Undressing the Moon

by T. Greenwood

  11. Discuss the use of music in the novel as well.

  12. Why do you think Piper blamed Mr. Hammer when Jake was the one who really raped her? In the end, was telling Quinn the truth atonement enough for that lie? Talk about Piper’s breast cancer as a symbol or manifestation of the guilt she’s carried.

  13. What is the significance of the widow for whom Piper is making a wedding dress? What does Piper learn from her?

  14. Why do you think Piper didn’t ultimately go looking for her mother once she found out where she lived? Would you have sought her out if you were in that position? Should Piper have let her back into her life when she attempted to make contact?

  15. What do you think happens to Piper after the book ends?

  A CONVERSATION WITH T. GREENWOOD

  What was your inspiration for writing Undressing the Moon? Which idea came first, Piper’s mother leaving, or her breast cancer?

  I actually wanted to write a contemporary version of “Hansel and Gretel.” It was a story that terrified me when I was young. The idea of two children being left alone to fend for themselves in the woods was unnerving. And so that is how it began, but then there was another voice that kept interrupting. It took awhile, but what I realized was that it was Piper, years later. There was an urgency to her voice, and so I listened.

  For that matter, all of your books include characters with tragic backstories. Does their past usually influence their present, or do you write their history to inform their current story?

  I think that we are all defined, to a certain extent, by our childhoods. My childhood memories are so vivid: the tragedies as well as the happy times. I am who I am because of the sorrows I suffered as a kid as well as the bliss. Fictional characters are no different. I almost never write about adult characters without understanding where it is that they came from. What haunts them.

  Why did you choose to make Piper such a young woman dealing with cancer? Did you consider making her older? Was it hard to imagine, as a young woman yourself, what it would be like?

  I wrote this novel when I was thirty years old, and I kept imagining what I would do if all of a sudden there was no such thing as a future. I actually experienced a minor health scare at the time, and my own future was, if briefly, uncertain. I was rattled by this, and it made me think about a lot of things that might be going through a young woman’s mind as she, essentially, prepares to die.

  The mother-daughter relationship is prominent in many of your books, but probably not as much as it is in Undressing the Moon. Why do you think that dynamic is such rich fodder for you?

  I think that the mother-daughter relationship is one of the most wonderfully complex relationships there is. My mother has been a prominent and positive force in my life, and we have maintained a strong relationship over the course of my entire life. In my fiction I really like to explore what happens when there are breaks or fissures in this relationship. I had not had my daughters when I wrote Undressing the Moon. The Hungry Season is actually the first novel that examines this relationship from the mother’s side of the fence.

  Many of your books take place at the fictional Lake Gormlaith. Why do you keep going back there? Is it based on a place you know well? Do you plan to revisit it anytime soon in future novels?

  Lake Gormlaith was originally based on a real place in northeastern Vermont where I grew up. My grandfather and his father built a cabin (“camp”) on a pond there in the 1940s. It is still in our family, and we spend our summers there. However, over the course of four novels, Lake Gormlaith has taken on a life of its own. It is as real to me as any true geographical location. I’ll always go back to our camp on the pond, and I suspect I’ll always go back to Lake Gormlaith.

  Talk a little about your writing process. Do you have a routine? A specific place you go to write, or a particular time of day that’s more productive? Do you listen to music or prefer quiet?

  I usually ruminate about an idea for a long time (months, even years) before I begin to write. But I like to write the first draft of a novel rather quickly. Undressing the Moon was written in five weeks. This Glittering World took six. Then comes the long, slow process of revision.

  In terms of where and when … because I have two little girls, I write wherever and whenever I can. I like to get up early when the house is quiet and write until someone needs me. Then I leave my document open so I can return to it whenever I get time. I have a lovely little office, and I like it quiet. Now that both of my girls are in school, there’s a lot more of that than there used to be.

  Undressing the Moon is your third published book, originally released in 2002. How has your writing evolved since then, in your more recent novels Two Rivers, The Hungry Season, and the upcoming This Glittering World?

  My first three novels were all written from the first-person point of view of a female narrator. In the subsequent novels I have utilized a male narrator and rotating third-person narrators. I like to give myself a challenge with each novel. I wanted a sweeping historical scope and a complex narrator in Two Rivers. I wanted to explore the central theme of hunger in The Hungry Season. And in This Glittering World, I wanted to write a tragedy. My hope is that I am growing as a writer with each subsequent book, and that I am not some sort of complacent one-trick pony.

  Is there a particular book of yours that you enjoyed writing more than the others or that has a subject to which you felt more of a personal connection? Were any of them easier to write? More difficult?

  Two Rivers was the most difficult. The male narrator was demanding, the research was extensive, the plot was complicated, and I had two very small children at the time. But I loved writing it, and I am proud of it because of its ambition. But Undressing the Moon and This Glittering World were both these magical books that almost seemed to write themselves.

  Your books tend to deal with serious topics, such as cancer, rape, and Mr. Hammer’s inappropriate relationship with Piper in Undressing the Moon; Munchausen’s by Proxy in Nearer Than the Sky; racial tension in Two Rivers; and eating disorders in The Hungry Season. Yet you deal with them all very sensitively and explore them through the eyes of relatable characters. What spurs you to tackle such profound ideas?

  A reviewer once referred to me, somewhat snidely, as “family damage specialist, T. Greenwood.” I thought that was funny, like something I could hang on my office door. But if you’re writing about people, you are also always writing about families (of some sort or another). And who wants to read about happy families? I don’t. I want to read about struggle, about people who both love and hate each other, people who fight and hurt and then embrace each other.

  The very nature of narrative is that there needs to be conflict. Problems. Trouble. I simply figure out what my characters’ problems are and then see them through them.

  If you could go back and do revisions on Undressing the Moon, would you change anything? What?

  I wouldn’t change anything. I can’t change anything. When you publish, you let go. The last brushstroke was already made. (I actually don’t reread my older novels because I’m afraid of this.)

  Has having kids changed the way you write or the themes of your books?

  Yes and no. I think being a parent has changed my perspective on the world in too many ways to count. And that will naturally affect my writing.

  In terms of the way I write … I think they have taught me that writing only when I am inspired is a luxury I no longer can afford. They have taught me a work ethic, a perspiration over inspiration mentality. I write around their lives, around their needs. If I want to be a writer, this flexibility is necessary.

  Have you ever reread your old books? If so, what do you think of them now?

  I have, and it was a mistake. It’s like looking at artwork you did in high school. All I can see are the flaws. It’s embarrassing.

  Who are your favorite authors, past and present? Does reading their work influence yours at all?

  Dorothy Allison, Miranda Beverl
y-Whittemore, Chris Bohjalian, Michael Chabon, Dan Chaon, Marguerite Duras, Louise Erdrich, Mary Gaitskill, Jane Hamilton, Kathryn Harrison, Ursula Hegi, Alice Hoffman, John Irving, Mary Karr, Jim Kokoris, Barbara Kingsolver, Wally Lamb, Toni Morrison, Howard Frank Mosher, Anaïs Nin, Flannery O’Connor, Tom Perrotta, Richard Russo, J. D. Salinger, Scott Spencer, Virginia Woolf … just a handful of the many, many writers who have influenced me as a writer (and a person) over the years.

  What are you working on now?

  This Glittering World, my next book, comes out in January 2011. Beyond that, I have a few projects simmering on various back burners, but I am most compelled right now by a sort of contemporary Isaac and Abraham story. I’ve only written the climactic scene. I don’t know what leads up to it, or what will happen after.