Libro.fm Podcast – Episode 22: “Interview with Kelsey Norris”

We sat down with author Kelsey Norris, whose debut collection of short stories, House Gone Quiet, released on October 17th, 2023. We discussed the themes of her stories—the search for home and a sense of community and belonging—her journey to becoming a full-time writer, multi-narrator audiobooks, the publishing industry, and more.

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About our guest

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By Kelsey Norris

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Audiobooks we discussed

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Full transcription

Karen Farmer:

Hi, welcome to the Libro.fm Podcast, the monthly series where we talk to authors, narrators, booksellers, and more. I’m Karen.

Craig Silva:

And I’m Craig. On today’s episode, we sat down with the author Kelsey Norris, who released her debut collection of short stories on October 17th, titled House Gone Quiet.

Karen Farmer:

Yes, we both got to read this. We enjoyed it. I’ve also listened to the audiobook. For those of you that aren’t familiar with this book, it is described as, and I quote, “An eerie, irresistible debut story collection about the bonds and bounds of community, and what it means to call a place home.” All things that I love. Short stories, eerie things, Kelsey.

Craig Silva:

Yes, also love Kelsey. For our listeners, Kelsey used to work at Libro, so Karen and I know Kelsey very well. I remember when we were in Seattle for some work trip, and we were all hanging out together. Kelsey was like, “Guys, I think I might have a publishing deal.” It just felt so long ago, so I’m so excited to see all of this come to fruition, and I also love the book. And cannot be happier for Kelsey, if it was possible.

Karen Farmer:

Absolutely agreed. So let’s start the episode. Just a reminder to our listeners, if you don’t follow the podcast yet, we would love if you did. Also, if you have a second, please rate and review or subscribe. If you haven’t signed up for Libro.fm membership and you want to give it a shot, you can listen to Kelsey’s new book, House Gone Quiet, and many others. Use the code LIBROPODCAST when you sign up, and you’ll get two audiobooks for your first month of membership, instead of just one.

Craig Silva:

All right everyone, enjoy the interview. And as always, stay tuned afterwards to hear what Karen and I are currently listening to. And maybe we’ll tease some upcoming episodes that we’re excited about, so thanks for listening.

Kelsey, welcome to the podcast. For our listeners who may not be familiar with your work yet, could you please give us a brief introduction?

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, so I’m Kelsey Norris. I have a book coming out with Scribner and Simon & Schuster called House Gone Quiet on October 17th. It is my debut story collection.

Karen Farmer:

Huge congratulations on House Gone Quiet. Craig and I are very grateful we got to read an advanced reader’s copy of it, and could not put it down, could not stop gushing about how much we loved it. And I can’t wait for everyone to read this book.

Kelsey Norris:

Oh, thanks. It’s so exciting to share it with y’all, to be sharing it with people, and especially y’all.

Craig Silva:

I know when my NetGalley got approved, I was like, “Oh my God.”

Kelsey Norris:

I know, it’s happening.

Karen Farmer:

This is probably an obvious question, but would you be willing to share kind of a brief overview of House Gone Quiet for our listeners and what they can look forward to?

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, totally. House Gone Quiet is a collection of 10 stories. There are linked stories that follow a certain cast of characters, or that are about a particular place, but this particular collection is more unified by theme. It’s 10 stories of characters sort of searching for home and searching for a sense of community and belonging. But as far as subject matter, they’re sort of all over the map. There’s a story about a group of women who are sent across a border into enemy territory to make husbands of the enemy and they’re trying to decide if they’re going to kill their husbands. There’s a town where the mayor tells everyone they can’t wear clothes anymore. So it’s about the repercussions of that. There’s also a story in there about a group of joggers who meet at a Dick’s Sporting Goods to discuss the bodies that they have found on their runs. So we are sort of all over the map as far as subject matter, but it’s all about community and belonging and what it means to belong or not to.

Karen Farmer:

I’m so curious about this. As a person who loves reading short stories but does not write them, I am wondering how you decide what stories to include in the collection? Were there ones that didn’t make the cut that you almost put in, but didn’t? As you’ve worked on this, how have you made those calls about the structure of it?

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, there were. So I started this collection during my MFA program at Vanderbilt, and the collection that I put together for my thesis, there was more, I think it was less together, it was less unified than this final collection ended up being. So there are some stories there that had to fall to the side. I think at that point I was trying to figure out that there are wonderful collections of Southern writers, writing Southern stories, and there are also more identity-based collections where for instance, a Black writer is writing about the experience of blackness, and all those different shades and colors that can come in.

And so I think while both of those things are in this collection, it has Southern stories, it has Black characters, I think it took me a minute to figure out that I also wanted to play with form, and play with other story elements that weren’t so character-based or weren’t so place-based. So I think as I went to a workshop, I went to Tin House Summer Workshop, after I had written a large bulk of these stories and worked with some wonderful writers there and some wonderful mentors there. And I think I was able to hone the pitch of what brought these stories together. And then once I had figured that out, I wrote a couple more stories to fill the gaps that were there with that and then just started pitching those to agents and pitching those to publishers and that’s how it came about.

Karen Farmer:

So cool. And it also makes me want the equivalent of the outtakes reel. I’m like, can I read the other stories too?

Craig Silva:

I want the B-sides.

Kelsey Norris:

Stay tuned.

Karen Farmer:

Kind of my last question on this, because I could ask you a million. I happen to know from early conversations that you and I were both big fans of the book Friday Black, and I saw on the cover of your book that your book is being recommended to people who love Friday Black. And there’s also a very spectacular blurb by someone that I know that you really admire as a writer. What has that felt like, to have people that you just admire so much blurb the book, and see it show up on really exciting new up and coming lists that are being released now?

Kelsey Norris:

It’s wild. It’s exciting. Nana, who is on the cover of my book with a very kind blurb and who has been such a wonderful mentor to me, even before we had talked one-on-one, just his stories did that. And I think writers like Nana himself and writers like him who sort of played with subject and played with discomfort and played with weirdness in their stories to make something else shine through, right? Karen Russell’s another, Carmen Maria Machado’s another, where there’s sort of an unbalanced element in their stories that lets them talk about social topics in a new and interesting way. And that’s not all their stories are doing but those were very permission giving while I was still learning what the bounds of what I was comfortable with doing and what I needed to push myself towards doing while I was writing.

