Elina Penner, 'Nightberries" (CMU Press, 2026)

Summary

Podcast Summary: New Books Network — Elina Penner, Nightberries (CMU Press, 2026)

Date: May 24, 2026
Host: Holly Gattery
Guest: Elina Penner
Book: Nightberries (translated from German, by Bradley Schmidt)
Publisher: CMU Press

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Episode Overview

This episode of New Books Network spotlights Elina Penner's darkly funny, psychologically layered debut novel Nightberries, newly translated into English. Host Holly Gattery guides a thoughtful conversation with Penner on the book's origins, its exploration of Mennonite German immigrant family life, trauma, mental health, gender roles, and the challenging but vital use of humor. Penner reads from the novel and discusses everything from her writing process and literary influences to the art of translation and what she’s working on next.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Book Origins & Writing Process

• Origins in Fragments: Penner describes how the book began as a collection of sentences and mental fragments she carried for years. The turning point came during a conversation with a future agent, who asked if she wanted to write a book—prompting her to start writing during parental leave, amid the Covid-19 pandemic ([03:38]).
  • Quote:
    “When other people were making sourdough, I was writing this novel and I was immersing myself in there.” — Elina Penner (04:40)
• Timing: Penner began writing in her early 30s; the book was published in German when she was 35.

2. Themes: Domestic Gothic, Trauma, Family Secrets

• Domestic Gothic: The story revolves around Nellie Newfield, the youngest in a German Mennonite family from Russia, now in Germany. Holly identifies the novel as part of the “domestic gothic” tradition—peeling back the layers of ordinary domestic life to reveal psychological unease and trauma ([05:17]).
• Addressing Unspoken Pain: Penner emphasizes how families often ignore or minimize serious issues, notably around mental health. Nellie is depicted as “not well,” embodying generational trauma and the consequences of unspoken suffering.
  • Quote:
    “Nellie is unwell. I think that is, like, the one sentence...She’s not okay. ... The tendency to not acknowledge things that are clearly going on is very, very high in families.” — Elina Penner (06:32)
• Role of Faith & Culture: Nellie is culturally Mennonite but not actively religious, highlighting the complexities of heritage and belonging ([09:04]).
• Perspectives: The novel expands beyond Nellie’s viewpoint to include her son and, notably, her brother, exploring male trauma and toxic masculinity.

3. Exploration of Masculinity & Mental Health

• Men’s Emotional Isolation: Penner was inspired by stories from her Mennonite community about men suffering in silence, culminating in higher rates of suicide and unaddressed pain.
  • Quote:
    “In the end, the uncles kind of have like a supporting role, but it was very much about [the men] and they were at the forefront of what I was doing and how I was thinking. ... They very often don’t have anyone to talk to.” — Elina Penner (12:32-16:30)

4. Narrative Structure & Character Voices

• Favorite Character to Write: Penner loved writing Eugen (Nellie’s brother), a city-dweller returning home, serving as a lens of both insider and outsider. His chapters provided comic relief and fresh perspective through code-switching and candor ([19:04]).
  • Quote:
    “People always ask if, you know, Nelly was inspired by myself ... but no, it’s him brother is me.” — Elina Penner (19:04)
• Stylistic Choices: Nelly’s first-person narration is tight and clipped, reflecting her internal struggle and sense of containment ([10:12]–[12:32]).

5. Reading from the Novel

• Excerpt: Penner reads a section from Chapter 2, showcasing Nellie’s perspective at a tense family gathering, her internal preoccupations, and marital conflict. The passage balances mundane details with deeper emotional turmoil.
  • Quote:
    “Can you imagine what it’s like to live with you? No. ... I just want. I want love. All right?” — Nellie’s husband, from Penner’s reading (23:59)
• Host Reflections: Holly praises Penner’s ability to render so much through Nellie’s fixation on the domestic, marital tension, and subtle psychological cues ([24:52]).

