When Bendrix texted and asked where I was working that day, I didn’t take the time to wonder why he needed to know and texted back that we were near Market Street near Fortieth. I then went back to picking up tossed fast-food bags and empty cups in front of a car repair shop.
About twenty minutes later, I heard honking from up the street. I saw what looked like Bailey’s Mercedes coming toward me. (I guessed it was hers because it was brown and from the 1990s.) Myrna and Velvet stopped what they were doing, as did a few other SWAP mates. The Mercedes slowed and Bendrix leaned out the side window with a sign that read FREE ABBEY! Joan and Rita sat in the back. Joan waved and Rita leaned over in her seat and yelled, “We love you!” Bailey continued to honk the horn. “Make sure you take a shower once you get home!” She laughed. Bendrix held the sign higher. “Benz and Ross forever!” he yelled.
When they were gone, Myrna said, “Who was that?”
I stood watching the car make its way down the road. “That was my best friend Bendrix and three of my mothers.”
Velvet blinked. “Damn . . . girl. How many mothers do you have?”
“Five.” I smiled. “But who’s counting?”
23
What’s New?
A year after my release from SWAP, I thought it would be fun to commemorate the date by giving out cupcakes at Scratch. What I called SWAP cakes were made with chocolate buttercream, coffee, and fine Dutch cocoa, and I gave them out for free until noon. Myrna was working at the counter by then. She was bossy and in everyone’s business and perfect for the job. Velvet was taking cosmetology classes but stopped by to say hello. I’d hired more workers because I was starting the adoption process and knew once the baby came I would have to cut back on my hours, at least for the first few months.
Around New Year’s, Carmen and Jake announced their engagement. They were going to have a party with the family later in the month, but I wanted to do something with just the three of us and took them to hear the Mark Rollins Trio at Yoshi’s. It was after they played “I Remember You” that I heard someone whooping and whistling from behind. When I turned, I saw none other than Jason Ethan Cooper sitting alone at a table and clapping loudly while grinning up at the stage. I smiled and kept my eyes trained on him until he finally looked my way. His face brightened when he saw me. “Abbey?”
He gestured at the empty seat next to mine and I waved him over.
“How have you been?” I asked.
“How have you been?” He smiled.
Memories of our night together came rushing back. I couldn’t take my eyes off him. After a moment I heard Jake say, “Hellloooo? You going to introduce us?” Since the musicians had started the next song, I had to speak quietly. After everyone shook hands and said hello, Jason moved closer so we could talk.
We were being rude, whispering to each other while the musicians played—a big no-no, especially if you were a Ross, but I couldn’t help it. Jason leaned next to my ear and told me how sorry he was about Dad. At one point I asked about Gina: Where was she? How was she doing?
That’s when he told me they’d divorced.
I giggled.
He looked at me, confused.
“I mean, I am so sorry to hear that.” I tried to feel sad. I did.
“And you?” he whispered. “How’s your husband?”
I held up my ringless wedding finger.
“Can’t blame us for trying.” He grinned.
The drummer from the trio hit his cymbal and the bass player took his cue and slowed the beat. Jason closed his eyes and leaned back in his seat, but then just as quickly looked over and smiled. “It’s good to see you, Abbey Lincoln Ross.”
I laughed. “It’s good to see you, too, Jason.”
After a moment, I glanced at Carmen and Jake, who were both staring wide-eyed. Jake pointed. “Ahhhh!”
Todd Foster
Renee Swindle is the author of Shake Down the Stars and Please Please Please, a Blackboard bestseller. She earned her BA from UC Irvine and MFA in creative writing from San Diego State University. She lives in Oakland, California.
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A CONVERSATION WITH RENEE SWINDLE
Spoiler Alert: “A Conversation with Renee Swindle” and “Questions for Discussion” tell more about what happens in the book than you might want to know before you read it.
Q. An earlier version of this novel began with Abbey doing community service in an orange jumpsuit. What was your first inspiration for the novel, and how did it take shape as you wrote it?
A. I first saw an image of a woman in prison, actually, and that led to several oddball ideas as to how she got there. The writing became so much easier after I dumped the prison idea and went with community service. I see people in my neighborhood picking up trash and wearing these SWAP vests, and I just loved the idea of writing about a woman who has to do that. Once I realized she had a passion for graffiti art, I knew exactly how Abbey would end up wearing orange; thankfully, it didn’t involve murder or any of my initial prison story lines!
Q. I love your description of Abbey’s bakery, Scratch—the place itself, the food she makes there, and that it becomes a community hangout by the novel’s end. Can you comment on the research you did? I’ll bet it was loads of fun!
A. I made Abbey a baker because I like to bake myself. If I liked working on cars, she would probably be a mechanic. Writing Shake Down the Stars, for instance, gave me the excuse to write about astronomy.