But I got to work under Nana at that workshop and we worked through one story together. And then it was Nana really who was like, I think if you have other stories that are up to this level of doneness, then it might be time to think about the fact that you have a book and that you need to start talking about this as a book and start looking for people to also be able to… Looking for a place for it to land. And he also talked me through so much of the publishing process, which is strange and bewildering, and it is really helpful to have somebody to guide you through it. And also, I mean, I love his writing also, so it’s all just very exciting to have a writer I so admire as someone that I can ask questions.

Craig Silva:

As Karen said, we could not be happier for you, for listeners, we used to work with Kelsey, so we’ve hung out and it was just so exciting. I remember in the early days you were talking about getting this together and that the publishing date was, it felt very far off, but here we are. It’s coming out in a couple months, so congratulations.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, thanks so much.

Craig Silva:

For folks who don’t know, you used to be a bookseller, so you worked at a bookshop, and then you were also a school librarian, which I didn’t know until I did some research for this podcast. And then like I said, you worked with us briefly, which I’m sure was the highlight of your life, but now as a-

Kelsey Norris:

Everything from there is a down slide, but I’m trying.

Craig Silva:

Yeah, yeah, of course.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah.

Craig Silva:

But now as a full-time writer, for aspiring writers, can you tell us what that journey looked like? I mean, going from working in a bookstore to being where you are now. What was that like?

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, sure. I feel it sounds like anybody’s career sounds together, in retrospect. It was blah, blah, blah, it felt a little more frenzied. But before I went to grad school, I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Namibia, and actually one of the stories in the collection is set on a salt pan, right behind where I used to live. So the content of that story is more imagined, but it was cool to be able to base it off of a place. But while I was there in Namibia, I worked as a teacher, and then I also ran our school library, so that was wonderful. There was a couple of volunteers before me who had put in a big effort, but in two-year assignments and turnovers and stuff and just different focuses for those people that the library needed a little revamp. So it was really wonderful to be able to do that and to also be able to instill in my students a real love of reading.

Then I went to grad school. And then after that I worked in a bookstore. I worked in one locally here in DC called Busboys and Poets, which is sort of a bookstore and also a restaurant and a community space. So worked there for a while. And then as the pandemic approached, there were some complications that came up and I had to leave. And then luckily, Libro.fm was hiring booksellers who had been affected by the pandemic. So that is how I got in with Libro. And it was a temporary position there where I believe there were 10 of us in total hired to work across the company in different aspects.

And then I just stayed on afterwards. And here I am at this point, I’m working full-time as a writer, which is wild, and I feel very lucky to be able to do it and for however long I can. And I feel like throughout that career, I’ve been very lucky to work places where my colleagues are excited about books, where my job is talking about books, my job is promoting books, whatever. So maybe I just followed books around. It’s what led to those, Craig. I will say that working at a bookstore, it’s very dangerous to work to get your paycheck from the place where you most want to spend your paycheck. So I didn’t navigate that while I was there.

Craig Silva:

My office is above a bookstore and I don’t get any kind of discount or anything, and it’s still dangerous. I can’t imagine being in it every day. I would just take my paycheck and hand it directly back to them, yes.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah.

Craig Silva:

You mentioned instilling a love of reading in your students. Do you feel like the experiences as a bookseller and a librarian have shaped the writer that you’ve become?

Kelsey Norris:

I think that they have made me maybe less… Because during my MFA program, you’re reading a very particular, you’re reading a lot of literary fiction, you’re reading some experimental literary fiction, but I think I was surrounded by people who loved that kind of writing. And I do that kind of writing, but that’s sort of the writing that we were talking about. And I think comparatively, working as a librarian and working as a bookseller taught me about the whole vast world of books, and I think to some extent audiobooks as well.

That was not something that was necessarily on my radar as a reader and as a writer. And I feel like all those experiences maybe helped me branch into different genres that I wouldn’t have. Also, I feel like my feeling on genre is, it’s helpful in some ways for categorization, but also sometimes is a little arbitrary. I like things that lean in more than one direction, but I think encountering readers who are so passionate about their particular genre or their wide array of genres, I think gave me more respect for different kinds of writing and the different sorts of talents that are sitting in that writing.

Karen Farmer:

So kind of piggybacking off of the career journey question, the following of the books, you’ve shifted from having to share time across your passions with the work that you’re doing to being a full-time writer, which is so cool. And I am just so curious to know, what does your day-to-day or your week by week look like? Because I know it’s more than just the actual writing. There’s the editing and there’s the publicity and the marketing and the taking of headshots for book covers and stuff. Can you just give us a little glimpse into what life is like with this as your full-time job?

Kelsey Norris:

I mean, that stuff that you mentioned, the stuff at the end, taking headshots and doing interviews like this one and doing publicity stuff, that’s the more glamorous side, but I feel like those are sort of few and far between, especially because, well, A, it’s a lot of hurry up and wait because you’re waiting until you get to pub day to do a lot of that. But also the publishing industry, good news happens about a year and a half before you’re able to really hand somebody a finished product of that thing. So I feel like the time in between that is… I feel being a writer, it’s like giving myself homework. I’ve assigned my work. It is important to me that I finish it, so it’s very self-driven compared to other jobs that I’ve had where there’s a box of books to unload or there’s a class coming in or there’s a meeting to attend.

So it’s a little trickier to schedule my day because I’m so used to having those brief moments of being able to squeeze in creativity in between. And I think when I first started, I struggled with feeling maybe unproductive because whereas I can squeeze in or it’s the norm to have an eight-hour workday and focus for at least the majority of that workday, eight hours of writing for me looks like many other things other than writing. There’s just a long lead up time to, I mean, summertime, luckily I can go on a walk and go outside and fix something in the garden, and that counts as time getting into the book. And I do a lot of reading, whether it’s craft books or nonfiction or fiction too. But sometimes I’m a little picky about what I’m reading when, so that I don’t maybe start to mimic in a way that’s not helpful.