6. Humor in Darkness

• Britney Spears Epigraph: The novel opens with a quote from Britney Spears’ song “Everytime”—which both signals the novel’s dark humor and foreshadows its psychological themes ([26:07]).
  • Quote:
    “There’s a lot of parallels between the protagonist Nelly and then Britney Spears in terms of feeling caged in, not knowing what to do, trying to follow rules but then kind of breaking out and kind of not.” — Elina Penner (27:05)
• Dark Family Humor: Humor emerges naturally from immigrant and Mennonite storytelling traditions, and Penner notes cultural differences in reader responses—immigrants and Mennonites laugh, while some German literary audiences are unsure if they’re “allowed” to ([29:44]).
  • Quote:
    “Sometimes that’s all you have left is to laugh about certain things.” — Elina Penner (30:40)

7. On Translation

• Translator Initiative: Translator Bradley Schmidt approached Penner, ultimately securing funding and handling the nuanced translation work ([35:02]).
  • Quote:
    “Sometimes it’s just one person who really believes in something and I’m forever grateful to him to have done that.” — Elina Penner (36:00)
• Linguistic Complexity: Penner’s writing is shaped by her multilingual background—Low Mennonite German, American English, and German—making her style unusually concise and idiomatically rich. The translation retains this unique voice ([37:07]).
  • Quote:
    “Low Mennonite German has a lot of English syntax...I never had classic training in writing German, so it’s always been odd.” — Elina Penner (37:30)

8. Food and Everyday Details

• Penner talks about constant references to food in her novels, reflecting her community's everyday life—a detail often commented on by German critics ([39:16]).
• Host Holly relates as an Iranian, always including tea in her writing ([39:30]).

9. Penner's Next Projects

• Current Work: After four books in four years, Penner is shifting to government work and researching a new novel about female friendship—specifically, why it can be so difficult to break up with longtime friends ([40:32]).

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Memorable Quotes

• “Nellie is unwell. ... The tendency to not acknowledge things that are clearly going on is very, very high in families.” — Penner ([06:32])
• “Sometimes that’s all you have left is to laugh about certain things.” — Penner on dark family humor ([30:40])
• “Low Mennonite German has a lot of English syntax...I never had classic training in writing German, so it’s always been odd.” — Penner on her writing style ([37:30])
• “You can't go through life being a collector of people.” — Holly’s 80-year-old friend on friendship ([41:38])

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Important Timestamps

| Timestamp | Segment | |-----------|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 01:32 | Ep start, guest introduction (Elina Penner and Nightberries) | | 03:38 | Penner discusses the novel’s origin and writing process | | 05:17 | Holly on “domestic gothic” and upending expectations of women’s lives | | 06:32 | Penner on Nellie’s unwellness, family secrecy, and trauma | | 12:32 | On male perspectives, Mennonite funerals, and toxic masculinity | | 19:04 | Penner’s favorite voice to write: Eugen/Eugene | | 20:57 | Penner reads from Chapter 2 (“Eating,” May 10, 2020) | | 26:07 | The Britney Spears epigraph and its meaning | | 29:44 | Immigrant humor, dark family comedy, and language traditions | | 35:02 | Story of the translation with Bradley Schmidt | | 37:07 | Multilingual writing, food details, and narrative richness | | 40:32 | Future projects: a novel on female friendship |

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Concluding Notes

Nightberries is a dark, incisive, and often bitingly funny exploration of Mennonite immigrant life, family trauma, gender roles, and the struggle to articulate pain within cultures of silence. Elina Penner’s unique linguistic and cultural background, penchant for dark humor, and compassion for her flawed characters make both the novel and this interview memorable and engaging. Penner’s reflections on translation and what’s next for her will be of special interest to readers and writers attuned to questions of identity, language, and literary voice.

Recommended for listeners/readers interested in: Literary fiction, immigrant and minority experiences, dark humor, family dynamics, German literature in translation, psychology in fiction.

Transcript

[Elena Penner]

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[Elena Penner]

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[Holly Gattery]

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[Elena Penner]

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[Elena Penner]

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[Holly Gattery]

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[Elena Penner]

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[Holly Gattery]

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[Elena Penner]

welcome to the New Books Network.

[Holly Gattery]

Hello everyone and welcome to nbn. I'm your host, Holly Gattery, and I am thrilled to be joined today by Alina Penner to talk about her newly translated novel Nightberries, which came out with CMU Press and is translated by Bradley Schmidt. Welcome to the show. Elena.

[Elena Penner]

Hi. Thank you for having me. Nice to meet you.

[Holly Gattery]

It's lovely to have you here to talk about this thrilling, compelling and darkly funny book. And as I was saying to you before we hit record, I did not know exactly what I was getting into. Like, obviously I'd read the book description, but even that did not fully prepare me for the chills, the thrills, the laughs. Strangely enough, that I would get out of this book. It was such a mesmerizing combination of feelings. So for our listeners, a little bit more about the book. Where is your husband? Nellie Newfield, quiet and scrupulously observant, doesn't seem to be in crisis. Or does she? The youngest daughter in a noisy, tangled German Mennonite family who immigrated from Russia and in the 1990s. Does she even know where she belongs? Marriage, loyalty, faith, family memory can be deceiving. A tense and unusual situation boils over in this darkly entertaining psychological novel of contemporary German life. So, Elena, for people who do not know about you, I'm just going to give our listeners a little bit of an overview. Elena Penner's first novel, which is Nightberries and was published by Offbaugh Berl in Berlin in 2022. And her first language is Low Mennonite German, and she lives in Germany. My first official question for Yelena, even though I was talking to you nonstop about this before the show, but for our listeners especially, I would love to know about where this book began.

