Editor’s Note: This exchange is part of a series of brief interviews with emerging writers of recent or forthcoming books. If you enjoyed it, please visit other interviews in the I’ve Got Questions feature.
- What’s the title of your book? Fiction? Nonfiction? Poetry? Who is the publisher and what’s the publication date?
The book is called Possible Happiness, and it’s a coming-of-age novel being published by Regal House Publishing on September 10, 2024. It’s available for pre-order now!
- In a couple of sentences, what’s the book about?
Here it is in one sentence: A loner teen accidentally unlocks a social life with his sense of humor—but can he unlock meaningful happiness that way, too, or will he first have to face and understand himself?
- What’s the book’s genre (for fiction and nonfiction) or primary style (for poetry)?
My publisher tells me that the book is Young Adult (YA) fiction, but I originally wrote it with a grownup audience in mind—so anyone in high school or beyond could handle (and hopefully enjoy) it.
- What’s the nicest thing anyone has said about the book so far?
Maybe I’ll nominate a comment from a reviewer on LitPick, who wrote: “I love everything about this book.” I mean, that’s pretty good, right? Although I also loved the starred Booklist review that called Possible Happiness “a beautiful coming-of-age novel with a highly empathic, multidimensional character who comes alive on the page. The mood and tone are spot on, contributing to a memorable reading experience.”
- What book or books is yours comparable to or a cross between? [Is your book like Moby Dick or maybe it’s more like Frankenstein meets Peter Pan?]
The emotional landscape is kind of like the one in Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower, but with more humor—like adding several dollops of J.D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye?
- Why this book? Why now?
That’s a great question. After all, the book is set in 1989, so it’s not exactly timely, right? Unless it is. I mean, I wrote this book now because now was when I was able to tell the story—sometimes you have to have some distance to be able to tell a story. But along the way I found myself exploring things that remain important today, the only difference being that we have more language to talk about those things today. Specifically: mental health, race, and class, all of which infuse Jacob’s story even if he can’t find words for what he’s seeing.
- Other than writing this book, what’s the best job you’ve ever had?
In my first I’ve Got Questions interview I talked about the pleasures of my very first job, which involved wrestling opossums out of cages, and in my second interview I talked about the joy of teaching and helping others with their teaching. Those are probably my best answers, but, to keep things interesting, this time I’ll mention the string of temp jobs I did in my early 30s. The work was not exciting or even particularly interesting, but usually I was able to do my tasks quickly and then have time left over, sitting in front of a computer. And so those jobs actually left room for a fair amount of writing—much more than meaningful work does.
- What do you want readers to take away from the book?
I guess I’m hoping for a couple of things. First of all, I want people to come away feeling like they’ve been spending time with real people, and moved by them, perhaps carrying away a deeper gut-level understanding of the experience of depression. I also hope they’ve laughed a fair amount. It’s those kind of emotional reactions that are my main priority. Secondarily, if people leave with good questions about friendship, of the complexity of race and class dynamics, and about the importance of giving language to mental illness so that people can articulate their lives, that would be great, too.
- What food and/or music do you associate with the book?
I don’t associate much food with this book, which is weird, because I’m a big food guy. But the novel is saturated in the music of the late 80s, and the song “Head Like a Hole” by Nine Inch Nails is a recurring force in the book.
- What book(s) are you reading currently?
I’m rereading Salman Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses, which is still great and so different from the way I write—so frenetic and loud and maximalist. I’m also reading Les Fourmis by Bernard Werber, which is partly from the point of view of some ants. Next up, I’m very excited to get started with Asha Thanki’s A Thousand Times Before.
Learn more about David on his website.
Follow him at Facebook and Instagram.
Buy the book from the publisher (Regal House Publishing), Bookshop.org, or Amazon.
