Gabriel Ricard: What has the reception to the book been so far?
Michael Kelly: Everyone I've had feedback from has loved it, although there've been people who've kept politely quiet about what they thought. In fact, they may have taken to avoiding me, now I come to think of it. It hasn't had any reviews in the press here, to my annoyance, but it's been mentioned approvingly in the course of several newspaper articles which were kicking the Misery Lit genre.
GR: Do you see any possibility of returning to this universe to revisit Sunny or even focus on a character like his adopted daughter Euphemia?
MK: Yes, but it's unlikely. If the sales take off or it at least becomes a cult or gets critical acclaim a sequel would be a temptation. I have unused ideas in terms of gags but there'd have to be a pressing satirical urge as well. It would most likely be in the form of a Sunny and Euphemia double act, but I did have a vague idea for something spinning Euphemia off on her own. I also have ideas for short stories featuring the pair of them. I'll probably revisit them in some form at some point. The only thing against it, but it's a big thing, is the logistical consideration of finding time and enthusiasm, as I'm working on several other things now which excite me more, and I will be for a while.
GR: Are you at all concerned that some people might not get the joke that the book is aiming for, the aspects of pop culture and daily life it's making fun of? Do you think anything might get lost in the book's brutal sense of humor?
MK: Only your soul, which you can easily live without, and your sense of common decency, which is a positive drawback in the modern world.
Concerned about people not getting it? I am always saddened when people fail to appreciate me. Saddened and disappointed like a passive-aggressive parent. I think almost everyone will get the basic joke. There are very few pop culture references that I remember. There are several over-topical or British-specific references, of which the one I most regret is Northumberland, but if one thing goes over your head there are another 8000 everyone will get.
GR: If this book were ever made into a film, who could possibly play Sunny?
MK: I remember saying Jim Carrey when a friend asked me this, but I've forgotten why, probably just greed. Um. Do you know a British actor named Timothy Spall, who plays all kinds of seedy or dreary or downtrodden men? He could be good. It would be fun to get a method actor who would actually get a baboon's arse grafted onto his face the way Sunny does. Christian Bale would do that I think. I'm not sure what it would do to his career afterwards. He'd have to exclusively play politicians from then on.
GR: I understand you've had some rather substantial problems with writers plagiarizing your work, or rather, it would seem that it's one writer in particular. Care to elaborate on that?
MK: Not really, I'm trying to put it behind me. But just to correct: it's more than one, this is the second large-scale one I've had to deal with, to say nothing of the minor ones, and they are not writers in any sense of the word, they just copy-and-paste things wholesale from my website, and those of other writers, onto their own sites, and claim to have written them themselves. It's quite funny when you can get past the murderous rage, you'll find some illiterate going 'hi thur folx, heer is a new uppdayt i wrott, worked hard on this lasst nigght so is a bit mor polished than my ussual postss!!!!' and then launch into this urbane and erudite essay that might have been written for the New Yorker. One of the scum who was stealing from me was also copying pieces from these very hip and metropolitan American writers but leaving all the Americanisms intact even though he lived in provincial England and the result was ridiculous. But people get taken in and it has serious consequences.
And it's beyond plagiarism, half an unconsciously-remembered line can get called plagiarism, ripping off ideas, which I've also had happen, is plagiarism, a professor forgetting a footnote can get done for plagiarism, but a new word is required for such industrial-scale button-pushing theft. I settled on just plain 'prickery' on my old website, and my webhosts summarily deleted me, for calling one of these people a prick.
One of my ideas for Sunny and Euphemia stories, by the way: my old website was hosted by a company called 'Orange' — they're a telecom company here, and by the way they sponsor this big writing prize, yet they had no compunction about deleting my website to protect a plagiarist — and of course one of Euphemia's numerous mental foibles is an inexplicable hatred for the colour orange. I thought it would be quite amusing, in the light of what's happened, to have her wipe them out somehow, just destroy the company or kill everyone who works for them.
GR: You seem to regard humor pretty highly as a means of getting through day-to-day life. Do you think it would be at all possible for you to go on without it?
MK: I realised lately that I don't actually have that sort of sense of humour in the way that some people do, in that they can just naturally laugh at their misfortunes or the insanity of the world, or I don't always remember to have it. I would love that, just whatever happens, laugh at it, treat life as one big joke, I do try to cultivate that attitude but don't always succeed. Still, I can at least laugh like a hyena at other people's misfortunes, that's something to cling to.
GR: I stopped by your website, I really enjoyed some of the material that's available. In particular, your poem, "Here Comes the Happy Bus" and the deleted scene from Godawful Life. Is there anything on there that you're especially proud of and would want people to check out?
MK: Most of the best of the short pieces aren't there at the moment, because I just moved to a new site for reasons mentioned above, and I'm sulking about people stealing them, and besides I might be publishing an anthology of them. If I ever put them back, 'Dear Clarissa' seems to be a lot of people's favourite and is one of mine. Other than that, they can read the original short precis version of Godawful Life and if they like it and want more of the same longer, funnier and sicker, read the book. Oh and they should read my friend Ulrich Haarburste's "Roy Orbison in Clingfilm" stories, and if they like them buy his book.
GR: With the book finished, what can we next look forward to from you?
MK: I'm working on two new books at once but I'm not sure if or when either will be finished and I don't want to say more. One is the funniest thing I've done yet, what I have of it, the other is the strangest, and no-one on Earth will like it but me, but I don't care.GR: Is life at all worth living, in your estimation?
MK: Hell yes, of course it is, even at its worst. Well, some of the time it is. It bloody is for me today, the sun is shining and I'm writing.
Gabriel Ricard is the Assistant Editor at Unlikely 2.0. You can learn more about him at his bio page.