[Elena Penner]

This book was basically a collection of fragments within my mind and I had it with me forever. I carried it with me. I carried sentences with me. And it was pure coincidence that I had met with my, well then future agent for a completely different purpose. And I had asked her during lunch, like, what do you have to do to write a book or to get a book, you know, published? And she said, oh, do you want to write a book? And I answer, I looked at her and I thought, well, we're in Berlin. Doesn't everybody want to write a book and have it published? Isn't that a thing? She said, no, like I don't. And that was kind of a huge moment in my life where she actually asked me if that was like one of my goals. And that was in, I don't know, I think 2018, 2017. And I actually started writing January 2nd. And then because we had a baby and we have a lot of parental leave in Germany, I had a little bit of time on my hand and then obviously Covid hit and while we, we had a very privileged little situation going on with the baby and the parental leave. But also, you know, when other people were making sourdough, I was writing this novel and I was immersing myself in there. So that's kind of where it all started. It was. And I was a little older. I don't know if that helps for the context, but I was in my early 30s and the book eventually got published when I was 35.

[Holly Gattery]

So, yeah, I was wondering if you could talk about where some of the themes in this book came from. So, for example, the kind of onion layer peeling back theme of the. I'm going to quote a wonderful Canadian poet and novelist and short story writer I believe too, Nancy Jo Colin. She calls it the domestic rural gothic. But I think the domestic gothic is really interesting and that's the vibe I got from Nightberries. And I think it does a wonderful job of upending expectations we have About. And often oppressive expectations and limiting expectations we have about what women's daily domestic lives and inner lives are like. And your book very slowly unpeels the life of Nellie. And I was wondering where that story came from, because the character. We're not only in the head of Nellie here. We have her son and her brother as well. But we start with Nellie, who was my favorite. And I was really fascinated about the way that her inner life unfolded. And where did that impulse to write that story come from?

[Elena Penner]

Nellie. Nellie is unwell. I think that is, like, the one sentence that we can utter without spoiling too much. She's not okay. And she represents so much about, like, family novels. I don't know if that's the proper term in English as well, but we definitely have that in. In German, where. When you. When you look at families like that, it's. How do I say that? The tendency to not acknowledge things that are clearly going on is very, very high in families. And I think if you have good friends, friends will check you, right? They will be like, oh, is this really what you're doing? Do you think you're.

[Holly Gattery]

You're okay?

[Elena Penner]

But I feel like very often you'll get some criticism, maybe from other family members, from your mother. But, you know, when there's really, like, a deeper issue and we talk about mental health or other factors, we kind of turn a blind eye on certain situations. And I think that's what's happening with Nelly's story, is I wanted to go as far as I could and be completely ridiculous and absurd with her story to see how far one can take that. Be like, well, that's just Nellie. You know how very often in families, you know, you'll have someone who might have, like, a substance abuse issue, someone who might be, like, a cheater or someone who, you know, just issues. People have issues. And then very often, you know, oh, that's just that one uncle that likes to have another beer, you know, or that's just. That's just your grandma. Your grandma's sad sometimes, but it's not something about, oh, listen, this is called depression. We need to do something, and we need to address it. So it's. It's also. Her story is a story of like. Of staying quiet when maybe you should speak up. And so it's trauma. It's that. And it's. For her, she started out her life and her story actually not even within the church.

[Holly Gattery]

Right.

[Elena Penner]

She's culturally Mennonite, but she had nothing to do with faith. And she wasn't involved with any of that. She just like culturally and whatever belonged to that. And she speaks the language and she's within her family, but she wasn't really into like any of it. And still, of course, also the trauma from the family and just from. From the generational trauma that she had with her. There's that one sentence where her brother explains it to her son, so to his nephew, he says, all of this could have happened to any other person and maybe they would have been fine. But it happened to her. And for her it was too much. And she didn't drink, she didn't look for other ways out. She kept it within herself, her issues. But at some point, and that's obviously what's happening in the book, is she just completely goes berserk and it's. And. And I won't say anything else about that. But yeah, she loses it. Literally. Yeah.

