Brett Benner: 0:00

Can you believe that July is over?

Jason Blitman: 0:02

No, I can't.

Brett Benner: 0:03

July is over. July is over. Oh, my God.

Jason Blitman: 0:08

I'm so over July.

Brett Benner: 0:10

I start to think the thing about summer ending and summer coming to a close are just the shorter days. And I do a long day. But what can you do I like the sun up at eight o'clock, so we're just starting to set. How are you doing?

Jason Blitman: 0:22

I'm good. I like the sun in the morning.

Brett Benner: 0:26

I like the sun and the morning and the moon at night. Gay's reading.

Jason Blitman: 0:31

my god.

Brett Benner: 0:32

It's not a huge publishing week, by the way. I think everything, everything is slowing down a little bit for summer, which is actually really nice.

Jason Blitman: 0:38

yeah.

Brett Benner: 0:39

But there are two titles that I wanted to bring up today.

Jason Blitman: 0:42

Bring them up.

Brett Benner: 0:43

The first is The Wedding People by Alice Nesback, which was just picked this morning as Jenna's pick for August. It is fantastic, and I would highly recommend for anybody who's into the audiobooks to get this one on audio. It's really charming, funny, moving, all about a woman who goes to a very posh hotel to end her life. And unbeknownst to her, the hotel has been taken over by a wedding party, and from the start she has a run in with the bridezilla and what transpires. It's great. The other one is Someone Like Us by Dina Magestu, I hope I'm pronouncing that correct. It's the son of Ethiopian immigrants seeks to understand a hidden family history and uncovers a past colored by unexpected loss, addiction, and the enduring emotional pull towards home. It looks really good. So those are my two.

Jason Blitman: 1:43

Amazing. And as always, if you like what you're hearing, share us with your friends, follow us on social media, at GayzReading and all of the books that we talk about today, which is a lot, because we have fantastic debut authors on the show, and their books, and they talk about books All of those books can be found in our bookshop. org page. The link to that and a whole bunch of other fun stuff is in our show notes. And in order of publication on today's show, we have Alana S. Portero talking to us about her book, Bad Habit. We have Kamel Ejazuddin talking to us about his book, Man Boobs. Bad Habit has been out for a few weeks now. Man Boobs comes out on August 8th. And we also have Gina Maria Balibreira talking to us about her book, The Volcano Daughters, which comes out on August 20th.

Brett Benner: 2:38

That name would've tripped me up.

Jason Blitman: 2:40

So yeah, we're going to talk to them in order of update. So first up we have Alana who's coming to us from Madrid.

Brett Benner: 2:48

Woo.

Jason Blitman: 2:49

I'm Jason

Brett Benner: 2:50

I'm Brett

Jason Blitman: 2:51

and enjoy this upcoming up and coming episode of Gays

Brett Benner: 2:56

Games. Really? Nah.

Jason Blitman: 3:14

Hello.

Brett Benner: 3:14

Hello. Good afternoon. Good evening.

Alana S. Portero: 3:17

afternoon, guys. Hi, how are you doing?

Jason Blitman: 3:20

is that your art behind you?

Alana S. Portero: 3:21

No, it's it's There's some art from little girls beneath you.

Jason Blitman: 3:28

I will say it's a little bit blurry. So

Alana S. Portero: 3:30

sorry. No, but my art looks like something like that.

Jason Blitman: 3:34

I wouldn't have been wrong.

Alana S. Portero: 3:36

I, I draw like a person who's suffering a stroke. So no guys. I'm not to warn you. I understand English perfectly, but I speak like a toddler. So please be

Jason Blitman: 3:47

We love toddlers.

Brett Benner: 3:49

Yes.

Alana S. Portero: 3:49

Okay. But I draw like what?

Jason Blitman: 3:51

how are you doing?

Alana S. Portero: 3:53

I am doing okay. It's very hot here

Brett Benner: 3:56

Very hot.

Alana S. Portero: 3:58

very hot. So I'm doing okay. I'm working, I working a lot this day

Jason Blitman: 4:04

you're in Madrid, which sounds fabulous.

Alana S. Portero: 4:07

sounds fabulous. Madrid is fabulous. I love Madrid. I love my city, but I'm not I'm not enjoying this these days because. I am totally into work. I'm at home. I only see fun through my window.

Brett Benner: 4:22

Congrats.

Jason Blitman: 4:24

Debut. novel, Bad Habit. Congratulations.

Alana S. Portero: 4:30

Thank you very much.

Jason Blitman: 4:32

Can you share the elevator pitch the way that you're talking about the book with us?

Alana S. Portero: 4:38

Bad Habits is a very Classic in a way, a very classic coming out of age novel it's the life of a trans woman trans girl who born and raised in a very poor neighborhood and she tried to live and tried to give herself a life. And uh, it's a a tale or a book about about discover life, about discovering the life.

Jason Blitman: 5:06

Yeah. And that journey.

Alana S. Portero: 5:09

Yes. Okay. See, totally the journey and the difficult to be herself and to be loved and and to love herself and how she confront all of these obstacles, all of these travels and try to be a happy woman, happy girl.

Brett Benner: 5:30

Finding herself and her community.

Alana S. Portero: 5:32

Yes. Especially the community because she's a lovely girl, a very lonely girl, and her her happiness depends a lot of her family. Of her community of the community built through the story through Yes,

Jason Blitman: 5:52

like this, where they're fiction, but the characters feel very, very. familiar. How much Would you say is your experience versus fiction or how much of yourself do you see in this book?

Alana S. Portero: 6:11

I think there's not a single writer Who don't talk about himself, herself, themself. The question is to gay writers, to queer writers all of our work tend to to be received like a first person novel, like a a real life novel. And I think this is It's a little unfair because absolutely my character, my the main character of Bad Habit is like a twin sister of me is and I use a lot of my points of view, my neighborhood. A lot of things to build this character and to write this novel, but I think Philip Roth talk about himself in every single novel that he wrote, and I can't think in a one single writer who don't talk about himself or there's a lot of my experience in the book. There's a lot of my. Of my life in there. What I think is like revisiting the my past to change something, to change, to live another life, to create another branch of reality to to myself.