I can’t remember how Abbey’s specialty became wedding cakes, but I loved the idea that she was a wedding cake designer who’d never been married. I already owned several books on baking, and I now own three in-depth books on how to design wedding cakes. If writing doesn’t work out, I officially have a plan B!
Abbey’s bakery is a composite of a couple of cafés I like to visit, plus details I imagined. “Designing” my own café and writing about a woman who had such a great talent in baking was fun. I hate research with a passion, so if I’m going to open a book or look anything up on the Web, it has to be something I’m personally interested in.
Q. You’ve said you want to write stories about imperfect characters who make mistakes. Does that mean you think Abbey is partly responsible for her romantic failures, and that you have a lot of sympathy for Avery and Samuel?
A. Great question. I do have sympathy for Avery and Samuel. Avery was looking for someone to ground him and help him grow as an artist, so he jumped right into a relationship with Abbey. Abbey was caught up in Avery’s looks and the “wow” factor. I think Avery and Abbey really fell in love and had a close relationship, but Abbey became swept up in Avery’s life and Avery lost sight of himself. After the Avery fiasco, Abbey chooses Samuel because he is safe and a “catch” by society’s standards. Samuel, I think, is ready for kids; Abbey also brings more fun into his life. But do those two really get to know each other on a truly intimate level? No. Abbey is dazzled by Samuel’s looks, his career, and her engagement ring as much as anything else. Poor girl.
Q. In an effort to maintain her relationship with Samuel, Abbey makes allowances for his beliefs, even when she disagrees with them, and for his behavior, even when it makes her uncomfortable. It’s a dilemma many women face—when should you accept differing values and adjust your expectations to build a relationship, and when does doing so mean you are being untrue to yourself? Can you comment on what interests you about this question, and why you wanted to explore it?
A. I sometimes start novels by asking a question or putting the character into a situation I’ll have to write myself out of. With Piper in Shake Down the Stars, I wanted to know if she could ever find happiness again after experiencing tragedy. With Abbey I was curious about why women ignore red flags.
From what I’m learning—and since I’m no therapist, I�
�ll speak only for myself—my body will actually react when I know I’m being untrue to myself. Sometimes I’ll feel my stomach shrink or an ache of some sort. This sensation might last for only a moment, but I know it’s there. Making adjustments and compromises, on the other hand, feels just like that—a way to keep things fair and the relationship happy and balanced. I think the problem is that we often talk ourselves out of what we’re feeling. That tendency to rationalize can be a sign that we’re not honoring our true feelings. If I have to explain away or analyze whatever I’m feeling, then usually something’s not right.
I’m sure other women can relate to this issue. But, you know, I don’t think men are all that great at paying attention to their true feelings either. It takes courage to learn to follow your gut; but once you start to honor your true self and desires, no matter how big or small, there’s no turning back.
Q. Your knowledge of jazz is broad and deep, and you use jazz in many ways to enrich the novel. Would you tell us something about your personal relationship with jazz?
A. I don’t know as much about jazz as I’d like to, but, yes, I listen to it all the time. I love the improvisation. I love that a single song can have a thousand interpretations. I love the incredible skill and talent of the musicians. You know . . . I pretty much love everything about jazz. And the lyrics to many of the standards are absolutely beautiful. I used so many song titles throughout the novel because you can tell from the titles alone that there’s a story inside every song. It’s hard for me to express how much I love jazz—which is why I let Abbey speak for me!
Q. Abbey’s wild, creative, rambunctious family, with all the ex-wives and ex-girlfriends, siblings and half siblings, is one of my favorite aspects of the novel. I’d love to be invited to one of the warm, raucous, jiving parties at Abbey’s dad’s house! Yet you also make clear that however fabulous a musician, and however loving a father, Lincoln isn’t able to “be there” for everyone who needs him. What do you most hope readers will take away from your description of Abbey’s family, and what originally inspired it?
A. I’m an only child and have always been curious about the ways families, especially siblings, interact. My father comes from a family of thirteen, mostly made up of half brothers and sisters. Whenever there was a family reunion, you wouldn’t know who was a “full” sibling and who wasn’t. My mother comes from a family of eight—and they are crazy funny. I didn’t base Abbey’s family on my parents’ families in any obvious way, but I did like the idea of writing about a big family, and I’m sure my parents’ families played a part in the writing.
In my first draft, everyone in Abbey’s family was getting along too perfectly. I have to thank a few early readers who called me on my tendency to avoid conflict. In an earlier version Abbey mentioned that her dad was on the road a lot, so I went back to the story and highlighted the problems that can come when a parent is overextended. In a sense, Abbey’s sister Carmen represents the downside to having such a large family.
My intention was to explore the idea that family is whatever we want it to be. Bendrix is family to Abbey as much as any of her brothers are. And while others may judge Abbey’s father for remaining close to his ex-wives, it works for them and I like that he wants to stay in his children’s lives. I hope readers can see that while these characters aren’t traditional, they definitely love one another. Samuel’s family, on the other hand, maintains strict ideas about what constitutes family, yet they aren’t very close at all.