So sometimes I’ll read away from my subject material or I’ll read craft books, which are about the subject, but not so much lines so that I don’t… Because I think for me, rhythm and sentence rhythm is really important, so I want to make sure that I’m… All the writers that I’ve read, I feel like their rhythms are in the back of my brain, but I want to keep those in the back so that I don’t bring them to the front and just pull directly from that. So there’s a lot of thinking about writing that goes into writing. And then there’s probably about three or four hours of productive scooting through and actually getting words down on the page.

And I have this productivity app that really helps where it gives me, every 30 minutes it says, “Good job Kelsey,” and then it gives me a five to 10 minute break, and then I get on my phone and do whatever or go and grab some water, go and pet the dog or whatever. But yeah, I mean, it is thrilling and also an adjustment, but it is nice in that it feels like my life can also come into writing. In thinking about, okay, I can’t write for nine hours a day, that means that the other components of my life get to feed into that writing as well. I don’t know if that makes sense.

Karen Farmer:

Totally, totally. What’s been the biggest surprise about this life?

Kelsey Norris:

I mean, naps. I don’t want to make it sound like I’m sleeping all the time.

Karen Farmer:

I love a nap too.

Kelsey Norris:

But I love a nap. Look, I’ve always loved… And before, I would take 20-minute, 15-minute naps in the middle of the day or something, post-eating or whatever. But now, my naps are a lot more active. I get to do-

Craig Silva:

An active nap.

Kelsey Norris:

It’s a half sleep kind of thing where my eyes are closed and maybe I’m not knocked all the way out. But you know that moment where you’re about to fall asleep and you’re aware that your brain is doing some weird story moves, you’re like, “Oh, I guess I’m about to fall into a dream.” I think I’ve been able to do lately is sort of control, go into it thinking like, “Okay, we’ve got this story problem to figure out, let’s think through.”

And then a lot of times whether or not I fall asleep all the way or whatever, but I’ll wake up on the other side with a line to go with and to start forward. And the other maybe surprising element is that this new project that I’m working on is a novel compared to a short story collection, and it’s in its very early drafts, but the project of writing a novel, it is wildly different. I’m a huge advocate for short story collections. I think there’s this idea that they’re warm-ups to a novel or that they’re less palatable or that they show less talent or something when actually I think they’re just two distinct writing forms.

I think of it of TV versus movies. For me, short stories are really wonderful for… Especially that feeling of when you’re in between a bunch of books or you feel like you don’t have the energy to maybe complete an entire book or you don’t have the time to invest or whatever, or you just want to feel like you completed something. I feel like a story collection has these goalposts built in where they’re like, “Good job. Okay, pick up the next one when you’re ready.” For the most part, you can read a short story in one sitting, so you get to hold the entirety of the story in your head. Versus novel, where writing that, it’s just a long period of time.

I just went to a talk that Lorrie Moore gave at Politics and Prose, and she writes novels and short stories and is celebrated for both. And she talked about how she doesn’t think that one is better necessarily as a form of writing, but she does think that short story writers suffer a little bit less because I have heard more than one writer talk about that writing a novel is like swimming in the ocean and you can’t see where you started or where you’re going and sometimes it’s nighttime and you’re still just paddling through the water and you have to have this internal faith that you know where you’re going versus when I write a short story, most of the time, I have a sense of either the ending or the last line, or I’ve written the last scene already, so I know where I’m going. They’re different.

Karen Farmer:

That’s a really good metaphor, I love that. I have follow-up questions on some things you just mentioned, but I’ll pause for it.

Craig Silva:

I mean, I’m looking at the script too, if you want to just jump into that because it’s kind of where the conversation just went. I think that’s totally fine, Karen.

Kelsey Norris:

I’m not looking at the script.

Karen Farmer:

No, you’re not.

Craig Silva:

You did ask for it though.

Kelsey Norris:

Everything is a surprise.

Karen Farmer:

Okay. I just have been dying to know about this book number two because I’m pretty sure this was a two book deal. And I was like, “I don’t know if she’ll be able to talk about it yet,” or how much we’re able to know about it. But was just curious if there’s anything you can share about the novel?

Kelsey Norris:

Because with the short story collection, I’m often writing off of such weird premises that it doesn’t really make sense to talk about before you’re through it. Yeah, those joggers are meeting and they’re talking about bodies that they found on their runs. It sort of falls flat without the semblance of the entire thing behind it. And I think it can feel like that sometimes too. And I’m talking about a project before it’s done where either I’ll talk myself out of it if I’m talking about the premise, I’ll be like, “Well, actually it’s kind of dumb,” and then it’ll be harder to turn back to it or you don’t end up doing it any justice. So I think for now I’m just sitting on it and trying to give myself the time to figure out what it is.

Normally when I write a short story, I am closer to the final version of whatever it’s going to… There’s normally working around and editing and being like, “Actually, this chunk doesn’t make sense. Let me go back.” And it’s really wonderful to get reader’s eyes on that and to be like, “Actually, I’m not following you during this part. Can you go back and rewrite?” But I think, for a novel, from what I’ve heard from people who have worked through it for the first time or after many times, the prevailing knowledge is that you have to finish it all the way to know what you have. And then the editing process is going to be a lot more intensive, because I think then I’ll have to assemble all those pieces into a story that makes sense and cut that. I don’t know why that character showed up or I don’t know why this section is in here, that’s got to go. So right now it’s a novel and it’s messy, but we’ll figure it out.

Karen Farmer:

Awesome. We’ll be cheering you on. I cannot wait.

Craig Silva:

When did you start writing the novel? Did you start this at the same time or before or is this a new thing that you’re diving into?

Kelsey Norris:

No, it is a new thing that I am diving into. So yeah, I was lucky that my publishing team just had, and my editor had faith that I would be able to work through it. And so at this point I’m powering myself through with that faith. I’m like, “Yeah, we’ll figure it out.”

Craig Silva:

Well, we look forward to reading it when it comes out

Kelsey Norris:

Fingers crossed.

