Andrew Wedderburn: On Constraints, Avoiding Reality, Single Parenthood and His Novel, "The Crash Palace"
The Crash Palace by Andrew Wedderburn is a book I can’t say enough about it. It draws you in from beginning to end. The main character Audrey faces her past and in her journey learns valuable lessons and gets her own form of unconventional closure. Wedderburn’s in-depth answers to our interview both fascinated the reader in me and impressed the writer side of me.
Below find our conversation where we discussed single parenthood, constraints, and responsibilities versus avoiding reality and his new novel, The Crash Palace.
Automobiles are a big part of Audrey’s life, from the time she learned to drive to work as a driver for a band. It feels as if driving is almost a vice for Audrey a way to forget and focus on anything but life’s problems yet in the end it’s what makes her confront them. It seems to be what got her on the path she took. Is this a warning about getting caught up in impulses fueled by our own desires?
Audrey is happiest when she’s alone on an unexplored road with no particular destination in mind. As a young woman, she does what a lot of young people do: she tries to build her life around that passion. She meets a lot of people who have done just this, who range from someone like Wrists McClung, who does his best to balance adult responsibilities while still staying on the road to play the drums, to Rodney Levermann, who is much more distant and removed from what you’d call a normal life, and the responsibilities that go with it. And then Audrey becomes a mother, and has to put all of that aside. And the narrative engine of the novel is her longing after what she’s put aside.
I don’t know if it’s a warning—my goal wasn’t to be too moralizing, although I recognize that making use of some of the fairy tale tropes and structures brings along a certain moral perspective. But I was absolutely interested in exploring the tension between freedom / impulse / desire and responsibility / restraint / sacrifice, yes.
When the story opens we see Audrey is a single mother dealing with a lot and she kind of implodes from the weight of it all. The past has come full circle and she finds herself facing. Do you feel Audrey driving off on that winter day was the only way she would be able to heal?
I hope that it works that way for readers, yes—that Audrey’s internal curiosity and doubt and wonder and dissatisfaction have all come to a point that she needs to confront directly. I like the phrase “implodes from the weight of it all.” Being a new parent is hard and demanding enough, being a single parent a whole order of magnitude beyond that. You are tired and you aren’t thinking clearly. Little things balloon on you. And then layer in Audrey’s sense of loss about the life she wanted to create…I hope that her implosion feels plausible and well-earned to readers. I think that Audrey needs something when she drives out of the city, but I don’t think she knows exactly what that something is.
Audrey did not have a bad upbringing, her parents were not perfect but they never did anything to push her away. Yet she avoids home at all costs. What made Audrey want to run?
I think that Audrey has a strong need to try and see and do things for herself, which is pretty common for people around her age. And then on top of that are really strong qualities of self-reliance, which is a wonderful trait, and stubbornness, which can get people into trouble. I feel like Audrey has the self-possession to tackle anything, but also—and this is part of her being so young in the beginning—doesn’t necessarily have the self-awareness to know when she’s in over her head. You often get in over your head not with a single decision but with a series of small cumulative ones.
Audrey’s parents without a word spoken picked her up when she found out she was pregnant and were there no questions asked. As a reader, we can see this as part of a parent’s love always being there for their child. As a writer, I can’t help but think was her parent’s silence because of a fear of knowing what their daughter had been through?
Yes, I think that’s definitely a very thoughtful reading. Families often find themselves in spots where they have to weigh the outcomes of having discussions—what can be gained versus what would be lost by talking about something openly. Those aren't easy choices to make and you don’t necessarily make them deliberately or consciously—they kind of happen over time. There’s an aspect of “we’ve got to make this work so let’s get on with it,” especially with Audrey’s mother.
The Levermen that Audrey ends up driving for, try in their own flawed way to watch out for her. It seems that has been the case for her through most of the journey there was always someone giving her advice or watching out for her. But Audrey’s luck runs out when she gets to The Crash Palace. Do you see this as the moment that Audrey is hit with the reality of life, no longer is she the spunky kid rebelling on the open road that it is her end of innocence moment?