Q. As in Shake Down the Stars, Oakland, California, is a lively setting for this novel. Is there anything in particular about Oakland that you wanted to convey in this novel that you didn’t in the previous one?
A. I wanted to focus on the Temescal neighborhood. I changed the names of the restaurants, but Abbey’s bakery and almost every restaurant mentioned in the novel are located in the Temescal area of Oakland. I also wanted to get in the First Friday art walk, which takes place downtown.
I added the dig the bandleader makes about San Francisco because that rivalry does exist for some of us. I like visiting San Francisco, but I wouldn’t want to live there, as the saying goes. There’s more diversity here in Oakland, and it’s mellower and has a fun, eclectic vibe. Some areas have serious problems that need addressing, and I hope to write about the crime and other issues in future books, but I get tired of people who don’t live in Oakland putting it down. So there!
Q. Many years elapsed between the publication of your first novel, Please Please Please, published in 1999, and your second, Shake Down the Stars, published in August 2013. In that time, many changes took place in publishing, the rise of e-books being a major one. What differences about the two publishing experiences struck you in particular? What remained the same?
A. I remember the first time I learned about e-books. I thought, That will never work. Boy, was I wrong. Then again, when Please Please Please came out, people were still using beepers. Of course now we have Twitter and Facebook and everything else. I guess social media is the biggest change in publishing. Thanks to social media, writers can get the word out about their novels and have a direct dialogue with readers. All the e-mail, posts, and tweets have helped make writing feel less solitary.
What’s remained the same for me since my first novel was published is that I wake up early to write before starting the rest of my day. The publishing industry is going to do what it will; my job is to stay focused and keep writing.
Q. Do you have a method for keeping your creative ideas flowing, and for remembering them once you feel the “zing” of inspiration? We’ve all had the experience of getting a terrific idea in the shower, or while dozing at five a.m., only to forget it later!
A. I daydream a lot. I figure out scenes in my head while I’m walking my dogs or during my commute to work. I sometimes replay scenes over and over until I get the kinks out or resolve an issue. By the time I’m ready to sit and type, it’s as if I’ve written out a draft. I’ll occasionally jot down a note or two, but for the most part, if I can’t remember the idea, it’s not worth remembering.
Q. Where do you keep your to-be-read pile, and what’s in it?
A. I’m usually reading two books at any one time. I have to keep them on a bookshelf in my room or I’ll forget where I put them. I still haven’t tried to read from an e-reader and have books everywhere. Right now I’m reading Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl and David Benioff’s City of Thieves. I just finished Twelve Years a Slave by Solomon Northup and Me Before You by Jojo Moyes. These are all great books. I’ve been on a reading high lately. Talking to you gives me the idea that I should post my latest favorites on my Web site. Thanks!
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
1. What did you most enjoy about the novel? What will you remember about it long after you’ve finished reading it?
2. In the beginning, Samuel seems so perfect that Abbey wonders why he hasn’t already been snatched up. Are you willing to share your own experience of a seemingly perfect man who turned out to be not so perfect after all?
3. What do you think of Abbey’s untraditional extended family? Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of living in such a family. Discuss in particular what Abbey gets from her family, and why she was willing to give up living with her mother on the East Coast in order to return to her father’s family.
4. Early on, Abbey gets one “red flag” about Samuel, but she convinces herself that his good points outweigh the negative. By the time she realizes there are significant ways in which they are incompatible, he is practically living with her. Does she jump into the relationship too fast? Or must every woman struggle with the question of how much of herself she should give up for a man?
5. Abbey sees Samuel’s father as an authoritarian figure who maintains control of his children through intimidation and abuse, yet Samuel defends him and credits his own success with his parents’ insistence on discipline and achievement. How do you see Samue
l’s father? What do we learn about how Bendrix achieved success, compared to Samuel?
6. Bendrix is Abbey’s best friend, and she comes close to saying that if he were straight, he’d be a perfect romantic partner for her. Do you agree? What do you think Bendrix and Abbey have together that she doesn’t have with Avery and then Samuel?
7. Discuss the various couples who come to Abbey to discuss wedding cakes. It might be fun to imagine which ones will stay married and which will crash and burn.
8. After each failed romantic relationship, Abbey reassesses her life. Talk about what she learns, how she changes, and what about her life she comes to appreciate more fully.
9. For Abbey and Bendrix, tagging buildings (i.e., spraying graffiti art on them) is an act of joyous creativity as much as civil disobedience. Is some of their creativity inspired by the awareness that they’re breaking the law? Does their punishment fit the crime? Did you find Abbey’s arrest and community service at all funny, or were you disappointed in her?
10. The death of an important character spurs Abbey to take action. Discuss these events, and especially what motivates her.
11. At the end of the novel, Abbey seems to be headed for happiness, but the author doesn’t take her all the way there. Did you find that approach satisfying?
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