[Holly Gattery]

And I mean, I even love how her language reflects that because we are in Nelly's head to. Through that first person narration, like it's not third person. We're right there. And even her sentences are very economic and clean and she's not given to verbosity. And it is such, to me, a thrilling and telling example of not someone who is economic and clean because that is the way their brain is, but of someone who is holding it together by a thread. And it's really beautifully done. And I think that's why I enjoyed her so much. Because, I mean, you're also talking to someone who once called her cell phone on her cell phone to find her cell phone, because I was so. And the whole time blaming my husband that he took my cell phones. Like, I've been there. I've been in this space where, you know, Nelly's inner thoughts, the way that she's processing things, felt deeply. And I mean, if anyone who's read the book, perhaps disturbingly familiar to me. And I think that a lot of women, though, would really get on board with and understand where Nelly is coming from. And I also appreciated the fact that when we're talking about mental illness and we're talking about neurodivergence or any way we want to talk about that. Not neurotypical, or healthy, quote unquote. I mean, whenever somebody talks about mental illness, I have feelings about that term anyways, for people who are really just neurodivergent and it's normal for them and they don't need to be cured. This is just the way they are. And in Nellie's case, I'd argue that maybe she should Talk to a therapist, but. Or, you know, 100%, a little bit of help. There might be some neurodivergence there, but there's also just being unwell and. And. But you. You. You don't scaffold her narrative through that omnipresent nar narration. You let us just into her head with no safety net, which was amazing for me. But you do offer those two other perspectives. And I'd love to hear about where the book started. Did it start with Nellie's perspective or did it start with her son or her brother? And if it didn't start with them, when did you decide to add them in?

[Elena Penner]

I had. I. I don't know if I quite remember. I had. I think only maybe in the very beginning it was a third person thing. And I also had the grandmother. So there is like, a director's cut version where Nightberries is like 100 pages longer and there were way more historical references, and they just didn't. The German publisher didn't. Wasn't interested in that. But asides from that, I was very interested in male, like, toxic masculinity. That was a big term back then already. And it was my father who actually inspired a lot of it because he had come home from a funeral. And, you know, Mennonite listeners might be listening and. And laugh when I tell the story, but it is meant as a joke. And because we. There's just always a funeral. If there's not a wedding, there's a funeral. You're always invited to some wedding, or you have to accompany your grandmother to some funeral. Like, that's part of my existence. Just pick people up from funerals or take them there. It's. Right. It's a huge community, and you have a ton of cousins and you have a ton of siblings, and it's just. It's a lot of people. Right. So when he came home from some funeral, I was just like, semi interested and said, oh, okay, who was it? What was the story? And we always get, like, these biographies, right. I don't know if it's the same in Canada, but you get like, this brochure of their life. And he's like, oh, it's just another man that drove himself to death, like, basically unalived himself. Right, right. And so he then started telling me how many men had done so within the last year. And I was like, that's a lot of men. And we started having this conversation, and I looked up the number, and I was not aware of the fact that men tend to commit suicide way more often than women do. And there's multiple factors. Of course, they hardly ever go to the doctors. They definitely don't go to a therapist. They don't talk about their emotions. They don't talk about their feelings, especially not the bad ones and the sad ones. And so it was a book that was inspired not necessarily to have Nelly's story. Like that wasn't the first idea that I had, but it really was about these men. And so in the end, the uncles kind of have like a supporting role, but it was very much about them and they were at the forefront of what I was doing and how I was thinking. Because these men, you know, are kind of left alone with all of this responsibility. And I have this image of. Especially when Nelly decided to join the church, she found this kind of community, right? She found the other women. She always had her grandma, she always had aunts. She. There was just so much female energy and other women in her life that she could talk to. And the more I was reading about men and also in. In religious minorities, but in any society, it doesn't really matter. That, you know, this is within Mennonite culture is that they very often don't have anyone to talk to, right. The second men are married, they kind of lose a lot of their friends. The only social person that they have in their life is their wife. So we have. I don't know if it's true for. For Canada as well, but in Germany, it's when the wife dies before the husband dies, there is a huge probability that that man will die within a year. So that's why we just don't even have that many widowers. Old people's homes are full of women because they just continue to live once the husband is dead. They're fine. They have their community. So when I was writing, it was really about these lonely men who would rather very often commit suicide because they really, truly think that is their only way out of misery or of not feeling well or being unwell. And that was really like the most important reason to write this particular story. Girl. Winter is so last season and now spring's got you looking at pictures of tank tops with hungry eyes. Your algorithm is feeding you cutoffs.

