fwriction

Matt Robison, of The Morning News, discusses writing in New Orleans, “from Early Times to Katrina cliches,” with a circle of writers:

Pia Z. Ehrhardt: The city’s charms and clichés are hard to keep at bay. Before Katrina, I worked small, inside the houses, inside the characters. I’m interested in the unexpected, corner-of-the-frame details. The stuff tourists can’t get to without a local taking them in. People work hard and play hard here. It’s not all gumbo and parades, bohemia and funk. The books written after Katrina—Dave Eggers’s Zeitoun, Tom Piazza’s City of Refuge, Mary Robison’s One D.O.A., One on the Way—dealt with the aftermath more frontally. It’s going to be interesting to see how writers handle Katrina now, to see what role the storm plays in novels and stories, and if it’s anachronistic to set a book right after Katrina. I think many of us are made uncomfortable by the seriesTreme, how it’s rehashing and generalizing what we have moved beyond. How will we write about the quieter, less obvious pressures of living right now in a wounded, mending city?