Brett Benner: 7:24

I love that. I love that.

Jason Blitman: 7:27

something that comes up in the book is the idea of she, she learned to look at herself. without seeing herself. What does that mean to you?

Alana S. Portero: 7:36

Oh my god. The closet is a very dark place and it's like living the life. But you cannot touch the light. And I think this is the idea. She lives she do. The best she can, but she can't touch the life, and she can't touch herself, and she can't see herself. She only see a version of herself. Of or a puppet who she creates to confront a life, to survive, but it's like touching everything with a glove, touching everything and see everything, and she herself through some glasses, through some, through Perspective,

Jason Blitman: 8:22

yeah. I think the way you describe it about experiencing life through glass by touching things with a glove makes total sense, right? The idea that you can only get so close, right? There will always be distance, even if it's, A sliver of, you know,

Alana S. Portero: 8:37

And this is a very incredible experience for using literature. And I think the closet gave us a unique perspective about life that other people cannot experience. And we can. We can do very we can do beautiful things with this awful experience. And this is my intention with the book.

Jason Blitman: 9:00

yeah, for the first time, I've always thought of the closet when we think about the closet and quotation marks as being this dark, scary place. But this is the first time I'm thinking maybe the door to the closet has glass. And you could see through it.

Brett Benner: 9:18

Oh, interesting. I always picture the closet as Narnia.

Alana S. Portero: 9:20

Oh uh, it, kind of, because, because uh, some magic happens inside the closet.

Jason Blitman: 9:29

and some danger Happens

Brett Benner: 9:30

Yeah.

Alana S. Portero: 9:31

I'm from danger. so there's there are witches and bad witches and Alliance. But but yes, I think that this doors made of glasses are a very good approximation, a very good version of the closet. Because you can see life inside the closet. You can see life, but you cannot live. You cannot see, but you cannot

Jason Blitman: 9:53

And I've never ever in my 36 years thought about it that way. And that's very interesting.

Brett Benner: 10:00

There's a great, there's a great thing in this book. Two things I love. One is how you use the city. And the city is almost a character. Sure. And I wanna, there's a quote that you said in another interview which I loved so much that I'd love for you to talk about where you said, I couldn't escape being from Madrid just like I couldn't escape being trans. Can you talk about that?

Alana S. Portero: 10:23

yes, because Madrid is my home. Madrid is the place that give me a life and an opportunity. Madrid in the eighties was a crazy place. A crazy place. In those years in Madrid was happening something called La Movida. There is a cultural movement where, for example, Pedro Almodóvar start his career. And I when I was a child, I see fabulous gay people. In my city, when I go to the, to this, to the center of Madrid, there you will see gay people with so defiant aesthetically incredible and but Madrid and in this, in those years was A very conservative place too. It was two faces of the city. Sometimes you hate Madrid with all your heart. Because Madrid can be a cruel place, or can be a very conservative, very Castilian, like an old time. A very Castilian city. But from one street to another, it's like another world. I think Madrid is a drag queen. I think, Madrid is like she presents herself like a, like an aristocratic city, like a Castilian city, like a conservative woman, but is so fun inside this Under this presentation, it's so fun. It's so dirty. a strange city. And I think we are daughters of our city and we are very, we are we look like our mother.

Jason Blitman: 12:09

How funny. So talking about, really being a drag queen and coming out of the closet and really discovering yourself, something else that comes up in the book is that the idea of discovering yourself should be a cause for celebration. And have you, Been able to celebrate?

Alana S. Portero: 12:25

Yes, totally. Uh, Said just just a moment I have the two experiences that A lot of difficulties, a lot. And I threw a lot of violence. I can throw a lot of violence, but The good times were amazing, and I celebrate myself a lot in the past and in the present. No one in the present, but When I discover the places and people and and all of this life that Madrid can offer, oh, I enjoy a lot. I enjoy a lot. And I celebrate myself. Maybe I can't remember a lot of, I can't remember a lot of my this explosion of life

Jason Blitman: 13:17

hmm.

Alana S. Portero: 13:18

it was amazing. My life is has been a wild trip and a while I went journey. Yeah. But the best thing that that I've been being trans is the best thing of my life. If if I. If I wasn't trans, I'd never write this book, I never knew the best people of my life, the most caring and the most incredible people of my life, so it's a gift. Be like ourselves. It's a gift.

Jason Blitman: 13:48

Yeah, there's something to be said about really learning so much about yourself, and then allowing yourself to live, right? And be you know, You.

Alana S. Portero: 13:58

Yes. Maybe we came later to our lives, but when we we arrive, when we are able to be in the party,

Brett Benner: 14:08

Yeah.

Alana S. Portero: 14:09

party ever, our lives are, I think, I can see now my life like I give like a wonderful thing, including the suffering. I learn a lot. I use this suffering to create beautiful things. So I'm so grateful to my abusers because I'm. I'm getting a lot of money, uh,

Brett Benner: 14:31

Yeah. There was a, there was another interview. There was another I was reading and this is translated. So excuse the translation, but effectively what you were saying is pain is where you find the most beautiful scenes.

Alana S. Portero: 14:41

Absolutely.

Brett Benner: 14:42

I love that so much because it's such a way to turn it and take anything and make it into something beautiful, which is so what you've done with this. Hmm.