Craig Silva:

So you had to know we’re going to go here, given that this is the Libro.fm Podcast, so we want to talk audiobooks. I saw that House Gone Quiet has multiple narrators. I think four is what I saw on Libro. So what was that process like for you? What was your involvement? Were you talking with these folks? Did you get a say in picking? We’ve heard the spectrum from different authors, so I’d love to know what it was like for you.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, it would be interesting to hear what, well, I should just listen to more episodes, but it’d be interesting to hear.

Craig Silva:

It’s good because when you’re taking your naps, you can fall asleep to it.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah. So the audiobook process typically runs behind the book publishing process. So an audiobook sometimes will come out just as the print book is coming out or sometimes a little bit after, which I think we know from working with them. But my involvement thus far has been the Simon & Schuster audio team sent me four narrators with samples from books that they had read, said, “Here’s who we’re thinking for these four different stories.” And I think they did a great job of breaking down stories that had things to do with each other or maybe had narrators who were similar ages or stories with a similar, there’s a couple of stories in the collection that have a storytelling kind of feel to them of sit down and I’m going to tell you a legend of this place.

And so in some cases, the same narrators are reading those even though they’re spaced out from each other within the collection. So I’m very excited and I’m hopeful that… I think that having those varied narrators will make it feel, I mean, it’s pretty common for short story collections to have a couple of narrators, and I think that will make it feel like each story is a piece on its own as well as a part of all of it. So I’m pretty stoked about it.

Craig Silva:

Have you heard any of it yet, other than the samples?

Kelsey Norris:

I have not. I’m not sure at what point I will hear it. I’ve had some people ask if I was reading any of the stories from the collection, and I’m not. And I’m very excited to hear professional narrators read them instead. I had an opportunity with The Kenyon Review who I published a story, one of the stories in this collection centuries with a couple years ago, and they had me read the story aloud for an audio version of it. And that was really wonderful. But I think also really it gave me big respect for… A, I think that authors read in a different voice than narrators do. I think there’s a sort of, if you’ve been to literary readings or heard people online read, there’s a cadence to, especially literary fiction that authors tend to do that I think is different from a narrated audiobook and that sort of experience. And narrators are very talented, and I’m sure, as you all know, a narrator can make or break an audiobook. So I’m so excited for the book to go put its best foot forward with voices that are not mine.

Craig Silva:

I did have a question that was going to be, did you ever consider narrating it yourself? But it seems like I’ve got my answer.

Kelsey Norris:

I think, considered it, thought like, “Nah.” Because also reading that story took a ton of takes and took me going over it again and again. And even the version of it that exists, which is cool that it exists, but the version of that story that’s online, there’s a train that runs, I’m recording it in a parking lot and it was cicada season, so they’re screaming in [inaudible 00:27:40] a train, and eventually it was the difference between good and good enough. I was like, we got to keep [inaudible 00:27:46] things. There are 10 of these. I can’t do it. I got to know my lane. And the narrators are going to do a way better job than I could have.

Karen Farmer:

I can’t wait to hear it. Okay, last serious question before we have some other surprises for you. What does October 17th look like? So what is launch day? Do you have launch activities planned? Are you going on tour? What is next for House Gone Quiet?

Kelsey Norris:

I am not totally sure because it’s still early in the process for that. Some of those details are still getting worked out. I think that I’m going to get to go to Southern Festival of Books, which is exciting, that’s in Nashville. And I think that also I’ll be doing an event at Greenlight Bookstore in New York, so that’s cool. And then hopefully I’ll get some DC locations in as well and likely be able to do sort of a launch event there. But your guess is as good as mine, I think we shall see. But I’m really excited about it.

Karen Farmer:

I was going to say, Craig would like to request that you come to Boston for your tour, and I would be very happy if you came to Detroit or Ann Arbor. So just make sure to pencil those in on the circuit.

Kelsey Norris:

Tell your local bookstores to hit me up. Because I think also the exciting thing is you can have in-person, and now in-person events are happening a little bit more. So my in-person tour might be a relatively brief compared to maybe some other books by more established authors or novel authors, but there’s a string of virtue. Hopefully this book has a long life, and I feel like I’ve already had some sort of really wonderful support from booksellers that I know and also booksellers that I don’t, like former colleagues who have helped administer events or helped me put together events for this tour. But hopefully I can do some virtual things too, so that even if I’m not going in person to those places, I’ll be able to still reach audiences there and reach readers there and get to hear from people about the book.

Craig Silva:

You mentioned hopefully having some DC dates. Is there a dream bookstore that you’re hoping for this launch event to be at, your favorite local bookshop?

Kelsey Norris:

I can’t pick favorite. I feel like DC has such a wonderful book culture, and if I start naming them, I’m going to forget them, and then those stores are going to get mad at me.

Craig Silva:

This is like when you ask someone which is their favorite pet, and they’re like, “I’m not answering that question.”

Kelsey Norris:

I mean, the pets at least don’t understand human language as much other than their main words of walk and whatnot. But yeah, I mean, there’s loyalty bookstores here. There’s Politics and Prose, there’s Busboys and Poets, there’s Kramers. I know I’m forgetting some. I mean, there’s a million. DC has a very robust book culture, really wonderful events, and I’ve been really lucky to go to those as a reader, either virtually or in person. And now I’m getting to attend those bookstores to go back to in-person events. Whoever will have me.

Karen Farmer:

Amazing. Well not in a desperate way, in a cool way.

Craig Silva:

Sure. I’m sure that’s how it’ll come out.

Karen Farmer:

Yep. No sweat. So Kelsey, our next section of the podcast, we have called the lightning round, in which we are going to ask you five or six very strange questions. Don’t think about them too much, fast questions, fast answers, and there are no wrong answers.

Kelsey Norris:

Okay, okay.

Karen Farmer:

And I think, Craig, you have the first lightning round question this week?

Craig Silva:

Yes. Is there a tattoo that you’ve always wanted but haven’t gotten yet?

