Open Mic: Nicola Griffith talks about her novel “Always”

I wanted a serious challenge: to reimagine Aud Torvingen, the Norwegian über-woman who always wins. The woman I’ve been writing about for ten years in The Blue Place, then Stay, and now Always. I also wanted to have a blast, to write something smartly plotted, richly textured, and stuffed with joy–something that also cracked Aud open a little (because seamless protagonists are, y’know, boring). But everytime I settled in to write, I’d get another email from a reader of the first two books wanting to know where they could learn what Aud knows, how they could stride as confidently through the world as she does. And, oho, I thought.

I’d get Aud to teach a self-defense class to ten Atlanta women. The kind of women who are her exact opposite. The kind, as her friend Dornan would say, with “big hair, big teeth, big nails–the kind who have babies!” Aud is amazed (and amused and appalled) by these women. And things go wrong. (I mean really wrong: suburban kitchen dripping like a vampire-party-cavern wrong.)

I taught self-defense for a living in the UK. I know it works. Here are some U.S. Department of Justice statistics: unarmed women fight off unarmed rapists successfully 72% of the time; those armed with a knife, 58% of the time; those with a gun, 51%. More than a 50% chance of winning, even if he has a gun. And these stats are for untrained, unarmed women.

Aud and I know a lot of nifty tricks. We know what to look for, how to assess risk, the best way to respond. In Always it’s all laid out neatly, step-by-step, and much more fun to read than a manual because, well, I cut all the boring bits. Because it’s a novel.

Actually, it’s two novels. Two narratives with their own characters, themes, setting, plot. One set in the immediate past, in Atlanta; one set in the present, in Seattle. I thought it would be cool to make this a book you could read either as an integrated whole, in the order presented in the text, or in chronological order, reading the entire lessons/Atlanta/blood-on-the-floor story first, followed by the Seattle/investigative/blow-shit-up narrative. The tricky part was to make sure the reader would be rewarded by doing either. So I paid particular attention to metaphor systems and emotional arcs and the weather, so both could stand on their own and resonate with each other. And I had a blast. (Literally so in the Seattle timeline, where I get to blow up a film set, throw people off tall buildings, and set things on fire.)

It’s a big book, 528 pages, so there’s room for a whole shedload of other stuff, too, like tricksy politicians, worried indie producers, friendship, family, fabulous food, great art and awesome sex. Also weird, foreign juxtapositional humour. There’s even an earthquake. Sort of. And it all makes sense–apart from one sequence where I bet you a beer you won’t have a clue what’s going on for nearly a page, or, if you’re very quick, a paragraph.

And, hey, it might save your life.

Nicola Griffith