I think that each of the four Lever Men are at different spots in a range between “living life free from constraints or encumbrances” and “willfully avoiding reality and responsibilities.” I say that with a lot of sympathy for each of them, but also a critical eye. There was a time in my own life when I would have quit whatever I was doing to be in Rodney Levermann’s band. And the thing about willfully avoiding reality and responsibilities is that there are people out there who can help you do it. The Crash Palace is obviously made-up and fictional, but it is a kind of place that exists in the world—that functions outside of the normal world as far as it can. And once you’ve got a place that’s working outside the normal world and its structures, you can often get people who take advantage of the power that provides. So yes, Audrey’s luck runs out in that she unknowingly crosses a border into one of these places, and stubbornly decides to stay there.
Audrey in the end is left with many questions yet she seems to have found some closure by going to The Crash Palace. Is there a lesson in this for Audrey, that perhaps you might not get all the answers you seek and have to find your own inner peace?
I hope so, yes. Life is about living and keeping on living. Audrey has met a lot of characters who have turned their backs on engaging with their own lives—who are escaping or retreating or fleeing or denying things. You might not be able to make sense of everything, and you might not get the answers you want or think you need, but at a certain point you have to just choose whether or not you’re going to keep going anyway—to find all the socks and sweaters that you can and head out into the snow
Even though it is never said who Shelly’s father is it is unspoken who it is and some clues are given. I in a way feel like it might have answered too many questions if had been said out right, causing the reader to not connect the dots and figure out the core of the story. In this story was it an important element for her father to never be confirmed?
I had a few things in mind around the withholding of the specific name. There are a couple of names withheld deliberately. In the case of Shelly’s father, it’s Audrey’s prerogative to speak it for the reader, and she doesn’t. I think that the father’s identity is probably pretty clear, but I wanted to give Audrey that power over him—the power to not speak his name. In fairy tales and in many other modes of fiction giving—and withholding—names gives power. I wanted to give that to her, because holding on to that power is important to her as she’s trying to make sense of where everything has ended up.
And that connects to the other withheld name, which is the Skinny Cowboy, who holds a lot of power over many of the characters. In this case, Audrey doesn’t know his name, and that power imbalance really troubles and haunts her. The Skinny Cowboy is more explicitly a fairy tale character, at least as far as how he works in the narrative—he controls this space outside of the world, and no one knows his real name. And part of what Audrey is working through is whether or not that matters—whether or not she’s going to let him have that power over her.
This story is deep it requires the reader to follow along, pay attention and in the end understand the overall lesson and underlying means. It’s done in a way that is smooth and keeps the readers attention. You manage to say so much without saying a lot. When writing this story what for you was the most challenging part?
Thank you. I think I had different challenges at different stages. This is my second novel, so I faced a lot of second novel challenges at the outset: confidence, nerves, a desire to try and do everything, a fear of doing anything at all. I spent four years on an early draft that I threw half of away.
What got me going was a series of scenes and episodes and images that connected with me emotionally. Audrey learning to drive as a teenager; the Lever Men picking her up on the highway; Audrey’s old house; the funeral on the lake top; Sue Father’s magic show. And then the challenge became the work of connecting those ideas together with the right amount of information for the reader to understand and the right amount of ambiguity for readers to engage with. Early drafts withheld too much, and Audrey’s desires and conflicts weren’t clear enough. There was a lot of work adding in details trying to get the balance right. I hope that I’ve done that, and that the mix of accessible structure and mystery is right.
Andrew Wedderburn's debut novel, The Milk Chicken Bomb, was a finalist for the Amazon First Novel Award and longlisted for the IMPAC Award. Wedderburn's musical work includes the groups Hot Little Rocket and Night Committee.
ABOUT THE INTERVIEWER
Nena Orcutt is an aspiring author, who thinks too much, Listens to a lot of music. Needs coffee to function. Who thinks Bukowski was a wise man and Hemingway was a genius. And feels romance isn’t dead. She is working on her debut novel “The Crow and The Butterfly” Making her home in Music City she’s ready to conquer the writing world and leave her mark.