[Holly Gattery]

You're thirsty for the sun on your

[Elena Penner]

shoulders that perfect hang on the patio sundress those sandals you can wear all day and all night. And you've had enough of shopping from your couch. Done. Hoping it looks anything like the picture when you tear open that envelope. It's time for a little in person spring treat. It's time for a trip to Ross. Work your magic. Study and play. Come together on a Windows 11 PC and for a limited time, college students get the best of both worlds. Get the Unreal college deal everything you need to study and play with select Windows 11 PCs. Eligible students get a year of Microsoft 365 Premium and a year of Xbox

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[Elena Penner]

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[Holly Gattery]

ready to soundtrack your summer with Red Bull Summer All Day Play? You choose a playlist that fits your summer vibe the best. Are you a festival fanatic, a deep end dj, a road dog, or a trail mixer? Just add a song to your chosen playlist and put your summer on track. Red Bull Summer All Day Play Red Bull gives you wings. Visit Red Bull.com BrightSummerAhead to learn more. See you this summer. I love that answer. And I feel like I felt the presence of these shadowy men who came into focus as the novel progress. But at the very beginning of the novel, from the first chapter, you know Nellie with at the family gathering and her brothers and you know, all of these men being around and again they came into clearer focus but that the presence of them was definitely always there. So before I ask you to read to us, I was wondering if you had a favorite perspective to write from.

[Elena Penner]

Oh, I love Eugen. You would probably call him Eugene in English. People always ask if, you know, Nelly was inspired by myself or anything. But no, it's him brother is me. Like he left the area, you know, his home, he moved to a big city and he comes back. So he is really the person that sees everything that's going on from multiple perspectives. And I think that's very true for kids who grow up from immigrant families or from families where the rest of your family didn't go to university. And then you come home and you live within all of these worlds and you code switch a lot and that's him. Like, he has a very particular brand of love for his family, but he's also not himself within the family. Right. He also plays a role. Yeah. So he was definitely the person that was most fun. Plus he curses the whole time.

[Holly Gattery]

Oh, I felt like it was, you know, every time. Eugene. Yes. That's what I'd call when you said his name at first. Mike, Did I read the wrong book?

[Elena Penner]

No, all good.

[Holly Gattery]

I was like, oh no, what was I reading? No, whenever he came on or when he was talking or Even just the first instant of him, where it's so clear that Nelly adores him and sees him as this bright, shiny button in her life. Anytime he was talking, I felt like fresh air in a room. And not necessarily that it wasn't. There wasn't a pervasive darkness to a story. There was, but there was a lightness that I felt as a reader whenever I encountered him, which was lovely. So would you read to us from your book?

[Elena Penner]

Yes, I'll read from the second chapter, the eating part. How long did you say I needed? Like two pages. Is that okay? Or is that too long?

[Holly Gattery]

No, that's perfect.

[Elena Penner]

Okay, good. Okay. Eating. Sunday afternoon, May 10, 2020. When I come from the dark hallway into the bright living room, the sun is so dazzling that I have to squint up my eyes and grope my way back to my chair. I see almost nothing but black fireworks. Eyes closed, eyes open. Everyone is sitting huddled around this huge table, and everything is bright. The bright sofa, the bright cabinet where the crystal is kept, the bright carpet. It all merges in a pool of beige and very light brown, like a big lump of toy buck, though the pale wood gleams without a scratch, as if it's only just been bought. I sit down and look at my brothers. The pictures in the sitting room are so high you have to crane your head to see them. As I stare at a family portrait from the late 90s, I hear a man's voice very far away. Where's your husband? Where do you think? If he isn't here, he's at work. Rudy could have saved himself the question he only asked for the sake of asking. In five minutes he'll have forgotten that he asked, mainly because he isn't interested, but also because he's been drinking since this morning. I can tell that he isn't with it. His head is swaying slightly, almost unnoticeably. His eyes are glassy, his nose red, his hair greasy. He stares past me into space. We try to look at each other, but we see nothing. Certainly not each other. Rudy's eldest kids are a bit younger than me. He never saw me as his little sister. For him, I was always just another crying brat who was sometimes at his house. His words. It's Sunday afternoon now, and I haven't seen Cornelius since Thursday evening. We went to bed together that night after the argument. That wasn't really an argument, because we don't actually ever argue. We're neither of us shouters, and maybe we don't see enough of each other to fight it. Was more like a confession. Though that's not quite right either. I don't think he's sorry. And it can hardly be a confession if he doesn't feel any regret. On Thursday morning he'd tell me what the last months had been like for him. The last years, in fact. When I couldn't cope. He had to keep functioning. His exhaustion didn't count. The constant traveling was a strain. The business trips with people from here who made him feel like a foreign clown. He had to be careful not to lower his guard. He found it more and more difficult to stand firm in his fate. I stood in the kitchen with the shopping bags. And he just sat there on that chair. That stupid cantilever chair that he'd insisted on buying. He made no move to help me. I unpacked slowly. It didn't seem to bother him. I saw him talking, but I was distracted. It was Thursday. The recycling had to be put out that evening. And first I had to empty the waste paper baskets and ask him to empty the paper basket in his office. All he had to do was empty this garbage. Nothing else. I took care of everything else in this house that was much too big for me or Jacob. I was thinking of the full paper basket in his office as he spoke. Can you imagine what it's like to live with you? No. But I knew he'd be late if he didn't leave soon. I'm so young. I've still got time for anything.