Alana S. Portero: 14:55

When we through when we walk paths, dark paths or tragic paths we are the best version of ourselves. And the most when it's dark outside or when it's dark inside, we are free. We are the most perfect version of ourselves, the most precise version of ourselves. We, Don't have to pretend to be another one. We don't have to be polite. We don't have to be nothing but ourselves. And I think. This is beautiful. I think it's beautiful. And I think Maybe, I'm so dramatic. Or, maybe I am the drama. Maybe I am the drama. But I think I love to the most beautiful theater plays are tragedies, are great tragedies. I think tragedies are an opportunity to beauty\,

Jason Blitman: 15:49

Yeah, there's also something to be said about, as queer people we've needed to learn so much about ourselves that, in turn, we can live our lives in a way that other people can't. Yeah.

Alana S. Portero: 16:04

Think we don't have another option. So. You, you have to use whatever life give to you. And if these are dark times, girl, make yourself a dark gown, no? So,

Jason Blitman: 16:17

With some bright lipstick.

Alana S. Portero: 16:18

yes,

Brett Benner: 16:19

how have you found'cause you're also a, you're also a playwright, you're also a director. How have you found, how did you find the experience of writing a novel versus, did you enjoy that? Did you enjoy that versus a play? Did you en

Alana S. Portero: 16:31

Writing a novel is very different than writing a play. Writing a play is so natural for me. I think in visual terms. And I think in this novel, there are a lot of that, where they are it's easy to imagine these chapters in, oh, in a, um, in a stage, there's so theatrical characters and situations. But I think a lot in the text. I think a lot in the novel. I work so hard that when I wrote the novel was a very fast process because I imagined the novel constantly in my head. I I don't wrote the novel, I redacted the novel.

Brett Benner: 17:21

Oh, wow. I love that.

Alana S. Portero: 17:23

Because every single chapter, every single character was in my head. Since, I don't know, five, six, seven years, and it was fast, and I gave myself in this frantic writing in a month fourteen years per day. During a month and I, yes. And

Jason Blitman: 17:47

purged out of you.

Alana S. Portero: 17:49

yes, I spend two hundred and nine ninety six hours writing Bad

Brett Benner: 17:54

524,

Jason Blitman: 18:00

296 hours.

Alana S. Portero: 18:02

Yes. 296 hours

Jason Blitman: 18:05

Divided by 24. So it only took you under 12 and a half days to write the book. In terms of hours, in terms of hours. I'm sure that took you

Brett Benner: 18:16

Space that how many days you'd like.

Jason Blitman: 18:18

Yeah. Are you reading anything that you're loving these days?

Alana S. Portero: 18:22

oh, a lot, but do you know Laurie John Joseph?

Jason Blitman: 18:27

No,

Alana S. Portero: 18:28

Lauren John Joseph is an incredible writer trans woman who writes beautifully.

Jason Blitman: 18:35

At certain points we touch?

Alana S. Portero: 18:37

Alice yes, a certain point. Yes, we touch. She's incredible. She's incredible.

Jason Blitman: 18:41

Oh, good to know.

Alana S. Portero: 18:43

I strongly recommend it.

Brett Benner: 18:45

Great.

Alana S. Portero: 18:45

she's great.

Jason Blitman: 18:46

Cool. I can't wait for everyone to follow your journey. When we posted that we were talking to you, so many people replied saying how much they love the book and how excited they were for this conversation because they love the book. They love you. Congratulations.

Alana S. Portero: 19:02

Oh, thank, thank you very much. Thank you very much. Sorry for my bad English, but you were

Brett Benner: 19:08

No, it's so fine. it's better than our Spanish.

Jason Blitman: 19:12

Have a wonderful rest of your day. Although it's evening for you, so have a good dinner.

Alana S. Portero: 19:16

Thank you guys, thank you for having me.

Jason Blitman: 19:17

That was Alana S. Portero. Make sure to check out her book, Bad Habit, which is out now. And next up, we are talking to Kamel Ajazuddin book, Manboobs, comes out on August 8th. So it's so hard with memoirs to ask for a logline or an elevator pitch

Komail Aijazuddin: 19:40

I come prepared.

Jason Blitman: 19:42

But that doesn't surprise me. But what would you say your elevator pitch is for the book?

Komail Aijazuddin: 19:48

When we were pitching it, we sent it out as a memoir about growing up gay and fat in Pakistan and the global South, indeed. And at Post 9 11 America, but told from the perspective of musical theater. That being said, I hope that it's a lot more than. about trauma and carbs and there's other things in it. But that's the elevator pitch was what it was like to grow up gay and fat outside of hegemonic kind of queer culture which stands in for an American culture. And seeing it and experiencing it Alice through the Looking Glass through television and through movies. And I was lucky enough to travel to London and the States when I was a child several times. And so I saw some Broadway musicals. I remember seeing Starlight Express in London. I saw Topol and Fiddler in 94. And there were these kinds of impressions, but most of my experience of that world came through, through television and movies. And the kind of shock of coming here and realizing that was a one way conversation, actually. It was a monologue from American culture to me. It did not.

Jason Blitman: 20:42

Or in, right in, or you engage. Yeah.

Komail Aijazuddin: 20:46

so that was and it took a while to separate. So in writing the book I wanted to find out which parts, examine all the parts of my life that had contributed to what I consider my gay identity. Even that implies it's somehow separate, but I was getting back to a very basic level of existence, which, because of our sexuality, I think is a way that we view the world before identity politics, which turns out to be the way that others view us. And yes, I was a huge fan of Judy, but no one asked me about that. They kept asking me if I rode camels to to college, which, and of course I said, yes, of course, didn't you?

Jason Blitman: 21:16

An alternate title for the book could be more than trauma and carbs.

Komail Aijazuddin: 21:22

I know. I wanted to call it Man Boo is a Tale of Two Tiddies, but my publishers were adamant that would not happen.

Jason Blitman: 21:28

That was too titillating for them.

Brett Benner: 21:30

Oh.

Komail Aijazuddin: 21:31

It had the whole it had the whole like old literature reference points and stuff. And at the end, I think the British edition has something on the back that says, I'm just a man standing in front of a salad, asking it to be a cake, which is a line I took from Notting Hill.

