Author spotlight: Eugen Bacon

I'm super excited to have Eugen Bacon stop by my blog for a quick chat. Some of you may have heard that her novel Inside the Dreaming is releasing soon. So, here goes!

You have a Tweet length to tell the world about your writing (280 characters) – and go!  

Curious, playful, provocative, poetic, cross-genre, cross-cultural. Text shapes my silence. It shouts my chaos. I feel safe when interrogating complex and unsettling themes. My approach to the compositional space is with a sense of urgency where writing is an active speaking from a place of knowing, or unknowing.

If you think about what has led you to becoming a writer, what are some of the key milestones that stand out?

A love for text from an early age—how and why stories: why the zebra… / how the crocodile… / when the hyena… / what the monkey… 

My father, the values he instilled in me, and a wonder about things beyond comprehension. 

A deep fondness for musicality in text, hence my attraction to Toni Morrison. 

Doing a PhD in writing and discovering literary theorist Roland Barthes, who found pleasure in the text; uncovering features of the ‘rhizome’ that philosopher Gilles Deleuze and his collaboration with psychoanalyst Felix Guattari produced in A Thousand Plateaus (1987), where the rhizome ‘has no beginning or end; it is always in the middle, between things, interbeing, intermezzo’. I see rhizomes every which way in my text: deviation, plateaus, interconnection. A distortion that is whole. 

Which cultural objects have resulted in massive ‘aha’ moments for you? 

Drums. Folklore. Spirits. Masks. A close affinity with water, nature, language, rhythm.

When I write, I read text out loud—how it sounds, what is sees, the shape of its flow is important. It’s like a ditty in my head, I just know when it feels right. 

In your own work, do you ever indulge in intertextuality?

Yes. There’s a deep connection between texts, hence my crossing genre and writing across forms. Mine is a betwixt kind of writing. Perhaps that’s why I’ve taken naturally to prose poetry—literary vignettes on the everyday, the cousin of a poem and flash fiction, words and imagery enmeshed in art and metaphor. 

I learnt balance from Barthes, for whom text is a multi-dimensional space where things are made and unmade, where language is infinite, and literature deepens or extends language. 

Do you hope your writing sparks change in your readers, and if so, what would you like to see?

I like to think of the author as an agent of change—if not for the world, for themselves. I borrowed an understanding of the power of literature from existentialists like Simone de Beauvoir, who understood how a story and its characters interact with each other—how they are a bridge to inside out: an author or reader’s self-understanding and experience of the world they live in, or are creating. 

Inside the Dreaming is releasing via NewCon Press in December. You have no more than a 100 words to tell someone who's never heard of you or your book before what it's all about and why they should read it.

There are multiple points of intersection in blackness. Inside the Dreaming is an African Australian story, black speculative fiction that’s a murder mystery and an origins tale. Ivory Tembo, the detective assigned to the case, has secrets of her own that make her uniquely qualified to face a killer that’s far more than human. And it’s linked to the death of a man with twin souls, wrath of the gods, a new habitat. This origins story is about finding who you are. It’s a fiction that’s literary and cultural. A speculative tale that is a mystery and a history.

Bio:
Eugen Bacon is African Australian, a computer scientist mentally re-engineered into creative writing.  Her work has won, been shortlisted, longlisted or commended in national and international awards, including the Bridport Prize, Copyright Agency Prize, Ron Hubbard's Writers of the Future Award, Australian Shadows Awards, Ditmar Awards and Nommo Award for Speculative Fiction by Africans. Her creative work has appeared in literary and speculative fiction publications worldwide, and 2020 sees the release of two prose poetry chapbooks, three collections and a novella—Inside the Dreaming by NewCon Press, UK.

Featured author: Maria Imbalzano

Today's featured author is Maria Imbalzano, who's here to tell us a little bit more about herself and her novel, Unchained Memories (for which there's an excerpt at the end of this blog post). Welcome, Maria, and over to you!

I was born in Trenton, NJ , in the heart of Chambersburg, the Italian section of town. My father was a barber and my mother, a State employee, who also taught me to jitterbug at the tender age of four. We loved to dance in the living room while watching American Bandstand. Hardly star material, but I was driven nonetheless.

The product of a Catholic School education, I learned the basics, and took for granted  I would be successful doing something, even if it entailed cutting hair. I attended Rutgers University as a psychology major, but after three years decided I liked political science better.