[Holly Gattery]

Anything.

[Elena Penner]

I could have children. I could be a father again. Plenty of men are. Fathers for the first time in their mid-30s. It's not too late. I could start over. Wouldn't you want that for me? For my sake? The recycling, the paper. Have you emptied your basket? Have I what? It's Thursday. Really, Nelly. Can you be normal for once?

[Holly Gattery]

Just a little?

[Elena Penner]

Can't this family be normal? I don't give a damn about the recycling. Are you even listening to me? I've lived with you for 15 years. And it's exhausting. I don't want exhausting anymore. I just want. I want love. All right.

[Holly Gattery]

That's it. Yeah. I. I love that. Because she is so. Nelly is so caught up in her. Her world and this hyper fixation on recycling. But there's obviously a lot going on. And then the. The weaponized incompetence of her husband and him only thinking about him. And that maybe she feels trapped too. And it's this wonderful ability to balance two perspectives but within a first person narration, which I thought was just delightful. So my My next question for you is one that made me just balk with, like, that kind of, like, literally chicken bok laughter when before I even started the novel. And I don't know why I struck it as so funny, but I'm thinking, okay, I'm getting into this psychological thriller. And then there's an epigraph by Britney Spears. And I was like, what am I getting into? Which did signal me and clue me into the fact that there would be quite a bit of humor in this book. But, I mean, it's also a really great epigraph looking at it in retrospect. I mean, I can laugh that it's Britney Spears all I want, but it's actually really, really fitting. And I was wondering if you could speak to it for us and tell us a little bit about that choice.

[Elena Penner]

I am a huge Britney Spears fan. I'm a huge millennial. Obviously, Britney was there every moment of the way. And this book was obviously written and had come out with way before her memoir came out. So I didn't know about the significance of this particular song. So it is a quote from every time. And the book deals with trauma, but also with grief. And we already knew at that point. I don't know if this was. I think the Free Britney movement was simultaneously kind of. But I was definitely aware of it already. So while I was writing. But it was still small. Like, it wasn't as epic as we had thought. And I think sometimes we look back in history and we're like, oh, yeah, of course. No, this wasn't right that, you know, she was treated this way. But Britney Spears, obviously, I could have done something with Lindsay Lohan. I could have picked Paris Hilton. I think a lot of these women have come out in the last years with just telling us what that was like for them. And obviously, there's a lot of parallels between the protagonist Nelly, and then Britney Spears in terms of feeling caged in, not knowing what to do, trying to follow rules, but then kind of breaking out and kind of not. And obviously, it's also, you know, a huge foreshadowing when it says that you're imagining things. And I thought I was very, very clear when I wrote that. But of course, you know, when you write a book and it takes you forever to write, you think everything is so obvious. But then, yeah, it's. It's a huge hint for everyone who wants to read the book. I think you should read that quote from Brittany maybe twice. It's. It should help with reading the novel.

[Holly Gattery]

Yeah.

[Elena Penner]

And I really like that song, for my 21st birthday, I had a Britney Spears party and I made all of my friends dress up as Britney Spears videos. And this was before Instagram even existed, I think. And I was every time. So that was, that's a. Yeah, that's a little bit of history from my own life is my, my connection to that song. I was walking around Hamburg with the huge men's shirt and the Boston cap and, and stockings. So, yeah, that is amazing.