Brett Benner: 21:44

my

Komail Aijazuddin: 21:44

And I thought

Brett Benner: 21:45

so genius. That is so genius.

Jason Blitman: 21:48

what kind of cake would you want it to be?

Komail Aijazuddin: 21:50

Oh my God, you might as well ask me which is my favorite painting I've ever made. I I am an equal opportunist. Actually, I've discovered a bakery quite near my place in the city, which I'm super into it. They do this sinful chocolate cake. But I in the summers, I I like cheesecake. I think anyone who's a Dorothy fan or like a Golden Girls fan, it's always going to be a cheesecake.

Jason Blitman: 22:09

Cheesecake.

Komail Aijazuddin: 22:11

was a very strange place the first time I went there. I was 12 and I walked into this place and I thought, God, do you live here? It was overwhelming, yeah, because they also give you a book from which to choose. And it was the first sense, I've been told, there's also this common refrain about coming to an American grocery store and suddenly seeing 58 versions of cereal boxes and stuff like that. And that I didn't mind. It was only when I was confronted with the cheesecakes and I was like, it is true. There is choice. There are

Brett Benner: 22:36

and here's what I ask, but are you a little bit of a purist with your cheesecake with just like a little strawberry on top? Or cherry,

Komail Aijazuddin: 22:43

It is possibly my most democratic feature in that I do not discriminate against any kind of cheesecake. But I, if there's a bit of fruit on it, it makes me feel better because it but honestly, anything it is healthy, but then a good cheesecake. I know there's a obviously British Bake Off is a program that I watch quite religiously. And one of the things that they, the refrains that they use is it worth the calories? And the older I get, the more that's becoming a a kind of concern because there's a lot of quite crap out there in terms of the cakes that they sell. And so when you find one that makes you feel like it's worth it. It is, it makes you feel present. It's like meditation. It's a whole, it's a whole religious experience.

Brett Benner: 23:15

You're right.

Jason Blitman: 23:16

Okay, moving away from desserts, in your book, you, let's use the word, threaten that you might belt out ballads unprovoked what are some of choice?

Komail Aijazuddin: 23:28

Oh wow. Oh, at the moment I'm I think I've got the entirety of Cowboy Carter and repeat in my head, but in terms of musicals that also led the Color Purple. I've been singing out a lot to myself in terms of classics. I always go back to hello Dolly Bar Streisand, the movie version. Uh, Because the, at all of them, it certainly, Ribbons Down My Back, I really love, that wasn't her necessary, but there's another one Love Is Only Love, which I used to hate as a child, because it's got it was this one scene, and there's nothing quite fancy about it, it's a zoom in, but as I've seen it as a, again and again, It's become my favorite song. It's a small little refrain that she does. It's about 30 seconds, and it's about the idea that love is not meant to be Violins and all these things that love is often just a touch or to be and it's a very kind of grounded musical song But I found that musicals in I think that they hold such wisdom within them. I still, I remember the first time I heard Sondheim, speaking of Into the Woods, when he's the line withers wither. And I thought, give them the bullets, I don't know what are we waiting? That was brilliant, and it's like a text,

Jason Blitman: 24:26

that one line alone,

Komail Aijazuddin: 24:27

alone, yeah, there's so many within them, right? The present of the moment to the moment from the I think there was something about that too and towards the end. But yes I belt out those cabarets always a fun thing. Sadly, my my own range is very limited. like a bass baritone. So I can't go up to those things. I

Jason Blitman: 24:42

in the shower, there's no

Komail Aijazuddin: 24:43

yeah. Only when it's not an outdoor show, I've been told to, to keep quiet By noisy neighbors.

Brett Benner: 24:49

You're like, mouth it and do the hand gestures.

Komail Aijazuddin: 24:51

know, lip sync for my life.

Brett Benner: 24:53

exactly

Komail Aijazuddin: 24:54

But those are the things, yeah, and sometimes I'll still sing as a child I remember singing that whistle song from the King and I to feel better. And small things like that

Jason Blitman: 25:01

exactly what it was designed for.

Komail Aijazuddin: 25:03

know it, it did, it worked completely. I wish I had a hoops skirt to go with it, but I I didn't.

Jason Blitman: 25:08

Those are good choices.

Brett Benner: 25:09

You talk about I, just the global, like you just said, they talk about Disney and all the fascination with Disney. And I'm very curious who you identify with the most of the villains.

Komail Aijazuddin: 25:18

Ursula, always Ursula.

Jason Blitman: 25:20

Duh.

Brett Benner: 25:20

But it's all of that, but also, there were so many points, and you were looking at it from a whole different lens, but like the Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and also Buffy the Vampire Slayer in terms of the parallels with mysticism, and also what Buffy was talking about, and what they were doing in terms of otherness. And when Buffy was created, Josh Whedon was really taking something to make a story about what it was like to be in high school. And that's what it really was. And these monsters were representative of our fears and insecurities and all of these different things. And then it morphed into this mythological thing that he created out of it, which was,

Komail Aijazuddin: 25:54

Yeah, an entire multiverse, actually, of like different mythologies and it's continuing to this day. The wonderful thing about I think Buffy was that, much like any of the kind of cultural products that we identify with as queer people, be it Buffy or even Ally McBeal, even like Insects in the City, you identify

Jason Blitman: 26:10

Golden Girls, which already came out

Komail Aijazuddin: 26:12

Golden Girls, right? You identify with a character who does not necessarily have, in stereotypical terms, the power, you would assume, in that place to exact, to enact change. And yet, in these situations, they have all the power, and so the damsel in distress becomes the nightmare of monsters. And I think that it's in the same way that X Men, for example, or comic books, when I was a child, the idea that someone oppressed can have, access to power in a literal way or dark Phoenix or any of these kind of comic characters that created Catwoman. And that's, it's a queer dream. It's something that sustains us. I think when we're going through periods of either change or kind of enormous pressure from the outside to change fixed points like these become very useful. And particularly abroad. As well as here, but one of the things that also I'd maintained throughout this was as my, as fan, as big a fan as I am of American television and movies, I had wanted in the book to be able to strike a balance between the idea that yes, we see these things and I know what a street in San Diego would look like. What is disturbing to me is that the reverse is not true. And so that And that's one of the things that the book was about, was to be able to talk about these experiences that may not be read, that other people may not have read about before, in American humor particularly. And to come at it from a place that is not asking for inclusion or demanding acceptance, it's quite the opposite. It's, it exists as it is, and it exists with a, hopefully a certain amount of witty humor in which I'm hoping that they will be able to, because human is the best way to, I think, to be able to connect with other people and particularly across cultures, because when you hear Pakistan or when you hear Muslim, there are very different connotations of what that means in this country. And it was it's nice to be able to expand that that definition.