Kelsey Norris:

No, I don’t think so. Well, I would love to get a friendship tattoo with one of my best pals who’s been talking about it for years. But I think I’m too indecisive. I feel like a thing happens where in the lead up to a tattoo, you’re like, “This means so much to me.” I have a quote from a book on my foot, and then I have an elephant. They’re meaning, oh, wait, no, this one, oh, it’s not on me. Anyway, I have one on my wrist.

Craig Silva:

For listeners, she’s showing us her wrist.

Kelsey Norris:

Which has an elephant on it. But then after you get them, you’re sort of like, “All right, well, I got it.” So no, I feel like I’m tattooed out for a little bit. We’ll see.

Karen Farmer:

All right. If you could eliminate one daily task from your life, what would it be and why?

Kelsey Norris:

I hate washing the dishes. That’s such a boring answer. I really hate washing the dishes. I really hate doing productive activities at night. I would rather just sit down. I would just rather be sitting for the last four hours of my day. I would like to just be parked. I don’t know how houses stay clean. It is just constant effort, exhausting.

Craig Silva:

It’s just all the time.

Kelsey Norris:

It’s just all the time. I feel like the people with the cleanest houses are just up and moving all the… I don’t know how they do it. So probably that. Also, I really struggle with waking. I mean, I don’t want to not wake up because that’s-

Craig Silva:

Then you would be dead.

Kelsey Norris:

Then I would be dead. But waking up is a constant… Every morning. It’s a surprise to me.

Karen Farmer:

I relate to that very much.

Kelsey Norris:

But we manage it. We pull it off. Here we are.

Karen Farmer:

We do.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah. Morning people, I’m like, “Ugh.”

Karen Farmer:

Can’t do it.

Craig Silva:

Karen’s a morning person.

Karen Farmer:

That is the worst joke you’ve ever told Craig.

Kelsey Norris:

I’m like, “Here we are again.” You’d think 32 years in, I’d be better at it.

Karen Farmer:

I know, I know.

Craig Silva:

Is your home a shoes off policy home, or no?

Kelsey Norris:

We’re going to take our shoes off.

Craig Silva:

Do you ever get people that come in and they’re like, I don’t want to take my shoes off?

Kelsey Norris:

Well, recently we had some people who were looking at our installation, very exciting stuff. They wore their shoes during part of it, which was cool. It was fine. But I think that’s just related to my cleanliness because I’m not consistent enough to keep a shoed floor.

Craig Silva:

A shoe’d floor.

Kelsey Norris:

I just feel like if they’re walking around barefoot, they’re also sort of doing the work of picking up some of the floor on their feet and then pop right in the shower that takes care of itself.

Craig Silva:

That is one way to clean the floor, yes.

Kelsey Norris:

No, we’re shoes off, we’re shoes off at home.

Karen Farmer:

I like it.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah.

Karen Farmer:

What is your favorite thing to show people or take them to do when they come to visit you?

Kelsey Norris:

I cannot imagine trying to put my dad in a canoe, but lately we have been, there’s a park-

Craig Silva:

Put him in.

Kelsey Norris:

Yes.

Craig Silva:

Picking him up.

Kelsey Norris:

Get in, he’d be like, “No, no.” There’s a spot near us where we take our dog canoeing, where we put her in the middle, and she’s a pit. She’s a 50 pound dog, she’s not tiny. But she has a little floaty and she sits in the middle. And then what always happens is that I’m in the front seat, which is the seat that has less, it’s a double canoe. So I’m in the seat that has less responsibility anyway. And then actually my job becomes just keeping the dog calm for the beginning part of it. And my husband just rows us around. So it’s sort of I’m on a gondolier kind of situation where I’m just chilling and petting my dog and I’m being taken all around the river. So that’s lovely. So I would like to do that with a pal. But DC has so many museums and so much stuff to see, especially down by the mall, and it’s free, which is just wonderful. So yeah, probably museum hopping if they don’t want to get in a lake.

Craig Silva:

Or before being gondoliered by your husband. Either one.

Kelsey Norris:

If he doesn’t want to put more than just me in that boat, it’s also an option to stand up paddleboard, but it’s the Potomac, so it’s better to stay in the boat, I think.

Craig Silva:

What’s an album you could play forever and never get sick of?

Kelsey Norris:

It’s not that I don’t like music. I’m a person, I like music. But I think I just don’t have cool answers to music questions.

Craig Silva:

This is a judgment free zone Kelsey.

Kelsey Norris:

Okay. Warmup question. Okay, my first workshop, the first day of my first workshop with Lorrie Moore, who’s a huge deal at Vanderbilt, one of her opening questions was, if you were on a desert island and you had to listen to only one album, what would you listen to? And it’s just, I don’t know. I’m not musically cool. Sometimes I just listen to what Spotify tells me to. I don’t know.

Craig Silva:

It’s fair. I don’t know what I would answer to this either.

Kelsey Norris:

Okay. All right. That makes me feel better. Okay.

Karen Farmer:

Totally valid answer. Okay, last lightning round question. What world record do you think you have a shot at beating?

Kelsey Norris:

I rarely lose an underwater handstand competition. So you know how some people go to the beach and they just want to laze in the sun, beach, that’s not me. I want to go in the water and then I want to fight in the water. I want to-

Craig Silva:

Go to the beach to win.

Kelsey Norris:

I want to go tumble around. I want somebody to try and throw me and me try and flip. I need some sort of a child in that way where I just need entertainment while I’m at the beach. So I do always challenge to a handstand competition, and I rarely lose. Sometimes it happens. Well, I don’t know if I should say. Well, okay, the only way to get me is if you do that sort of false fall down thing, you make a splashing noise, then it sounds like you’ve succumbed to the wave. So then I’m going to pop up out of there and look.

Karen Farmer:

I see. No one is allowed to use this against you in a future handstand competition because you-

Kelsey Norris:

Well, it’s good [inaudible 00:37:59]-

Craig Silva:

You’ve given the secret away.

Kelsey Norris:

… for me. Now that I’ve exposed that secret, now, I’ll just improve. I’ll just get better.

Craig Silva:

Find a new strategy.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, it seems unlikely, but I will do it.

