Karen Smyth (4:43)

Well, it started, the idea was to write a book, a novel about all the different characters in this fictional town, Upton Bay, which is probably familiar to a lot of Ontario or Canadian readers as one of the tourist destinations, like, for instance, Niagara on the lake. So I had all of these ideas about all these characters and the stories and their. Their secrets and their family secrets and how they ended up in this place, because it's. It's a kind of town that has attracted a lot of wealthy retirees who have very specific sort of politics and conservative views and lifestyles and that kind of thing. And so there was a lot of complicated stuff going on that I wanted to write about. But as I started to work on the book, there was one character kind of took over in terms of theme and where the story started to go. And that was the character Jay's grandfather, whose name is Otto, and he had immigrated to Canada just after the Second World War from Germany. And I started thinking about that particular history of that particular character and imagining what his life might have been in Germany and what his role might have been in the Second World War as a German of a certain age who would have been in the army. So as that research went on and on, I decided that the narrator needed to explore not only that family history, but her own family history. Because my narrator, whose name is Sam, is Norwegian by background, her mother and grandmother both from Norway. And so she started to expand her research within the novel to what happened in Norway during the Second World War. And then this whole other novel within the novel kind of started happening about Sam's grandmother and her family history and what had happened during the Second World War under those circumstances. And since my narrator is an aspiring writer, it kind of this whole movement in her mind and in the novel carried her forward into a future which will ultimately involve writing, but not, not a creative writer, but as a kind of writer of history and research. So it kind of took off from being about this one fictional small town in Ontario to being about two fictional towns separated by geography and decades, one in Ontario and one in Norway during the Second World War. And that's how it became the more complicated novel that it is.

Holly Gattery (8:00)

One of the elements of the book that I found totally fascinating and that tickled me in perhaps the pettiest way possible, was the portrayal of this wealthy winery driven area and how shallow that veneer of it is. And, you know, I guess somebody else coming to the novel with a different set of a different set of values or a different background or a different personal history might look at this a different way. But I was really fascinated by the way that you play with this place, this. This town that has all these older, wealthy or white people at the helm of it. And Sam arrives there and is bothered by it. And I love that for Sam, and I love that for me. And because it seems to be this thing that happens, you know, I'll walk into these spaces as a not older, not completely white, at least person, and be like, this stinks. Like this sucks. Why are people just letting this exploitation happen? Because all this is, again, coming from where I am right now, thinking about how most wealth is built on the backs of oppression, different kinds of oppression, but oppression. And I'd love you to talk about that because that is a one of the big Themes in the book.

Karen Smyth (9:39)

Yeah, it is, for sure. Yeah. So in this town of Upton Bay, one of the things Sam comes across, because she's there to write an article about the town, to promote it, so it's going to be for tourists, and so it's to talk about all the positive, wonderful, pretty things in the town. And one of her ways of going about that while she's there is to visit one of the wineries that hosts people on tours and sells them their wine and takes them around the town to show them, you know, the touristy places. So she goes to one of these wineries and what she experiences there is less, you know, what a beautiful little winery and restaurant and how lovely it is here. But she focuses on how the wines are produced, and she actually overhears an accident take place in the winery. So she starts. Her mind starts focusing on who is doing all this work to produce this, on the surface, beautiful, attractive, fun town to be in. And that's the kind of person Sam is. So she's. She's more of a I root for the underdog and I want to know what the truth is kind of person. She's got an investigative mind, so that's her. Her narrative voice kind of has that flavor to it, so to speak. So while she's interviewing people so that she can write this article, which has to appeal to her editor who's asked her to write this article, of course, she's struggling with what she sees and hears going on in town and what the town's really like. And the town is, know, one of those small Ontario towns that was settled and British, primarily British people settled the town and it's remained predominantly that kind of demographic for all these decades and centuries. But Sam also is aware that town such as this don't just flourish on their own, and that indeed, for the wealth to accrue, some people are taken advantage of, to put it nicely, abused, to put it less nicely. So I guess that's part of Sam's character and sort of the way her mind leads the story and the direction the story takes then starts to move in that direction. But she also, while she's there, is uncovering secrets about people's families. So these privileged people who live in this town or whose parents still live in the town, they've moved away. They all carry secrets with them as well. So the judgmental aspect that Sam brings with her to the town when she first arrives starts to shift a little. She doesn't lose her critical perspective whatsoever, but she. She starts to understand that most human lives have complicated stories and backgrounds. And what she sees on the surface of even privileged lives isn't necessarily the truth or the whole truth. Mm.