Brett Benner: 27:49

I think that most of these tabs were literally because

Komail Aijazuddin: 27:52

Oh,

Brett Benner: 27:53

It's so beautiful and heartbreaking. But. It is so funny. It is so funny. So much of it.

Komail Aijazuddin: 28:02

relieved because a sense of humor is always something that you hope you share, particularly with an audience as large as any kind of book with is hoping to reach. But yeah, that's the advantage of being able to use something like pop culture. And or musicals or what is considered light or soft entertainment, which I've never quite understood. I'm a painter by profession. And so the idea of high art versus low art has never really made sense to me in that context. But yes I would love to get into the second part of the book is slightly more about my experiences once I've come to the States and the the kind of dissonance that brought up, but hopefully the humor still runs through the rest of those instances.

Jason Blitman: 28:36

I would say too though, you know you earlier you said you hope that, it helps an American reader get a chance to have some insight to life in Pakistan and visualize the streets that you live on, to quote my

Komail Aijazuddin: 28:51

And also visualize their own streets

Jason Blitman: 28:53

Oh I was actually going to say, I think for me, so much of it was self reflection too, and in particular, when you talk about needing to make a choice between your home and yourself, and it was just an interesting thing. thought exercise

Komail Aijazuddin: 29:10

Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 29:10

to to not feel, you clearly didn't feel yourself at home and where one should be able to feel like themselves at home and they should almost be synonymous.

Komail Aijazuddin: 29:20

In that sense, a queer experience and an immigrant experience are twins. And I say that in the book, because there's a sense that you're leaving one place, but also that you're hoping for inclusion in another. The promise of immigration is also the promise of inclusion. And that at some stage, once you've passed the certain barriers to entry and prove certain things that you would be included within what is considered an America. That's an idea that I think the country is grappling with right now, but Am I, someone who'd been here for 20 years, have an American passport, but because I speak differently and look slightly different, then what does that constitute me as an American? And I've been to college here, and all of my references were from here, and I've been coming here since I was nine, but those things are not necessarily immediately apparent when you come here as an immigrant or a queer person. And so for me, I'd wanted to intertwine both of those experiences because the intersectionality of any of our identities, were never one thing. And one of the joys about writing the book was to also be able to write about stuff like art or politics or immigration or family issues and stuff that doesn't necessarily it's not simply about one's sexuality, but also about how you move as a holistic human, like a fully realized human through the world, no matter where you are.

Jason Blitman: 30:28

Yeah. You talked about this process being cathartic for you. Is there anything that maybe surprised you by this, writing this?

Komail Aijazuddin: 30:35

I'm surprised by how much I cried.

Jason Blitman: 30:37

Oh, wow.

Komail Aijazuddin: 30:38

Yeah, it was almost as if all of the scar tissue was coming out. One of the, one of the feedbacks that I've been getting about the book is the sincerity of the prose. And I'm often asked, how did you talk about things that are so personal? And at the time I didn't, when I was writing it, I didn't think of them as particularly personal. They were just the headlines in my head all the time. But in writing about them, I think even in addressing something as, as simple as being overweight and what that meant for me growing up and even talking about something like to a, Part of the book also has something about gynecomastia and the idea of how you're going to be able to deal with man boobs and it's, there was a study recently that came out the day before yesterday that 99, 97 percent of all gender reassignment surgeries are actually gynecomastia surgeries performed on heterosexual boys to reduce their breasts. And that, when I started thinking about it as gender affirming surgery it's a completely different way of looking at something like this, like gynecomastia. And I found it was yeah, it was an emotional and these are very personal kind of thoughts, but it was also, there's a sense of bringing sunlight to parts that I had assumed would remain locked and dark and damp for the rest of my life. And there was a toxicity that was rising from those the older I got. I came out to my school friends when I was 16. So I was out in high school in Pakistan and I was the first person who was out in my dorms in college. And I've always been. I assumed I was light years behind people, but I, so I came out wherever I was, but the the realization that journey never ends and that there's it's not as if you come out and suddenly everything's fine. You you negotiate professions in a different way. You negotiate the subway in a different way. You negotiate your family relationships in a different way, your courtship, your your relationship to your body, your relationship to clothes. I wore a cast down the other day and I started crying because there's all of this built up.

Brett Benner: 32:23

Now, I have a question because in the book you have obviously a very A complicated and I think identifiable relationship with your parents in regard to your sexuality and I found very much parallels with my own family with that because my father and my mother seem to track exactly the way yours did or has will they read the book?