Karen Farmer:

Our last silly question to you is brought to you by a segment that we call Instagram story time, in which we go through your Instagram and just [inaudible 00:38:20]. What can we learn from what you’ve posted recently?

Kelsey Norris:

My Instagram is boring.

Karen Farmer:

No. And I think Craig has selected or will ask the Instagram story time question.

Kelsey Norris:

That seems like news to him.

Karen Farmer:

Yeah, I surprised him.

Craig Silva:

It’s news to me.

Karen Farmer:

We discussed this yesterday.

Kelsey Norris:

The script, Craig. Look at this.

Craig Silva:

So Karen selected this photo.

Kelsey Norris:

Okay.

Karen Farmer:

I did choose it.

Craig Silva:

Yes. So this photo is of a table, with a corkboard on it, with orange sticky notes, with, it says, “First big edit down,” and I think it’s about your editing process for your book. For listeners, Kelsey looks like she’s never seen this photo before.

Kelsey Norris:

Hello. When was that taken?

Craig Silva:

This is news to her as well now.

Kelsey Norris:

Hold on, let me just go home, first thing. Oh, okay. Look, I’m looking at this board. I don’t know why, it’s-

Craig Silva:

Wait, it’s in your room?

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, it’s been around in here. That was my storyboard for the collection. Maybe this one, I wonder if this one has the, it has final title of the book.

Craig Silva:

It does, yeah.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah. Because based on the wisdom of agents and editors, we worked through some various titles, but then it has a sticky note for each of the stories in the collection. It has the first line for the story and the last line, and then it has the word count. So that was my method for, I mean, you could put 10 stories however you wanted, but I think for one, I think writing can feel very nebulous. You don’t get a lot of physical objects, so that’s why it’s helpful to, while you’re writing, go outside and dig a hole and put something in it for garden purposes, not a body, but a plant.

Craig Silva:

And a runner will find it after they eat Dick’s Sporting Goods.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, so it can be nice to have something physical to represent what is very much a brain thing happening. So this was my method for deciding either for the first time or for the final time, how things should go around. I wanted there to be variation. I didn’t want, if certain stories have a storytelling mode, I didn’t want one to push right into the next one because it’ll be confusing to hear the same sort of rhythm, but in a totally different setting. So that’s what that is.

Craig Silva:

Follow up question. Love the final title. You mentioned that there were potentially some other titles. Are you willing to share what an alternative title could have been for this?

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah. So one was, I think my initial title was… Well, am I going to, no, I don’t think I can use it for anything. I think it’s going to be fine, was With Your Place, which I sort of pulled from a Toni Morrison passage that’s in Beloved that I love. That passage has, the rhythm of it, it’s perfect. They’re in a clearing and it’s sort of a revival scene that’s happening in the clip, but the writing is beautiful. So that was one. And then we also thought about the first story in the collection is called The Sound of Women Waiting.

So we thought about that as a title, but I think the collection is more than, I think I didn’t want to misrepresent that it would only be a book about women and women’s stories. I think it’s not so tied to that particular identity, though that is a large majority of the stories. But House Gone Quiet, which is where we landed, comes from the end of one of the stories’ sentries. And I think there’s a lot of silence and noise in the collection as well. And the house element is sort of our community and whether or not we’re inside or outside that community. So that’s where we landed, and I think that’s the right place to land.

Karen Farmer:

I think so too. We can’t wait for October 17th. Our last thing we want to ask you before we let you go, what are you reading right now? Is there anything that you have enjoyed recently that you would recommend to us or to our listeners?

Kelsey Norris:

I just read The Changeling by Victor LaValle, which was great, and also has a series coming out. I’ve been meaning to read him for a while, and that was my push to get into it. And then right now I have on audio, I’ve got Sam Irby’s new essay collection.

Craig Silva:

Quietly Hostile.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah. I love Samantha Irby. I have all her stuff and her audiobooks are the way to listen to them, I think. Though I think I also have that book in print.

Craig Silva:

My dad just read that and was texting me updates as he was going. He was like, “This one’s really funny. This one’s really funny.”

Kelsey Norris:

It’s the book where I’m in public going laughing. It’s in my book. And then Jenna, who’s on staff there at Libro had an extra early copy. I mean, her early copy wasn’t extra, but she had a bonus early copy of The Vaster Wilds by Lauren Groff, which I think is coming out next month. So I’ve got that on my to read list as well as a book called Women and Children First, which is a debut novel by a friend of mine, Alina Grabowski, that’s coming out from SJP Lit and Zando books. And that’s coming out next year in May. But I’m stoked to read those. I’ve got a little vacation coming, so I’m going to read the… Okay, I’m at the beach either to play in the water or to basically eat a book. I’m just going to read. I’m reading, but don’t talk to me unless I engage first. I’m great to go to the beach [inaudible 00:44:21] not a nightmare. But anyway, I’m going to go-

Craig Silva:

Don’t talk to me unless I’m beating you in a competition.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah. I feel like I can pack light on a vacation besides books, at minimum I’m going to bring three and I’m going to hope that they’re [inaudible 00:44:36] backs. Those feel more like the beach move, hardcovers, they need more respect than I think lend to them in a beach setting. I mean, paperback deserve respect too, as someone who is about to have paperback. They just have different fields to them.

Karen Farmer:

For sure.

Craig Silva:

They’re easier to shake sand out of, for sure.

Kelsey Norris:

Well, we’ve talked about it before. Are y’all hardcover? I mean, no pressure based on my book.

Craig Silva:

Are you lightning round questioning us right now?

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, I’m turning the tables. I’m turning them. Are y’all bigger fans of hardcovers or paperbacks?

Karen Farmer:

I got to do paperback because I’m frequently a horizontal reader, be it couch, bed floor, other soft configuration I like to read on my side, and it’s too hard to wrangle a hardcover like that. And I like to put it in my purse when I’m likely… I love a paperback. I do.

Craig Silva:

I’ll take the other side of the coin. I’m a hardcover fan here. I just picked this one up earlier today. The new Ann Patchett book, hardcover, of course. I don’t dislike a paperback though. It has a time and a place. A beach is great for it. I really like old paperbacks, if you go into a used bookstore and find some really beat up copy of something, but for the most part.