[Holly Gattery]

And for, for our listeners, the quote is, the epigraph is, I make believe that you're here. It's the only way I see clear. So let that entice you to pick up this really thrilling novel. So, yeah, I mean, my next question for you is about the humor that is laced through this novel. And I would. I call it a dark humor. I don't believe it' humor that is, you know, going to have someone sitting there. Although, I mean, I did feel like laughing and crying at the same time a few times. But I, I don't think it's, you know, supposed to be laugh out loud. Send a comedy humor, but there's definitely humor. And I was wondering if you could talk just a little bit about creating that, that tapestry. I mean, again, I feel like it's more of a thread that runs through or pops up every now and then. But, but I don't believe, like, I don't think somebody would say, oh, this, this novel is a laugh out loud, comedic, you know, tour de force. I don't think that's the right way. Yeah, but, but the humor is definitely there.

[Elena Penner]

I think when this book was published, I had received many messages and some of them were voice messages and it was just people laughing. But the people who were laughing were of Turkish descent or Russian descent or also from the Mennonite community, and they really understood. And then sometimes when I had readings and I was reading from it and the entire crowd stayed quiet, I was like, this was a joke. They are very worried right when, when people read it. And, and sometimes people don't know if they're allowed to laugh, but you definitely are. And it's for sure meant to be comedic at times. And I think it's just a thing I have inherited from my family. I see it most with,

[Holly Gattery]

like, I

[Elena Penner]

was in Aupair for a Jewish family, and that's when I really encountered this kind of dark humor, especially about family history too, for the first time. And I think it happens maybe, you know, with some of the Jewish literature or shows I watch, but also with like, Immigrant experiences in general, because sometimes that's all you have left is to laugh about certain things. And with my family and with the family in this book and with the whole Low Mennonite German culture and language, it's because it wasn't written down for so long. We are really a family of storytellers. And so a lot of it was just passed on. And obviously people were writing either in Russian or in High German, but it would always sound kind of fake, right? Because it's not your. Your real language. And of course, also for the Mennonite community in South America, it would be maybe Spanish or they would continue to read, to write in High German or in Canada and English, of course, but it would never have that same flow as Low Mennonite German. And it's a super funny language. It's very similar to Dutch. There's a lot of English syntax in it. And it's just comedic without wanting to be that. Like, there's so many freaking words for such particular things. And it's in this book, too, that I like to explain little words. So I think the comedic aspects come with the tragedy of it all because it's just a sign that that's all you have left when everything else is falling apart. At least we still have our humor or sense of humor. And some of it is not on purpose. My mother will do this a lot. She is not good at sarcasm. She doesn't get it. She doesn't use it. So she will talk about someone's cancer diagnosis or someone's death, and it will be two seconds later that she'll tell me that a certain supermarket has coffee on sale and whether or not I want that coffee. And I'm just like, what are you talking about? You know, it's a lot of switching from seemingly banal things or from. From important things to seemingly banal things. But within that, there's just such a comedic aspect that you can't write. I'm rewatching Girls right now because as the rest of the world, I'm reading Lena Dunham's Famesick. And I feel seen in that show because very often it's like that.

[Holly Gattery]

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[Elena Penner]

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[Holly Gattery]

Yeah, what a great answer. It leads perfectly into my, my next question, which is about the story behind translating this novel and how that came to be because some, I believe was somebody that approached you. Bradley Schmidt, approached you about translating the book.

[Elena Penner]

Yes.

[Holly Gattery]

Yeah, I'd love to hear more about it and I'm sure our listeners would as well.

[Elena Penner]

So Bradley or Brad was we knew each other through, you know, Instagram or just, I don't know, being, being in, in similar circles. And he really liked the novel. And we had talked and we had met at a reading and he always said it, he always said he wanted to translate it. And I was like, oh, sure, yeah, go ahead. I was very, very busy being on tour with, with Nightberries for the first year and then the second book came out and then the third book came out and, you know, these came kids are still there and the garden is still there and, you know, there's errands to run and very often you think, oh yeah, maybe, maybe I could translate it at some point, but I could have never done that job. And I feel like very often we need to keep things to the professionals. And so he did and he got some funding for it. And, you know, sometimes it's just like one person who really believes in something and I'm forever grateful to him to have done that because, you know, I lived in the States for so long and my friends there are so excited to finally read it. Yeah. So that's just on a personal note, it means the world to me.

[Holly Gattery]

Well, it's a beautiful job. And I mean, I don't know much about translation myself, but I feel like it was, I can't picture this book existing as anything else, which is, you know, to me, the highest compliment for translation. You know, sometimes I can read things that are translated and things seem off and it's usually just something that's not published. It's just something that a friend has done. And, you know, I'm a beta reader. I'm like, I don't. I don't understand what's happening, or this doesn't make sense. And then this. It just felt like it's always been this way, your book.

