think. Maybe sooner. I want the first three or four chapters to be as tight as I can make them before I start.
Is it going to be free?
I’m struggling to decide. It really bugs me that I’ve had so much trouble monetizing this website which, after all, is the point of being on Substack. I went back and forth on this issue for months. I set the prices at the lowest allowed amounts. Mere peanuts, Boccaccio! Still, every time I put up a paywall, my numbers plummeted. Everything’s free at the moment, but I’ve been sort of thinking I’ll put the paywall back up on The Nature Preserve, and make the new stuff free. But if this prevents me from gaining readers for The Nature Preserve I’ll be heartbroken. You see my quandary? I really don’t know how all these other Substackers do it! This paywall stuff tortures me. I sometimes wake up at four in the morning worrying about it.
You wake up at four in the morning worrying about your paywall and yet you sail a rusty boat through a climate catastrophe at 30-thousand feet?
Yeah. Because when people won’t take out a paid subscription, I think, maybe they’ve just signed up but aren’t actually reading anything. Or maybe they’re sort of just browsing my work because they want to be nice, or do me a favor or something. I realized I don’t really care if people like me. I don’t care if they like me or hate my guts, but I really do care if they like my work! It’s a pretty infantile attitude I guess. Something about my mother I suppose. Or my kindergarten teacher. Or possibly it’s related to something that happened pre-childhood that I can’t remember.
It sounds like you’re overthinking it, Mr Bix.
It’s either what I said, or that some of my friends are actually very cheap. But look at that! A Black-chinned Hummingbird came all the way up here to buzz your lemon twist! Where are you going? Please don’t leave! Did I remember to tell you our nautical toilet has a pedal flush mechanism? Up to fill. Down to flush! It’s pre-digital technology—the sort of thing that can be kind of amazing once you get used to it.
"Don't bend; don't water it down; don't try to make it logical; don't edit your own soul according to the fashion. Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly."
— Franz Kafka
It seems that you follow this creed whether you were aware of it or not. It might take awhile for recognition, but nobody ever said it was going to be easy. Hell, if you can launch a yacht into an atmospheric river, the sky's the limit!
A new novel coming soon? Of an uncertain genre? Possibly offensive? Hurray!