Holly Gattery (13:11)

And it's something I keep coming back to a lot in picking up in themes of books I'm reading. Again, probably because it's on my mind a lot is the idea that Sam struggles. I'm trying not to give anything away, no spoilers. But Sam is. She starts with a lot more judgmental and a lot more kind of leaden in her opinions than she ends up at the end of the book. Because it's really easy not to give grace to other people when you think you are perfect and flawless and blameless. And as you said, everyone carries histories. And a really interesting unraveling throughout the story is not necessarily at the beginning, but as we move toward the later part of the story, as Sam starts to unwind more about her family history. My next question for you is one of my favorite. And by favorite, I mean it made me deeply uncomfortable settings in the book was Otto's house being anywhere in that house. Whenever Sam was in that house, I was like, ah, get me out of here. There is so much tension here. But it was so perfect for the book because that's exactly what should have been. I want to know everything about creating and maintaining that almost unbearable amount of tension in those scenes.

Karen Smyth (14:34)

Yeah, well, it's. It was interesting as I was writing it, because as you say there. There's so much tension there because there's so many characters who are kind of clashing into each other. There's Otto and his wife Shelley, and their different personalities and sort of stage of life issues, I guess, that they're experiencing. There's Jay, who was close to his grandparents, his grandfather, while he was a child because he was born in Upton Bay and spent a lot of time with his grandparents. But he's since grown up, moved away, is a musician living in Toronto, and has very conflicted feelings about his family and his upbringing. And then, of course, there's Sam, who's never met these people, who doesn't know Jay all that well. They've been together for about six months, but Jay has been ill through most of their relationship. So she's also kind of a caretaker in a way to Jay, and their relationship's very complicated and new. So with all that happening and with Sam walking into this very tense household, not knowing the people or the place or even her partner all that well, it's a little difficult to. When you're writing this kind of a story with so much complexity to put yourself in Sam's position where she doesn't know anything and to write it in a way that reveals what is important to be revealed at the pace that is the right pace for revelation, while knowing it all as the author but your character doesn't know. So in a way, I guess the tension that that produces in the writer because it is tense, kind of translates into the narrative itself.

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Karen Smyth (17:34)

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Holly Gattery (17:40)

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Holly Gattery (18:01)

And for people listening who think I don't know if my heart can take that much tension in one book. It's only when you're in the house, when Sam's traversing around town, visiting the wineries, you know, doing her Sam stuff, you, you can breathe again. And I think so. Like you're, it's, it's not a, like an extended exercise intention. So don't worry about it. It's just the right amount of times before it becomes totally unbearable. And I think, I think for me, having been in my fair share of relationships and my fair share of tense houses, people I don't know that well, I think that's part of the reason I was like, I can't take this. Like, it was just so Perfectly rendered. When you're sitting there not knowing what to do, it's not your house, it's not your space. And as much as somebody might say, you're welcome here, it is totally clear that you are not, and they'd much prefer you to not be there. So I just thought that was so wonderfully depicted and said Sam's response to it was just. I felt so true to my own. And one thing I also love about Sam's response is as someone who has done travel writing myself and has been sent to do this one type of fluff piece and then done something that is completely different, ended up not writing that at all. Like trying to take down the patriarchy with one. With one small discovery in a fluff piece I was supposed to be researching, I really felt that in Sam. And even when she's at her most infuriating, because she can be a little bit infuriating, she was still close to my heart that way. So I loved. I loved Sam. She was so. She was so fun. My next question for you is about the cast of. Okay, the cast of characters. There's a lot of characters, but I really want to focus on the older characters. I guess we could say the elderly characters, but I don't want to paint them in a light as being kind of stereotypical feeble elderly care. I mean, Otto is kind of there, but not all of them are. These are people that, as the story progresses, we. We see they have very complicated and difficult and in some cases very vibrant lives. So talk to me about giving enough airspace to each person to develop them fully as a character, but also not letting them take over the entire story. Because I was thinking, as a writer myself, I think it would be very difficult for me to be like, that's enough.