Kelsey Norris:

It’ll be nice to have a little community in your book. Your shelves probably look fancier.

Craig Silva:

Yeah. I have fancy shelves in my room for sure.

Kelsey Norris:

[inaudible 00:46:07] paperbacks that I’m a little bit, it just feels they’re more like, “What do you think about this?” [inaudible 00:46:12] I’m a book. Also I think-

Craig Silva:

I’m a book.

Kelsey Norris:

… I have a hard time with book flaps and keeping, because do you read with the book jacket on it?

Craig Silva:

I do. And I agree that it is a problem when it starts to slip out. I do like that a dust jacket is a built-in bookmark, which is nice though. That’s a nice feature.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah. A bonus feature of the print version of House Gone Quiet is that it’s a paperback with flaps.

Karen Farmer:

Yes.

Craig Silva:

Oh, nice.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, I’m excited about that.

Karen Farmer:

That’s fancy.

Craig Silva:

My digital copy does not have any flaps currently, so I look forward to picking up the real one.

Kelsey Norris:

Go check out your local bookstore.

Craig Silva:

Well, Kelsey, thank you so much for spending the last hour with us. I’m sure you’re super busy and have a nap to attend to, or a body to dig a hole for, et cetera.

Karen Farmer:

A beach to visit.

Craig Silva:

Yes, somebody to beat in a handstand contest. We look forward to your book coming out. And again, congratulations and thanks for being so gracious with your time today.

Kelsey Norris:

Yeah, I miss y’all. It’s so nice talking to you.

Craig Silva:

Yeah, you too.

Karen Farmer:

We miss you, too.

Kelsey Norris:

Ask me on some wonderful questions about the book, and I’m very excited for y’all to read it, and for everybody else to read it and just thanks for having me.

Craig Silva:

All right. Have a great rest of your day.

Karen Farmer:

We’re done.

Craig Silva:

We are.

Karen Farmer:

We did it.

Kelsey Norris:

We did it.

Karen Farmer:

All right, that wraps up our interview with Kelsey. Thank you so much for listening everyone. We do have the audiobook of House Gone Quiet available on Libro.fm and I’m sure that you can get it through your local independent bookstore as well so we highly recommend that you check this book out.

Craig Silva:

Yes, I’m super excited to read this audiobook. I haven’t done that yet. I had the NetGalley version, or whatever. How was the audiobook?

Karen Farmer:

It’s fantastic. There are different narrators for different short stories. So lots of different voices and performance styles I would say. I loved it.

Craig Silva:

Nice. Can’t wait. All right, Karen, it is my favorite time of the episode where you go, “Oh, no,” when I ask you what you’re reading. So what are you reading?

Karen Farmer:

Oh my gosh, I thought you’d never ask. Thank you. Is that the response that you wanted? I am reading the greatest audiobook ever. I was recently at Heartland Fall Forum in Detroit, and a bookseller recommended this audiobook to me. It is called Sisters of the Lost Marsh. It is by Lucy Strange, who has written many, many other books that are beloved. And this book is unputdownable for me. I see you typing right now. Are you looking it up?

Craig Silva:

No, I’m like, “I know Lucy Strange.” So I was googling what other books would I know? And then I giggled because you said unputdownable, which is a very Karen thing to say and I like it.

Karen Farmer:

So this book is, it’s very fairytale-esque, I would say. It’s about six sisters who live in this kind of marshland village. They live with a really terrible father, but a really wonderful grandmother. And there’s kind of this lore around the existence of six sisters living in a family. So they have learned about this lore. They feel that they are cursed because there are six of them. A bunch of things start happening.

The crux of which is that the Full Moon Fayre comes to their small village and on the last night of the Full Moon Fayre, they are allowed to attend. All kinds of shenanigans start… None of this is spoilery, I promise this is all in the description, but the older sister vanishes after the Full Moon Fayre has been there. Our main character, her name is Willa, kind of where I’m at right now. And this telling is that she’s on a quest to get her sister back, her older sister Grace, and kind of uncover if this curse is real and if it is real, what she needs to do to protect and save her other sisters. Cannot get enough. Highly recommend. I love it.

Craig Silva:

It sounds great.

Karen Farmer:

It’s wonderful.

Craig Silva:

You had me at Moon Fayre or whatever.

Karen Farmer:

Full Moon Fayre. Yes.

Craig Silva:

Yeah. It reminds me of the night market and all of that.

Karen Farmer:

Yeah. And what’s the Erin Morgenstern book, The Night Circus?

Craig Silva:

Mm-hmm.

Karen Farmer:

That beautiful, beautiful book. That cover is one of my favorite book covers I think I’ve ever seen.

Craig Silva:

Which cover? I have three copies of that book.

Karen Farmer:

It makes sense.

Craig Silva:

It’s a problem. And if a new edition comes out, I will buy it.

Karen Farmer:

You’ll get that too.

Craig Silva:

Yes.

Karen Farmer:

Well, there’s also one other thing I’m reading, but I suspect that you might be reading it or have just finished it as well.

Craig Silva:

Yeah, don’t steal my thunder here.

Karen Farmer:

I shan’t. Craig, what are you reading right now?

Craig Silva:

Oh my God, I thought you’d never ask. I just finished Stars in Your Eyes by Kacen Callender.

Karen Farmer:

Yay.

Craig Silva:

I love this book so much. It is very difficult at points. There’s a lot of trauma and heartbreak, it’s very difficult, but it’s also extremely funny. It’s got it all. I love this book. For listeners, I’m going to sum this up as shortly as I can for an obvious reason that I’ll get to in a second. Basically, there’s this happy-go-lucky actor who everyone loves and I bet he’s never jaywalked, he’s the golden boy, I think is what they keep calling him in the book. And he’s co-starring in a film with the complete opposite, the grumpy, crotchety, angry, foulmouthed bad boy of Hollywood who’s gotten into tons of tabloidy type issues.

Karen Farmer:

Duffles.