Komail Aijazuddin: 32:43

Yes, I'm sure. I think that the relationships that I describe in the book about with my parents, my parents are both extraordinary writers in their own right and collectors and readers. So I learned a lot from them in terms of how to express oneself. In many ways I think what I demanded of anyone around me was complete acceptance, and often. Sometimes I look back at those kinds of demands and wonder whether it's, did I ask for too much? There's a sliding scale with stuff like this and people have to be given their time and all the platitudes that we hear when something like this comes up. I am going to be 40 later this year, and there came a point in my work, I was living as a gay man in Pakistan, I was out to my friends and family and everyone knew, and I was making work about it as well but I could not understand why my life, my lived experience did not reflect that inclusion and I think that Has more to do probably with me than them. It was because I, there was all these places that I was going through life with my hands tied behind my back. So I was not making overtly queer work. I was not writing. I had a column for 10 years, for example, in which I use the same voice as this. Sadly, I've never been able to write any other way. I was a journalism major and they hated me because I mean like they, They're trying to strip you of all your personality in journalism writing. And they took one read of my first paragraph and no no, you should go to the op ed classes. come to here, which is what I did. But there, Hopefully they will read the book and hopefully anyone who knows me, the weird thing is anyone who knows me who's read the book, the first thing they do is come up and give me a giant hug,

Brett Benner: 34:12

get

Komail Aijazuddin: 34:12

But I've often thought that beyond even radical honesty, this kind of to use humor to access vulnerability and then in turn To become as vulnerable and honest as possible is, I think, the closest thing to truth that you can get. Particularly with an experience as specific as queerness or being Muslim or being Pakistani, any of these things the more specific you get in your own self, the things that you think no one else thinks and the things that you believe you're the only one who feels and thinks about yourself, from your body image to what you eat to where you go and how you stand, how much money, all of that, everyone thinks that. Every single person I've met has the same awful person in their head with this running commentary of critique saying, you are not good enough. You have to be better. You should do this better. You didn't do that. That person hates you. You're still that person in high school. You will never, you're never going to be jello, and it's just a thing. And to be able to conquer that I think is a lifelong journey. And writing the book was cathartic, and also in the sense that I'm now able to hold space for myself rather than requiring other people to accept or reject. So it's not necessarily that you don't give away the power but it takes a while to get to a stage like that. But I use my family in the book as a standin also for just Pakistani society, the kind of the. The love and the affection and the, and all of the wonderful memories that I have are as much a part of my experience of that place and my own family as indeed anything else is. And so at a certain point, I think the thing that started affecting me when, I decided I am an artist and I'm a writer it is ridiculous that I have to not talk about such a huge part of my existence and how I look at the world. All of these things that I was bubbling with, I got to tell someone about blasphemy and about paintings and about the fight with a tampon and all of those things. I just needed to get it out of me. And once it, once I did, there was a certain sense of calm that and I was quite surprised by that, the sense of peace. I stepped out in the street the other day in Manhattan in a car whizzed by a cab and I was like inches away and my first thought was, at least the book's back, was funny. Yes. Acceptance. Yes.

Jason Blitman: 36:11

We've kept you for so long, but I have to ask if there are any books that you are recommending that you're excited about, or that you've read recently, or that are coming out soon.

Komail Aijazuddin: 36:22

At the moment I'm reading something by Obeid Mukundji, who is an English writer. Who does detective stories set in 19, 19, Calcutta. But actually that said, there's a, there is a book that at the moment of serving as a, as the.

Jason Blitman: 36:35

The stand

Komail Aijazuddin: 36:35

stand for my computer and it's called The Secret Life of Country Gentlemen and it is about two queer gay male characters in 18 something in England and one is a pirate and the other is a lord or something and then they fall in love. It's, it is essentially Jane Austen but like for us and it's quite wonderful in this

Jason Blitman: 36:54

Oh, how fun.

Komail Aijazuddin: 36:55

swashbuckling kind of

Brett Benner: 36:56

Oh, it's KJ Charles.

Komail Aijazuddin: 36:58

Yes.

Jason Blitman: 36:58

Kumail, such a pleasure to have you. Congratulations

Brett Benner: 37:03

So excited for you. It's a beautiful, fantastic book. I

Komail Aijazuddin: 37:07

Thank you so much. It's very kind of you, and I'm really happy to be able to share this with your listeners in the hopes that they will be able to find something that matters to their own life in which they might be able to talk about.

Jason Blitman: 37:17

The full title is Man Boobs, a Memoir of Musicals, Visas, Hope, and Cake.

Komail Aijazuddin: 37:22

all whiz

Jason Blitman: 37:23

Just as we started, we are ending. Cake, may you have all of the cheesecake the rest of the summer. Thank you for being here.

Komail Aijazuddin: 37:30

Thank you very much. Thank you so much. It was such a pleasure to be on your show. Thank you.

Jason Blitman: 37:34

Thank you. Pleasure having you. All right. Go, go have fun in the sun. Now we have Gina Maria Balibrera. talking to us about her book, The Volcano Daughters, again, which comes out on August 20th.

Brett Benner: 37:51

How are you?

Gina María Balibrera: 37:52

Hello. Thank you so much for having me.

Jason Blitman: 37:54

Thank you so much for

Brett Benner: 37:55

being had.

Jason Blitman: 37:57

How are you doing today?

Gina María Balibrera: 37:58

I'm doing well. Yeah. Doing well. Happy to talk with you both today.

Jason Blitman: 38:02

We always ask for an elevator pitch. Do you have an elevator pitch for The Volcano Daughters.

Gina María Balibrera: 38:07

Sure. Sure. Absolutely. Basically it's the story told by a course of women ghosts, from the first page you're dealing with something a little strange for women who are narrating their stories, their lives and the stories of two sisters, Graciela and Consuelo. In the aftermath, long aftermath of a massacre in 1932 that takes the lives of our chorus, spares the lives of these two sisters. And this is their sort of reclaiming of a narrative that has been obscured and hasn't always been written from their points of view and from their terms. So this is them reclaiming the story and also I think having a little bit of fun with with myth making, with the creation of new worlds Yeah,

Jason Blitman: 38:53

How did this story come to be?

