Here at Big Shiny Robot we spend a lot of time bringing you the big news in entertainment and geekdom but we have a special place in our cold, steel, heart compartments for independent artists. To that end we’re bringing you another installment of Indie Books, wherein we feature an independent author and their work. This time around we visited with Phoenix, a local author in Salt Lake City, to talk about his previous novel “Silent Noise” as well as his most recent semi-autobiographical novel “The Street Kid.”
Hi. I’m Phoenix. I’m a local writer in Salt Lake City. In this day and age, with the arts devalued for not being utilitarian in their approach, I try to maximize my own artistic impulses and my creativity by not worrying so much about how my works of literature are appropriate for what society deems useful, but rather, going off an intuitive feeling of what I feel is beautiful, expressive, honest, authentic, and most importantly, meaningful and real.
But this hardly means that I write strictly for hardcore existentialists, Romantics, and naturalists, or for the literary elite in academia, for that matter. I write, rather, for anyone who is interested in what I have to say. With my work, I try to craft something meaningful: something artistic, to be sure, but also something that is truly expressive and unique. I write things that don’t make you think to make you feel idiotic, but to invite you to share my quest on the search for truth, beauty, and honesty. And if you just so happen to be a raging Postmodernist, then yes, I’m open to the idea that we aren’t searching for truth, but simply, a deconstruction of our complex reality.
I write all across the board: Fiction, short fiction, autofiction, autobiography, personal essays, philosophy, plays, poetry … pretty much anything that I can challenge myself to write. Many great writers, such as Sartre and Camus, wrote across varying disciplines and genres to really cultivate their literary and expressive powers. I use this determination as a model for my own work and my own creative impulses.
But again: This doesn’t mean I’m an elitist. I in fact despise the genre/literary fiction dispute that has been raging ever since people wondered whether Philip K. Dick, a down-to-earth science fiction writer, was as valuable as Jorge Luis Borges, an experimental and difficult literary artiste from Latin America. The point being: I blend these elements in my own work.
I’ve written over twenty books, with five published, but for much of my work, I always try to have a speculative bent or angle. This is because I love what the imagination can conjure up and create. “Silent Noise”, my first published book, a novella, is like that. While it may deal with intense conversations about poetry, the plot is rather unusual, in that the story follows the young prodigy Micah Smith, absurdly intelligent and well-versed in the art of poetry, not stopped by the fact that he is deaf and mute, through an odyssey and adventure in poetry: Basically, Micah decides to leave home one day, as a nine-year-old, so he can go learn more about poetry. Micah meets many colorful characters, and talks about poetry as ancient as Plato or as modern as the New York School. And the speculative element comes into play with the cool things that Micah gets to experience, such as when Micah meets the mystical and magical Muse of Poetry, or when Micah sees a surrealist painting come to life around him, or when Micah meets a ghost who is also a girl that he just happens to like. Micah’s gift for poetry is really a gift for honest communication, not about highbrow and elite conversations in academia and in stuffy university classrooms. The whole point is to express, and to express meaning. This means I may not fit perfectly with the expectations of modern science fiction and fantasy … or do I? If we assume that the goal of science fiction and fantasy has always been to merely entertain, like the great writers of the pulp era, then perhaps not … but if we assume that science fiction and fantasy can be both expressive and imaginative and entertaining, then I believe “Silent Noise” meets that criteria.
“The Street Kid” is another book that I have written and published, and it’s one I’m very proud to have in existence. It’s an autofiction, meaning I use fictional elements to talk and write about my life. But there are striking parallels to Hunter S. Thompson and his strategy of constantly making the reader ask, “Is this really happening?” You could even go so far as to compare it to some of Philip K. Dick’s more trippy moments, of delusion and reality and how those two starkly contrast and yet blend in together strangely. In fact, “The Street Kid” wouldn’t be what it was without the influence of modern fantasy and the imprint that modern fantasy has marked on my mind: Where anything becomes possible, where everything is possible.
Anyway, that’s who I am as a writer, and I hope we can connect. You can find my work, which has further links to my blog and YouTube channel, here.
Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Phoenix
I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Phoenix at local readings and have followed his endeavors, both literary and humanitarian, through the magic of the internet. He has always struck me as someone who sees the world differently than most, in mingling tones of light and dark, the kind of person whose mind I’d like to visit. It’s been said that books offer a form of telepathy, allowing the thoughts of one person to travel silently through time and space into another.
Phoenix is offering a special promotion from now through January 7, 2016, “Silent Noise” with an excerpt of “The Street Kid” is free download for Kindle on Amazon. Why not take a vacation in someone else’s thoughts, it won’t cost you anything more than time.
You can find more content from Phoenix at his blog, YouTube channel, and Goodreads.