Craig Silva:

Yes. And the film is tanking basically because of drama. So they pretend to be fake boyfriends for the sake of the film. And that is not a spoiler, that’s on the jacket. So I won’t go any further. But it is lovely. And the reason I won’t go any further is because we are going to be talking about this book a whole lot because Kacen Callender is our next guest for the podcast. At the time of rec-

Karen Farmer:

I’m so excited.

Craig Silva:

I know. This is your V.E. Schwab moment as you’ve put it.

Karen Farmer:

It is. I have been hoping for so long that we could talk to Kacen and yes, this is the equivalent of when you got to talk to V.E. Schwab. Felix Ever After by Kacen Callender is one of my favorite books of all time. I cannot recommend it enough. I’m smiling so big.

Craig Silva:

I know. I’m really excited too. Funny enough, this is actually my first Kacen Callender book.

Karen Farmer:

Well, are you going to read the other ones now?

Craig Silva:

Yeah, of course. I love this book, yes. No, I’m so, so excited. And at the time of recording, we are interviewing Kacen tomorrow.

Karen Farmer:

I’m so nervous.

Craig Silva:

I’m nervous for you. Is that helpful?

Karen Farmer:

Gee, thanks.

Craig Silva:

So yes, super exciting. Go buy this book, it is so good. So that is the book that I finished. And not to belabor this podcast and just add the minutes, but I do, I’m obsessed with the book that I’m reading right now, so I want to talk about it for a second.

Karen Farmer:

Belabor. Belabor it. Yeah, belabor it. Tell me everything.

Craig Silva:

I am midway through maybe about 40 to 50% ish of a book that I am falling in love with. It’s not a haunted house book in the sense of what you would think, but it totally is a haunted house book. It’s very unique. It’s told from multiple perspectives, which I love. And the house is one of the perspectives, which I think is very fun. When I say this book has trigger warnings, there’s an entire part before the audiobook starts and there’s an entire page about it in the paper book. This book has all of the trigger warnings. Everyone’s exists. They’re in this book. So this book is very, it’s difficult to read. It’s got transphobia, it’s got self-harm, assault. It’s very hard, but totally worth it if that is something that’s not going to bother you. Obsessed with this book.

Karen Farmer:

Did you say the title and the author name?

Craig Silva:

Oh, no. Really burying the lead here, so thanks. This is why you’re… Thanks for keeping the podcast on track, Karen. The name of the book is Tell Me I’m Worthless by Alison Rumfitt.

Karen Farmer:

I can’t wait to pick this up.

Craig Silva:

That’s it. That’s all I’m reading.

Karen Farmer:

Well, thank you for the recommendations. One of them I am also currently reading and I’m glad that you didn’t say more about Stars in Your Eyes because I have just a smidgen left to finish tonight, so I appreciate.

Craig Silva:

I was bordering on spoilers too, so yeah.

Karen Farmer:

Oh, that would’ve been cruel and unusual. Well, are we allowed to talk about the next episodes we have coming up? Because I’m very excited about that.

Craig Silva:

Well, we just did.

Karen Farmer:

Yeah, I know. But okay, so as of right now, the day we are recording this, the Libro.fm team, many of us are going to go to Austin, Texas for the Texas Book Festival. And Craig and I have this really cool opportunity to interview a bunch of the authors that are going to be there. We’ve been doing all kinds of emailing, all kinds of scheduling. Thank you Craig, for wrangling-

Craig Silva:

There’s a lot of spreadsheets involved.

Karen Farmer:

Yes, I was going to say thank you for wrangling this epic spreadsheet that you’ve created. We are creating this lineup that I just cannot believe in terms of the authors that are going to be talking to us, so get ready.

Craig Silva:

Yeah, it’s pretty crazy actually. I feel like I won’t say who the authors are because a million things could happen. So I don’t want to say that we’re going to have X author and then that person is like, “Sorry, I have to go to a lunch or something.” But I am so excited for this list. One of the authors in particular has written a book that you know I am obsessed with.

Karen Farmer:

I do.

Craig Silva:

It’s not V.E. Schwab. But no, I’m super excited and nervous. It’s going to be a rapid fire of talking to six or seven pretty amazing authors all back to back to back.

Karen Farmer:

And in the same room with them, when the only other time we’ve done this was when we interviewed Ann Patchett in Nashville. So here we go. Come on the journey with us.

Craig Silva:

I will say that when we did that, I was insanely nervous, not only because it was Ann Patchett, but I’ve never done the in-person recording thing before. And it was also episode five, I was a little podcast baby.

Karen Farmer:

We both were, we both were, but we learned a lot. And we’re going to-

Craig Silva:

Yes, it’s now been a year, so hopefully we can do this slightly better now.

Karen Farmer:

Basically experts.

Craig Silva:

Yes.

Karen Farmer:

And you mentioned this tomorrow. At the time of recording, we’re talking to Kacen Callender, which is going to be wonderful if I can keep my ash together and not just completely fan mode on.

Craig Silva:

From your face right now, I am not confident.

Karen Farmer:

You’re concerned? And then we’re talking about a few other things, but the one thing I wanted to mention is that I have my heart set on a romance bookstore episode for February. There are so many amazing bookstores that are dedicated to romance and have just been so beautifully created and curated, I’m thinking about Meet Cute. I’m thinking about The Ripped Bodice. I could just talk about this all day long. So we’re hoping to get some of the store owners and booksellers from those shops together on the podcast and talk to them a little bit more about how they’ve built these beautiful spaces and how they curate their titles.

Craig Silva:

And to be very on the nose, this episode should air in February for Valentine’s Day.

Karen Farmer:

Hooray.

Craig Silva:

How adorable.

Karen Farmer:

So if you work at Meet Cute or Ripped Bodice and you’re hearing this, please expect-

Craig Silva:

Give us an email.

Karen Farmer:

… an email shortly.

Craig Silva:

Yes. All right, Karen, we have teased enough episodes. We’re all the way into February. I think it’s time to wrap this podcast up. Do you want to hit us with the tagline?

Karen Farmer:

I would love to. As always, thank you for listening.