My first job led me to Manhattan where I worked as a paralegal for four years before attending Fordham University School of Law. There I learned to think like a lawyer, write like a lawyer, and speak like a lawyer, all while living like a pauper in the city of my dreams. Living in New York City, albeit on a tight budget, allowed me to indulge my love of ballet, art museums, and theater. Did you know you could walk into a theater after intermission and no one checks your ticket? I enjoyed the second half of many plays as well as ballets.

My love of reading dates back to my childhood when I would borrow at least four books from the library every week. During the summer, I would sit in the house and read, until my mother, totally frustrated, would send me outside to play and lock me out. I always found my way back in.

However, I must confess, I hated to write. In every English and writing class throughout college, I dreaded trying to be creative. As a friend from law school so aptly put it, “The reason why we’re here is because we don’t have a creative bone in our bodies.” I agreed.

Despite my dislike of creative writing back then, I embraced legal writing, and was first published in Volume 5 of the Fordham International Law Journal. My article was entitled “In re Mackin: Is the Application of the Political Offense Exception an Extradition Issue for the Judicial or Executive Branch?” I would advise you against reading it, for you will surely fall asleep.

Following law school, I returned to central New Jersey and took a job at a local law firm, where I have been a partner for many years. My area of practice is divorce, and while emotions run high and clients are living through the worst time of their lives, I find the practice very satisfying.  In addition to litigation,  I have added mediation and collaborative divorce to my repertoire, which are much more civil ways of dealing with issues in family law cases.

In addition to practicing law and raising two daughters, I’ve been working towards my second career.  Memoranda of Law and Legal Briefs, although fascinating, pale in comparison to writing romance/women’s fiction. So how does one transition from divorce lawyer by day to romance writer by night? That’s the beauty of having two distinct passions.

Blurb: 
As a rising medical malpractice attorney, Charlotte Taylor believes in standing up for the injured, giving them a voice, and advocating for their rights. She couldn't do it for her mother, so she does it for others, even if it means losing the love of her life.

Dr. Clayton Montgomery believes in working hard and playing even harder, until he reconnects with Charlotte. Barely noticing her crush when he tutored her ten years ago, Clay has a chance to make up for lost time when the beautiful lawyer comes back into town...until he discovers her chosen career path.

Now, philosophical differences soon become a reality and Charlotte is faced with the choice of representing a client against the hospital and against Clay. Will Charlotte give up her career and her tribute to her mother for a second chance with the man who got away?

Find Unchained Memories on Amazon, or check out Maria's website. Follower her on Twitter, like her on Facebook, and friend her on Goodreads.

EXCERPTRed. Hot. Sexy.
Like magnets, Clay’s eyes clicked on Charlotte, unable to repel the force holding them. Her chestnut hair was held up in a loose, sexy do that had him itching to pull the pins to release it. Her strapless dress showcased a long neck and creamy shoulders that called out to be kissed. His involuntary focus on her lovely traits throughout the evening had made him a rude dinner companion; unable to answer even the easiest of questions.
He had come here tonight to socialize with the powers that be at the hospital, to talk up the ER, to lay the groundwork for future requests. But his concentration had been directed elsewhere. Since he’d squandered his opportunity to network, he should leave. But here he was at the bar at ten-thirty, waiting for a scotch and soda. The band was heavily into their Motown set and many of the revelers packed the dance floor.
Across the room, Clay zeroed in on Charlotte talking to a group of men, her red gown like a flame in a sea of black. He smiled. She sure knew how to turn heads. His included.
But he knew her better than those clowns. He knew the sweet, tough eighteen-year-old who’d lost her parents within hours of each other. The broken girl whose emotional health had worried Dr. Collins, their Chief of Surgery, much more than her physical wounds.
As the band segued into a slow song, Clay covered the distance between them. “Excuse us, gentlemen, but the lady promised me a dance, and I’d like to claim it now.” He deposited his drink on an empty table and guided her toward the dance floor.
“I don’t recall promising you a dance.” Her beautiful face held the hint of a smile.
“You don’t? I must have dreamed it.”
He pulled her into his embrace, and moved with the music around the floor, feeling like one of the luckiest men there. Although she hadn’t promised anything, she glided around the room, following his lead. Her perfume intoxicated him more than any drink ever could, and the  movement of her graceful body against his had his heart palpitating.
Little Charley Taylor had certainly grown up, and he couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like to know her now. As an adult. Ten years removed from the time their lives had intersected.