[Elena Penner]

So, I mean, can I add something? So the thing is, of course, that, as I said earlier, low Mennonite German has a. Has a lot of English syntax to it. And I lived in the States for a long time. I got my bachelor's and my master's in American Studies. And so English is a huge part of my life. And it reflects on the way I write in German, because I never had any kind of classic training in terms of how do you write in German? So it's always been odd, right? The. The way I write is not typical German. It's. It's just. It has kind of a different flow. I use words differently. And I never noticed it, really, until I started doing this. And then my friend Nina, who's so amazing, she finally had, like, a light bulb moment, and she's like, it's because you literally write American, but in German. Like, it's shorter sentences, it's clearer. It's. It's just different. And. And German novels tend to be, you know, very long sentences, very. A lot of explanation. And it's just not what I was taught. And in combination with my native languages, it's just such a crazy mix. And I think that's why it's always good to read books from people who grew up with many languages, because I think their mind works differently. They see the world from so many perspectives, because every single language will have a different filter that also contains, of course, your cultural experiences, the experiences you've had, maybe with religion from different countries and holidays and food. You know, I can't even stress the importance of food within the Mennonite culture. And it's one of the first things in all of my books that German critics will always comment on. Why is she always writing about food? Like, they're always eating. I was like, because we always are. You know, we're always hungry. It's. It's a part of it. And then you read a German novel, and they're never showering, they're never eating. And it's like, this is weird.

[Holly Gattery]

Yeah, I love that. I mean, it's just whenever I write, I'm a Iranian. There's always tea. I can't escape it somehow. There's this ubiquitous glass of tea that's in every scene. And, I mean, I can even remember one editor saying to me, okay, enough with the tea.

[Elena Penner]

It's like.

[Holly Gattery]

But there's never enough with the tea. What are you talking about? Tea is everywhere. Tea and fruit, it's everywhere. I don't understand. No, I love death. It's great.

[Elena Penner]

It's so many little things. It's the taking of your shoes. It's the taking of your outside pants. It's just things that are so normal. Right. That you don't even think about. I do write them down because to me, it's part of the routine of writing within that world, but I would never question it. So even with my third book, that has nothing to do with Mennonite culture. It's just these people are closed in, and it's kind of like a Big Brother moment. But obviously it's a reality show, too, so they're going to eat the same way they eat, you know, in the Big Brother show, because they have to. They have to cook for themselves. So, yeah, that was just.

[Holly Gattery]

I love that. And I mean, I was going to ask you next. Your next question. I mean, maybe you're not working on anything right now, but the final question I always love to end with is, what are you working on now? And it's completely fair to say nothing, Holly. I'm tired.

[Elena Penner]

I am a little bit tired. So counting the children's book, this, it's four books, and I think four years, that's a lot. And I've been on the road nonstop. So I actually started working for the government in January, so I really love the change of that. But I am working on a book, and right now I'm just researching. I'm taking everything in. I'm reading, I'm watching shows, I go to. To plays, but I will. It's going to be female friendship, but as a novel. And what else can I say, already it's very much centered in why do we have this urge to stay friends with people just because we've known them for a long time? Like, why is it so hard to break up with friends, even if they're not good friends friends, and they don't even have to be bad friends, but they're just also not good friends.

[Holly Gattery]

Yeah. One of the most. I love that, by the way. One of the most liberating things somebody ever told me. It was a friend of mine who. A new friend. She's in her 80s, and she said, holly, you can't go through life being a collector of people and that that made me feel a little bit better about letting some of my older friendships that I was not or I was feeling like I had to upkeep it just because, as you said, I've known this person forever, that I was just like, you know what? This isn't up to me. That's right. I don't have to collect these people. That's fine. So yeah, I look forward to reading that when it's out, not if I'm giving no pressure. A very firm when it's out. And I want to thank you for coming to talk to me today on NBN about Nightberries, everyone. You can get Nightberries by Elena Penner, which is published by CMU Press from wherever books are bought or borrowed. Thank you again, Elena.

[Elena Penner]

Thank you so much for having me. Thank you for listening to this episode of the New Books Network. We are an academic podcast network with the mission of public education. If you liked this episode, please share it with a friend and rate us on your preferred podcast platform. You can browse all of our episodes on our website newbooksnetwork.com Connect with us on Instagram and BlueSky with the handle ewbooksnetwork and subscribe to our weekly Substack newsletter at newbooksnetwork.substack.com to get episode recommendations straight to your inbox.

[Holly Gattery]

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