Karen Smyth (20:31)

Yeah, it's a good point because there are a lot of characters and they, as you say, they do have a lot of stories and complexities in their lives. And so one of the things that I had to figure out was how to tell all these stories in a way that made sense when. When I had a first person narrator who wouldn't know all of these stories and wouldn't find out about all of them either, during her stay in Upton Bay for a few days. But in order to do that, I ended up deciding to write third person vignettes. So I ended up embedding within the novel, mini stories within the story about the characters, the key characters that are involved in Otto's social life and circle of friends, to whom Sam is somewhat exposed, either by seeing them or meeting them or having conversations with them. So she has some exposure to them. So it makes sense that they're in the book. But how did. To tell their stories was something a little bit more difficult to figure out. So when I came up with the vignettes idea, I had made that work by moving those vignettes around until I found places that felt almost organic for those stories to emerge. And it was important that to me, that different points of view emerge because Sam's point of view obviously structures the novel and focuses it. But I. Part of the point of the novel, or one of the main themes is that in order to tell a story truthfully or to know something about the past in a more truthful or full way, fulsome way, is that you need multiple voices. You need to listen to a large. A wide variety of voices in order to get there. And so that's why I thought it was important to have those vignettes embedded into the novel and to contrast with some of the scenes in which you see those people interacting with the main characters as well. So the vignettes are kind of backstories, but contextual for many of those secondary characters, I guess.

Holly Gattery (23:04)

Yeah. As much as I want Sam just to be the most reliable narrator because it, you know, justifies my smug sense of self satisfaction because I see myself in her, the truth is, of course, she can't be. And when you start, you know, peeling back the layers of these other characters and seeing their stories and how not necessarily, necessarily wrong Sam is, but how shallow her understanding of people and place and history are, that that's a really, you know, for me, it was a. An unsettling, in a good way, revelation because again, it's reflecting back on me as, as the reader, I'm being like, wow, you know, you need to listen more. And I, I think, isn't that what all good books do? They should encourage us to listen more and reflect more deeply. So I enjoyed being reminded of that in your book.

Karen Smyth (24:05)

My. My final thing might be the ideal reader. Holly. So.

Holly Gattery (24:09)

Well, I have a theory. I'm not a theory. I would say it's not even a theory, it's a practice. And that's anyone listening. I encourage you not to adopt it, or at least to try it out, or at least to think about what I'm going to say. And it's just simply that, you know, meeting books where they live, trying not to go into a book with too much of your own expectations, it's impossible to go in with none but of what a book should be, but to, you know, kind of listen for the music of the book before you take up the dance. Like, what is. No, I'm not going to start dancing before I figure out what this book is, what we're. What we're dancing to here. And I think that if more of us could go into books and just meet them where they live and not impose as much of our own reality on them, it. And. And when we do, to maybe think about why we're doing that and what says. What that says about us or our world or whatever. I think. I think. I actually think the world would be a better place, number one, if more people read and if more people read and enter conversations with each other, even in real life, not just a conversation of a book, but conversations with each other less sure of ourselves and more willing to just listen to what other people are trying to say first. So I do try to do that with books because, I mean, your book had. I was not. I mean, I knew, but I was not prepared because you have these vignettes and then you have some other really fascinating. And at first for me, it was surprising ways in which you relay information in the book. I was wondering if you could talk about that.

Karen Smyth (25:44)

