Michele Lombardo’s story from the Spring 2020 issue resonated with me–and not just because I’m a former online dater myself. I invite you to read “The Love Trigger” and my brief interview with Michele. [VV]
Toulouse Reading
How did this story come to be?
I was actually at a kid’s party when the idea sparked. Another mom was telling me about the trials and travails of a 20-something in her office who was navigating the online dating world. At one point she remarked that dating apps should allow people to give each other ratings, just like Amazon, and I found myself really intrigued by the idea. I immediately began wondering what would happen to humanity if such a thing existed and what the person who brought it into existence would be like.
How does “The Love Trigger” fit with the rest of your work?
It nestles in there nicely. I have a thing for strong, heavily flawed female protagonists. I tend to write a lot about the various ways in which women collide with societal expectations. Carol, as you can probably imagine, is a polarizing character. I can’t tell you how many times the word “unlikeable” came up when I was workshopping this story. Because, of course, female characters are supposed to be likeable even though the same expectations don’t exist for male characters. But I think the fact that she doesn’t conform to that allows her to tap into the zeitgeist of now a little, too. She is an unapologetically “nasty” woman with a vulnerability to her that she’ll do just about anything to conceal. And she does things we all dream of doing, like stabbing an ex in the leg with a pen. We all do dream that, right? Not just me?
Carol’s voice is so strong. Did you consider third-person POV?
I didn’t, actually. I think her voice developed very strongly early on, so I just went with it. Third person limited POV probably would’ve worked, too. But I’m glad she narrates the story. I’m glad that readers get a heavy dose of her unmediated voice. I probably wouldn’t change that aspect of the story if I were to rewrite it.
This story made me snort with laughter. Does humor come naturally to you? Do you think you’re a funny person?
God, no. I do have a dark sense of humor that seeps into a lot of my pieces. But I’m no comedian. I don’t tell jokes and I don’t see myself as an especially funny person. I’m more like the kind of person who thinks of the witty retort five minutes after the conversation ends. So I might think the funny things, yes, but it’s usually not at a conversational pace. Good for writing with humor, not great for speaking with humor.
What makes you laugh?
Cats. Occasionally people, but mostly cats.
Is there an aspect of fiction writing you find particularly challenging, i.e. getting started, story beginnings, middles, endings?
Yes, actually, and it’s weird. I always struggle trying to come up with the small actions that accompany dialogue. I often try to punctuate conversations with some actions that the characters do while they’re speaking. This helps cut down on the number of dialogue tags I need to use. But I can never think of what people do when they’re speaking. I always default to the same few things, like “Jane sighed,” or “Jane crossed her arms,” or “Jane furrowed her brow.” The most boring, trite, meaningless things possible. I SEE myself doing it constantly and I admonish myself each time. Think, I say. What do people do with their bodies when they talk? You know this….But, alas. I do not know this.
You mentioned that you’re finishing up a novel. Could you tell us a little about that project? Do you have ideas for what’s next?
Sure. I wrote a novel about three moms behaving badly. The story explores class, but it is also preoccupied with the joys and disappointments of female friendships. The things we hide and the toll that takes. And our jealousies. It also explores the ways in which women subjugate ourselves to perform the role of “mother.” There is a loss of self that happens after one births a small being and a woman must eventually reinvent who she is to accommodate that fact. When we emerge from that reinvention, there are casualties everywhere. Everything is altered and our options shrink, which has consequences for our relationships and our career trajectories and our self-worth and, ultimately, our attitudes toward our kids. The three moms in my book come together with the best of intentions – to help young girls – but they’re in desperate need of help themselves, so it doesn’t go well.
I do have an idea for the book I’d like to do next and I think it’s a really fun one, but I’m not allowing myself to work on it until I wrap up the latest round of revisions for the first book.
What’s the best complement you’ve ever received about your work?
That my story made you snort with laughter. I was also told by a friend recently that my stories were “fun and dark and naughty” and that was a pretty great compliment, too.
What is the last thing you read that really impressed you?
Probably Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere. Moreso than the language or even the content (although I did enjoy the content), it was the way she knit such a complex plot together so tightly. There were so many threads, so many characters, and somehow they all hung together. Each element overlapped and commented on another and by the end my mind was blown by how she’d created something so efficient. So many disparate things pulled together into one thematic whole. It was like a set of nested dolls.
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Michele Lombardo is a fiction writer, co-founder of the monthly writing series Write Now Lancaster, and a member of Philadelphia Stories’ Fiction Board. Her work is forthcoming or has appeared in Literary Orphans, DASH Literary Journal, Cosmonauts Avenue, Philadelphia Stories, Crack the Spine, Permafrost Magazine, and others.
