Oliver Mol, author of Lion Attack! – Interview and Book Giveaway
Today we welcome Oliver Mol, Aussie author of Lion Attack! to Booklover Book Reviews.
“From an inaugural winner of the Scribe Nonfiction Prize for Young Writers comes a funny, energetic coming-of-age story that isn’t quite like any other book you’ll read this year.
Oliver is a writer who’s just moved cities. He doesn’t have any friends yet; he can’t get his surly flatmate, Mark, to crack a smile; and the only people who talk to him are the odd assortment of characters at the KeepCup warehouse where he works, plugging lids into cups in an endless cycle.
His hours consist of daydreams: sweet, touching reveries of driving down the freeway with the girl of his dreams, and outlandish fantasies of bursting through the roof at bedroom store Snooze.
Oliver is lonely. For the most part, he is sleepwalking through life. At nights, he begins to write memories of growing up in pre-9/11 America, as he finds himself thinking of his childhood in Texas. But when he meets up with Lisa, the girl he’s been writing to on Facebook, things begin to change.
Lion Attack! is a startlingly original, ambitious work about a young man trying to navigate contemporary Australia and his own life. Part romance, part tragicomedy, and part social critique, it is hilarious, poignant, and ultimately deeply moving.”
(Scribe Publications, April 2015)
What inspired you to write Lion Attack! ?
I wanted to call my book Lion Attack! before I even started writing the book. Before I even knew what the book was about. Sometimes you just know. Sometimes something just seems so right and you’re not sure why. But I think you’ve got to trust that. Maybe that’s the only thing we can truly trust. Those brief moments when it’s just you and your mind and outside it is shitty and dark but inside it is not. Inside you are not smiling but then you are smiling. You’ve thought of something and it seems insane and terrifying and beautiful. And you’re not sure what it means. That’s all I want to what trust. The insane things. The beautiful things.
How does this title compare to others you have written?
I haven’t written any other books but I have written a lot of short stories and poems. I like titles that seem like tweets. I like titles that contradict themselves because life contradicts itself. I like books and stories and poems that are like life. My next book will be a collection of short stories and poems. It will be called I’m Trying To Write My Way Out Of Feeling Sad And It’s Working, I think. I wrote a short story recently that came from a very emotional/dark place. The short story ends with hope though. I feel it’s important for stories to have hope. We need hope in this world. Whenever I find some sort of hope I try and hold onto it so bad. The short story I wrote is called When People Say Fun Fact I Interrupt And Say, “You’re Never Going To Own A House” (But Maybe One Day You Will)
Can you tell us a bit about your writing process?
I like writing in the morning. I like drinking tea and water and writing for maybe four to six hours. I write because even though it is not always easy it makes me feel good. The practice/application of it. It gives me purpose. It makes me feel things. When writing stops making me feel good/giving me purpose I will stop writing. I’m not sure what I will do but I will do something else. I don’t really write after the sun goes down. I like spending time with friends. I want to date my friends. Not in a romantic way but in a platonic way. I want to give f##ks to the things that matter.
Do you have any tips or advice for aspiring writers?
Just stop thinking and write. If you truly want to write just do it. Don’t think specifically about what you are doing. Thinking kills/poisons nearly everything. Find things, other things, like art and music and people that make you feel beautiful and dark and happy and f##ked and write in this beautiful and dark and happy and f##ked way. Read widely. Read people from all over the world from all different backgrounds and genders. Read contemporary. Read old. Learn how they do things and steal their things and make them your own. We’re all in this together. We’re all here trying to figure out whatever this insanely complex and sometimes shitty and sometimes completely not shitty/wonderful/“shiver-y” thing is. We’re trying. Yeah. We’re to remember the things we dreamed about when we were younger.
Lion Attack! is available from:
Booktopia | Bookworld | Amazon | Book Depository | Kobobooks
Oliver Mol is a Sydney-based writer. He is the editor of The Adventure Handbook. He is 26. He grew up between America and Australia. He has lived in Houston, Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne. He was the recipient of a 2014 ArtStart Grant, the co-winner of the 2013 Scribe Nonfiction Prize for Young Writers and the recipient of a 2012 Hot Desk Fellowship. He has appeared at Emerging Writers Festival and Melbourne Writers Festival. He has read creative nonfiction at the Museum of Contemporary Art. He has interned at The Lifted Brow, was a fiction editor at Voiceworks and is part of the Stilts Collective. He is excited about life.
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Book Giveaway
To celebrate the release of Oliver Mol’s Lion Attack!, Scribe Publications has provided a paperback copy (with gorgeous iridescent title art) for international giveaway:
extra entries for spreading the word via Twitter and Facebook/Google+/Webpage - extra entries for registered participants of the Aussie Author Challenge 2015 – there’s still plenty of time to sign-up!
- entries close midnight 15 May 2015
- the winner will be randomly selected and must respond to my email requesting their mailing address within 5 days otherwise their prize will be forfeited and another winner selected
SORRY, ENTRIES CLOSED – The winner is Angie López.