Yeah. So another thing that I did right from the start, and this was even when I was planning to write the book just about this town of Upton Bay and all the people who lived there, was I wanted to contrast Sam's point of view, the first person point of view, with another point of view that is embedded in the footnotes. So I decided I was going to play with footnotes and see what that would do. Because as, for instance, as Sam's driving into the area surrounding Upton Bay and she hears what sound like gunshots go off, and she assumes it's one thing, but in the footnote, you're informed and Sam wouldn't know this. So the reader doesn't know this, but you're informed about what that noise really was. So it sets up a kind of doubting, I guess, in the reader's mind in terms of Sam's reliability, but just not just Sam as a narrator and in metafictional terms, but just in terms of beliefs or thoughts or certainties that people have. Everybody has as you go through life where you make assumptions and those assumptions might be wrong, completely wrong. So it's kind of a third person narrator that speaks in footnotes throughout part one of the book. And I just liked that. I liked that little bit of extra information. So it's Informational for the reader, but the reader can ignore the footnotes, too. But it also emphasizes the point that the novel is making as a whole, in that you don't know everything that you need to have, as you said, an open mind and. And question things and not. Not necessarily take things for granted or take your own knowledge base for granted. And then Sam also carries on in that way in her part of the book, that is part two, where she focuses on her family history and what happened in Norway, because she. As she writes about her family history and presents it, she also uses footnotes. But her footnotes are not an extra voice. It's her voice, but it's providing factual information. So she's doing research and she's providing extra detail for her reader within the body of what she is writing and presenting to the world. So that kind of double use of footnotes and the use of footnotes in two different ways was really fun and freeing as a writer, speaking as myself, not as Sam. But it was really freeing and fun because the, as you know, Holly books are divided into categories and marketed as belonging to one or another category, whether it's history or fiction or memoir. And so blurring that line a little bit was fun and also freeing, as I said, because it opened up all kinds of possibilities for different ways of writing. And another major point of this novel and theme is that it's really important to pay attention to how history is written and how memory is transmitted down the generations, because point of view and source material and time passing and all of those features have an impact on what it is actually that you're reading, if you're reading historical stories or information about what's happened in the past. So those were, as you said, that it was kind of surprising. And I know I've had that question from other readers about why the footnotes. And maybe that's a bit of a complicated answer, but it kind of explains why I started doing that and how I felt it was important for the novel to. To include those aspects of the. Of the book and the actual structure of it.

Holly Gattery (30:06)

Yeah, I don't think I wondered why the footnotes. My question was, how am I as a reader who, when I saw the footnotes and immediately seized, I was like, no, I don't want to be back in school, Mom. Like, that's. That was so what? Like, I was like, okay, well, this is saying something about me, right? Like the reader. It's. It's. They're in here for a reason. So what I told myself is ignore the footnotes and then every section go back and read them all. Which is really neat because I wasn't getting any of that input like when I first read them. And then when I read back I was like, oh, okay. So I was just experiencing, for instance, in that first section that purely Sam. Purely her experience. And then it's like bringing another witness into the interrogation room and then getting a whole, like sometimes not a whole different story, but a, A different, at least vaguely different story or a completely different understanding in some cases. So that is the way that when I had that, you know, kind of anti academic. So I was like, no, no, no more footnotes. I already read the Norton Anthology of English Literature once. I'm not doing it again. And this is a reaction that is born out of, you know, my exhaustion with being in post secondary education. But it is, it is not a reaction to actually what this author is doing in this book. So find a way that works for you to read them. And for me it wasn't stopping to read them. It was reading each part separately, fully. And then I was totally fine with them and made it through them no problem because otherwise I was just going to, you know, have a very stubborn toddler moment.

Karen Smyth (31:49)

Right, right. Oh, that's interesting. I like that approach. That's good.

Holly Gattery (31:54)

Yeah, yeah. Well, thank you. My final question for you, and I'm very curious about this one, is what are you working on next or now?

Karen Smyth (32:02)

Right now I have a novel that is another first person novel, first person narrator and a woman's voice. And it's about a woman who has recently divorced and has kind of exiled herself to the Amber Hebrides off the coast of Scotland. And the story unfolds about her family and her background and why she's there. And it has secrets that she isn't aware of that she comes across in the course of this novel that change the way she sees herself and her past and her relationships within her family. So some of the same themes, I suppose now that I'm saying all this in common with the Town with no Noise. But it's not an experimental novel in that sense of the structure that I played with in A Town with no Noise. Embedded documents and kind of dramatic monologues or dialogues, plus the footnotes, of course. It's more of a straight narrative, although typical for me, it moves around in time quite a bit. So it follows the motion of memory, I think maybe in this way.

Holly Gattery (33:27)

Well, I love a good blurred knot like line and I love a good secret. So you do both really well. So I'M here for it and I, I cannot wait to see what becomes of that novel and hopefully read it. Karen, thank you so much for joining me on NBN to talk about your really remarkable novel, A Tamastown Noise, which is available wherever books are bought or borrowed and published by the resplendent Plamelips Press, which is a wonderful indie press in Ontario. Karen, again, thank you so much for joining me.

Karen Smyth (34:05)

Oh, thank you, Holly. It's been really wonderful chatting with you.