Gina María Balibrera: 38:55

I started writing the story in 2011 right before I started grad school here at University of Michigan. And it started as a, I was I was in Bogota for a summer and I was I was writing a lot and I was writing a story. So it started with these four women and their voice. And I just wanted to follow their voice. And the initial kind of iteration of this book was in the form of a short story. And I I really had a lot that I wanted to say in 25 pages, and I think a little bit frightened by the idea of writing a gigantic novel. But then I realized that I wanted to bring out the voices of these two sisters and. As I, was doing research, as I I was fortunate enough to get a grant through my grad program to go to France and study what I could find of a historical figure who inspired the character of Consuelo's older sister and so to like the Surrealist Museum in the south of France. I went to visit different apartments where she lived. I went to visit student archives. And I just I just kept it going. I eventually did have my first draft of the whole book I guess like 2013. Sorry, this answer might be way too

Jason Blitman: 40:18

So I'm, I think I'm just so surprised that you started with the voice of the ghost from the perspective of the ghosts. Where did, were they always telling the story of the sisters or did you just like, how did the voice of the ghosts come to you? I, that is what I'm so surprised and curious about.

Gina María Balibrera: 40:36

I yearned for they're playful and somewhat they're they're out of time, but the time they die, they are three of them are 18, one of them 16. And so they have that sort of like teenage, Girl authority where they know everything and they are the absolute experts of their experience. And then of course, as the book goes on they become older in different ways. And they gain more of that authority of age. And but I yearned for that. I think that that figure that like verb and that sort of, I yearned for their, Like anger and their their sass too. Like I wanted them to speak back and provide like a playful corrective to a lot of this, the narratives that have been written about the place and about this period of time. This is a history that I've always been very, reverent about, fascinated, curious, and, sad about, I think it's just it's, um, it's horrific and ugly, but I also, I didn't want the narrative to be, Entirely flat and dismal either. I wanted their lives to be visible on the page and for the joy in their voices to be there too.

Jason Blitman: 41:40

I love, I Obviously, the idea of allowing these humans to not change the narrative because the narrative isn't changing, but to have autonomy over the narrative makes total sense for these ghosts to be the one sort of reclaiming their their culture story. Did the sisters come out of the ghosts or was, or did you always want to tell this sister story?

Gina María Balibrera: 42:03

Yeah, that's a great question. So the ghosts came first and I knew that they would be telling the story of their friend Graciela. So I knew that like they would not have survived this and their friends somehow would. And then as

Jason Blitman: 42:19

again is not a spoiler. We learned that in like the

Gina María Balibrera: 42:21

yeah, we learned that on page one. But so they, I knew that, Graciela is sort of. Had been part of them, and she survives, and they don't, and they are piecing things together and telling her story. And then Isaiah delved into Graciela's world, and, the world I imagined for her after she arrives in the capital, and what is, like the different pressures placed upon her, what's happening in the nation and what's happening back home with the four friends. I was also thinking about her having an older sister and Consuelo came after Graciela. I was just really inspired by a woman who yearns to be an artist, but is always cast as a muse. The historical figure who inspired Consuelo, was part of A circle of surrealist artists in Paris in the 1930s and 40s, but absolutely pushed to the side and, devalued as an artist and as a thinker, even in biographies of some of her more famous counterparts she's past as this very petulant child.

Brett Benner: 43:25

Sisters?

Gina María Balibrera: 43:26

Yes, I do.

Brett Benner: 43:27

I'm also, I, yeah, I just know if it was

Jason Blitman: 43:29

you didn't say if they were siblings or they were sisters.

Brett Benner: 43:32

I'm also, cause I'm so curious too. I was curious about you because you have these two central women, both of who are very artistic and very different ways. One is one, one is a writer and an actress and a dancer and the other is an artist. Is that thread in your family at all? Are you the one artistic person or? Does that exist?

Gina María Balibrera: 43:49

it does exist. Yeah. There's a lot of very creative folks in my family. My parents are, their day jobs were, my mom worked as a nurse and my dad worked as a chauffeur but the way that they met were The classical guitar society in San Francisco, they're both like avid classical guitarists and just like totally devoted musicians. Would tape themselves playing Bach's Tracon a hundred times in between shifts and they were like, so definitely art and music and creativity was always a part of my family growing up, alongside other things like work. But they were absolutely, yeah, they were absolutely, like, readers of poetry, readers, lovers of art, but. Yeah, absolutely. And my siblings are all, I have five siblings and they're all very creative in their own ways.

Brett Benner: 44:38

Where are you in that mix?

Gina María Balibrera: 44:39

I'm in the middle. Yeah, but I'm the oldest, my, my father was married before, and so I'm the oldest of my batch. Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 44:45

And how do you, have your siblings read the book yet?

Gina María Balibrera: 44:49

So no I have one galley in my possession right now that I've been using whenever I have to

Brett Benner: 44:54

Pantheon! Get

Jason Blitman: 44:56

one. We know

Gina María Balibrera: 44:57

No I've received more, but if

Jason Blitman: 44:58

important

Gina María Balibrera: 44:59

I dropped some at, I dropped them at bookstores. I, yeah they will, they'll read it soon.

Jason Blitman: 45:03

I was asking because I'm curious if they, saw any of your relationship in the story.

Gina María Balibrera: 45:12

Oh, yeah.

Jason Blitman: 45:12

because whether you intentionally put it in there or not, I do wonder if they see, if they were to see any of a sibling dynamic that is familiar to them.

Gina María Balibrera: 45:22

Yes. It's probably all there. It's probably all there. It's hard. Yeah. It's funny. I'm sure they'll parse it and feel, all kinds of things. I feel like,

Jason Blitman: 45:32

first, I'm sure.

Gina María Balibrera: 45:33

yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But they've all been really supportive and sweet.

Jason Blitman: 45:38

How, so this is your debut. How do you feel?

