Features
It's Been a Novel Experience
Guelph-Humber master's student enjoys positive reviews for debut novel
BY REBECCA KENDALL
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| Zoe Whittall is making her mark on Canadian literature after the 2007 release of her first novel, Bottle Rocket Hearts. Photo by Kelly Clipperton |
She's been called cocky, brash, funny, tough and elegant, but 20 years ago, Zoe Whittall was like many other girls growing up in the '80s. She listened to Madonna, Culture Club and the Police and read books by popular children's authors Judy Blume and Paula Danziger. She also wrote her own stories, something she started doing even before she learned to print.
“I'd dictate my stories to my mother, and she'd put them down on paper for me.”
Today, the University of Guelph-Humber student is making her mark on Canadian literature after the 2007 release of her first novel, Bottle Rocket Hearts.
The novel is one of many books included in the 2008 Campus Authors recognition event to be held Oct. 30 from 4:30 to 6 p.m. in the McLaughlin Library.
By the end of 2007, the book had caught the eye of a number of literary critics, including a reviewer from the Globe and Mail who wrote: “Zoe Whittall might just be the cockiest, brashest, funniest, toughest, most life-affirming, elegant, scruffy, no holds-barred writer to emerge from Montreal since Mordecai Richler.”
She says reading that review in the pages of one of Canada's most prestigious papers was one of the top 10 moments of her life. “I was happy and stunned.”
The newspaper included Bottle Rocket Hearts in its list of top 100 books of 2007; Quill and Quire magazine placed it among its top 10.
“The book did really well,” says Whittall. “It went beyond my expectations in the mainstream press, it reached people I didn't expect it to, and I got a lot more support from the mainstream literary world than I'd anticipated. That was amazing, and I feel pretty awesome about that.”
Now pursuing a master's degree in creative writing at Guelph-Humber, Whittall was also named Emerging Artist of 2007 by NOW Magazine and received the 2008 Dayne Ogilvie Grant. The $4,000 award is funded by an endowment established by Robin Pacific and given by the Writers' Trust of Canada to an emerging gay writer.
“Bottle Rocket Hearts is a story about a young woman named Eve who comes into her own surrounded by the political climate in Montreal right before and after the referendum,” she says. “It looks at '90s feminism and the queer-core scene and what effect they had on the people involved.”
Whittall grew up on a sheep farm in South Durham, Que., and moved to Montreal as a teenager. She says some of the book's inspiration came from her experiences as a student at Dawson College in the mid-'90s living in the “plateau” area of Montreal, which, at the time, was known for its vibrant arts community.
“The plot isn't autobiographical, but the milieu is what I experienced. I went to school around the time Eve did and came out about the same time she did, but I didn't have a gay best friend, I didn't have a roommate who died and I didn't have a crazy first girlfriend.”
Success has been a long time coming for the 32-year-old writer. Although she had been involved in Toronto's arts scene as a spoken-word artist and folksinger and had contributed to a number of independent zines since moving to the city, she wasn't sure how to get to the next level as a writer.
“I always thought the things I was doing were separate from being an author, capital A. I always had aspirations to be one of those authors, but I never thought it was a real option.”
That was until she took a writing course through George Brown College's continuing education program and started writing and networking.
“Every time I met a writer, I'd invite the person out for coffee to ask questions about how he or she got into the industry. I was told it would be hard to make my living as a writer, but I'm glad I stuck to it.”
Whittall got her first taste of the publishing world after releasing her first book of poetry, The Emily Valentine Poems, in 2006 with the help of her writing instructor at George Brown.
She has since published two more books of poetry, The Best 10 Minutes of Your Life and Precordial Thump, which is scheduled for release this month.
“It's an autobiographical book that talks about the demise of a relationship and the starting of a new one,” she says. “It examines confessional poetry and takes it apart in terms of what's truth and what's not.”
Whittall is also working on a second novel that follows the lives of three Torontonians, two of whom are involved in a bike accident.
“One of the characters is a paramedic, and the other is an agoraphobic. The story looks at how emergencies affect their world. The agoraphobic is always monitoring and being afraid of what could happen, and the paramedic is constantly dealing with emergencies, so it looks at their relationship because they're on opposite ends of the spectrum.”
She did research by tagging along with an ambulance team to see what they experience.
“I'm dating a paramedic now, so when I go out with her work friends, I'm constantly asking them questions.”
Despite her early successes, Whittall enrolled at Guelph-Humber after the release of Bottle Rocket Hearts because she was uncertain about how the book would be received and was driven to hone her talent.
“The idea of having a master's degree was really exciting to me because this kind of formal education boosts your employment options. So I took a chance, and when I arrived, I really liked it. The faculty are very supportive, and the class is small and talented.”