Gina María Balibrera: 45:40

I'm really excited about it. Yeah. I'm super excited about it. It's one of those things where, um, I'm excited to share the world. I'm excited to see, I think I'm going to see finished copies of the book pretty soon, and then I'll be going on a tour after it launches and the end of August, and I'm really excited to bring it to different places that have been. formative for me and special to me, like favorite bookstores growing up and and share it with readers and books. It's that's, I think that's been like the most gratifying or one of many gratifying parts of this process has just been hearing from like booksellers and readers who've had, who've gotten early copies and have enjoyed and connected with it. So I'm really excited for it to begin its life.

Jason Blitman: 46:23

Yeah. This has been in your world for the better part of 13, 14 years. How does it feel letting it go?

Gina María Balibrera: 46:32

I think the time is ripe. I know

Jason Blitman: 46:34

Are you like over it? You're like, get out.

Gina María Balibrera: 46:36

no, I'm still, I'm still here. I'm in it, but I really feel like I I lived in this world for a really long time and I'm eager to have the mental space to devote to start new projects new writing. There is that kind of swirl in my mind of can I ever do this again? Is it going to take another 14 years? Is my brain capable of producing more? I know it is. I have been working on some things, but yeah, I'm eager to to just continue on this journey of imagining worlds.

Jason Blitman: 47:08

Yeah. Good. Good. That's great. I know some authors just have a really hard time letting go and sharing this thing. That's so intimate.

Brett Benner: 47:16

The

Gina María Balibrera: 47:16

it is. Yeah. And I hear that I You know, it took, the editorial process was so beautiful. My editor is a genius and really she rushed nothing. She did not rush me. She was just so patient and loving with the book that where I I think that's what, that's why I feel like, Oh, the time is ripe. Like it is gestated because Naomi, my editor and I, we like really she has a very. A very loving touch. And she she really helped me right through everything. She permitted no shortcuts. She permitted no elision. Like she was just like let's really make this book everything that it can be.

Jason Blitman: 47:55

So fantastic.

Gina María Balibrera: 47:56

and she pushed me and it was good.

Brett Benner: 47:57

There's a quote that the said the muses, the women, the ghost, Shea. And I just want your take on what you think this means, talking about Graciela and writing. And she says, maybe it was her mind's habit of keeping a secret pocket of laziness despite her obvious cleverness. She didn't know yet, nor did we, that writing down words makes the world. What does that mean to you?

Gina María Balibrera: 48:22

So I many books. Thank you for reading my books so closely and with such care, too, by the way. That's so kind, Brett. But I, there were so many books along the way that really helped me, connect a lot of these ideas together. And so I one of those books is the Popol Vuh the Mesoamerican creation story as translated by uh, the poet Michael Bassett. And there's another incredible version by the writer Ilan Stavans beautiful translation. And I encountered this in my during my edits like in the last few years, and was just like, look at, going up as a kid in the 90s I read a ton of like, Greek mythology Norse mythology but I had never read this It's Mesoamerican mythology, and it was just incredible. And there's this like recurrent theme in this creation story of the word makes the world the idea that like, when, when these beings are created, first are created there's wood creatures, there's mud creatures, and then there's creatures that are made out of corn, like maize a few other things like. blood, milk, other things. And what makes the like creation successful is that these creations can, they have names, they have language, they have a sense of insight, a sense of themselves, and they have a desire to also create things, to grow things, or to write poetry, or to whereas, the wood and the mud creations don't have that. And so there's something about that ability to make sense of our world, right? To write things down, right? To record things, right? I think one of the things, one thing that's One of the many atrocities of something like La Matanza Massacre is the destruction of memory, right? Like the destruction of collective memory, the destruction of like official memory destruction of archives, and I think like the kind of a long censorship in the aftermath that happens after something like that. And so, the corrective, to me, I think, is something that I saw, reading this, And so American creation story, which is a story of creation and destruction, that's nonlinear. Once things are created, they go back to the beginning and start over again. Is this idea of creating it, of refusing to forget something. There's power in that kind of creation. And I don't want to, I'll go back to Roberto. He talks a lot about how fascism occurs because of, so it's like amnesia and, this idea that we forget and so then these terrible

Brett Benner: 50:54

here we are,

Jason Blitman: 50:55

know. It's just

Brett Benner: 50:56

we are.

Gina María Balibrera: 50:57

And here we are, right? 2024 on July 15th, right? So here we are. So when we, we fail to record and to, to speak to, to pay witness to to acknowledge what has happened, to make art about it, to try to understand it or just to make art because we're expressing our own kind of human. Then we just, it's, um, we lose our, we lose everything. We lose our wisdom. We lose our humanity. We use, we lose our ability to have a sort of like long perspective on, on where we are.

Jason Blitman: 51:28

Yeah, I know. It's storytelling is important.

Gina María Balibrera: 51:31

Yeah. We got to keep it real.

Jason Blitman: 51:32

Yeah. So you are a debut author. We ask all of our debut authors, if there are any books that they are recommending that should be on our radar, that should be on our listeners radar, anything that you want to shout out?

Gina María Balibrera: 51:47

I should go Chavez. She has a book called the anthropologists that just came out last week. She's incredible. She wrote white on white and walking on the ceiling. Another one that's coming out in September is a mad woman by Chelsea Beaker. And if you've read, heartbroke collection of short stories, or Godshot, her just incredible gold glittery novel Like you're in for a real treat. Madwoman is, I love Chelsea and I love both of her earlier books, but I think this one is her best. And it's really beautiful. So mad women. Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 52:20

that just came out and one that comes out soon. What a perfect sampler of books. Fantastic. Gina, we're so excited for you. Congratulations on What's to Come.

Gina María Balibrera: 52:32

thank you so much. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for having me today. Thank you so much for this conversation.

Jason Blitman: 52:38

Alana, Kamel, Gina, thank you so much for being here.

Brett Benner: 52:41

Thanks. All of you. Go by their books.

Jason Blitman: 52:44

Make sure to check out Bad Habit, Man Boobs, The Volcano Daughters. All of those books are in our bookshop. org page, which is in our show notes. Thanks. Happy summer. Talk to you later. Bye.