Connie May Fowler. The name just reeks of southern, doesn’t it? Her latest novel, The Trouble with Murmur Lee, is exquisitely written — buy it, read it. Or grab it from the library … ha, free reads are righteous.

Connie May Fowler is a novelist, memoirist, screenwriter, and also co-owner of a clam aquaculture concern in Florida’s Apalachee Bay. When I met Connie May, I quickly learned two things: she’s got a good sense of humor and she’s extremely busy. She is the Irving Bachellor Chair in Creative Writing at Rollins College where she directs their annual symposium Winter with the Writers, A Festival of the Literary Arts. She is also a professor in the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program at Spalding University. Her many accolades include the Chautauqua South Literary Award for Remembering Blue (my personal favorite), the 1996 Southern Book Critics Circle Award for Before Women had Wings, and three of her novels have been Dublin International Literary Award nominees. From 1997 to 2002 she directed the Women With Wings Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to aiding women and children in need. She continues to advocate for battered women and their children nationwide, most recently performing in The Vagina Monologues with Jane Fonda, Rosey Perez, and Margot Kidder. The event raised over $100,000 for two social service agencies in the North Florida/South Georgia region.

Just makes me tired writing about it.

Probably best known for her novel Before Women had Wings, Connie May’s books make readers laugh, cry, wince, and eventually — join hands and dance. In her books, as in many books by women writers (especially southern ones) there is a different take on the “coming of age” idea. Women mature when they are adults. They eventually gain their own independence and self-awareness — but not as teenagers. The female protagonists in Connie May’s books don’t become “one” with their adulthood by hitting a triple and sending Frankie in for the scoring run. These girls don’t have a fumbling, poignant, first sexual encounter that is both bittersweet and endearing, and they certainly don’t become mature adults by sucking it up and just “getting over it.” Connie May’s women become strong because they confront adversity. Her 2001 novel — When Katie Wakes — for example, is a memoir that explores her descent into, and escape from, an abusive relationship.

I spoke email-conversationing with Connie May a few years ago and her answers to my questions still ring true, so let’s publish them here, okay? Ya’ll can read more Connie May on her blog.

Let’s continue, shall we?

Valerie MacEwan: Let’s talk food, I mean, we are southern and nothing is more important here. First off, you and seafood, Florida seafood — Replace the pot roast with fish, with seafood, give me your menu. (Then cook it and send it to me in a container filled with dry ice so I can taste test it for this article.)

Connie May Fowler: Well, of course, we need oysters, oysters, and more oysters. And not just any run-of-the-mill oysters but freshly harvested Apalachicola Bay oysters.

Sauté a chopped onion in butter (please — no margarine!) Add some fresh minced garlic. Next, add in the oysters and all their liquor. Throw in water (just enough to cover the oysters and onion), some white wine, fresh chopped parsley, bring it to a boil. When the oysters start to curl, squeeze 1/2 of a lemon into the pot. Salt and pepper to taste.
Add more lemon now — if you want.

VM: So this is one of those recipes where quantity is in the eye of the beholder.

CMF: Yes. That’s what makes it so easy. And this stew has no milk, no potatoes. Just simply the essence of the sea. Serve hot sauce and sour cream on the side. And I like to bake parmesan tuilles (grated fresh parmesan, tablespoon mounds on a cookie sheet, bake at 350 until brown and bubbly — doesn’t take long — and voila! Parmesan cookies!

Besides oyster stew, I usually make seafood perleu (only fresh gulf fish and shrimp), angel biscuits, and lots of veggies (piles and piles of them). And I always bake my mother’s pineapple upside down cake, also a pecan pie and coconut macaroons using my own recipes.

VM: Holidays are an extremely effective vehicle for setting place and time, even mood, in any form of art, whether it’s writing or visual. Valentines, Easter, birthdays, Thanksgiving, Christmas, whatever. Have you used holidays to help further the plot or to increase the reader’s awareness of a character’s personality traits?

CMF: Hmmmm, the only one that comes to mind is that I used Thanksgiving in Before Women had Wings. A widow and her two girls, trying to celebrate Thanksgiving in the wake of death and their subsequent plunge into poverty — it was full of pathos. And… of course, the holiday didn’t go well despite their best efforts.

This is one of the truly awful side effects of holidays: they force us to confront how very alone in this world we are.

VM: That’s a great lead in to discussing your work with Refuge House, but let’s stick with food for just a bit, then we’ll talk about the women’s shelter. What’s the most exotic food you’ve ever cooked (and not just as a holiday meal)? I ate alligator once (yeah, it does taste just like chicken) but I’ve never cooked it.

CMF: Since I don’t eat red meat, I’m profoundly boring on this issue. But — once I saw a recipe for elephant ear soup (not the animal, the plant) which I planned to make one day. Then a friend came over for cocktails and appetizers, so I served some different cheeses on a giant elephant ear leaf taken from the plant in my yard. Being from Sweden, the friend reasonably asked what an elephant ear was and if it was edible. ‘Sure it’s edible!’ I told him. We started eating it like a couple of rabbits. He was the first one to realize that his throat was burning … I mean REALLY burning. My friend, being a physician, knew we had to call poison control! The people there told us to drink milk and they wanted to know how many children had ingested the plant. Turned out elephant ear contains an acid that hooks into the soft lining of your esophagus.

VM: Wow. I grow elephant ears in my yard, but, honestly, I never thought about eating them.

Back to the women’s shelter discussion. The Women With Wings Foundation and Refuge House — the women’s shelter you work so hard for — how do they figure into your life? Now that the holidays are over, did you do anything special there?

CMF: Refuge House is the domestic violence and sexual assault shelter in Tallahassee, Florida, serving eight north Florida counties — the largest service area of any shelter in the state. The community comes together in many ways to support Refuge House during the holidays, including donations of food and gifts for the women and children in the shelter. Also, two years ago, my foundation teamed up with Gulfwinds Track Club for their annual Turkey Trot Thanksgiving Race. We raised about $10,000.

A point I must make is this: lots of organizations come out over the holidays to help agencies such as Refuge House. It’s terribly needed and appreciated. But what happens the rest of the year? These agencies need support all year long. For instance, traditionally one of the busiest times for domestic violence shelters is at the beginning of the school year.

VM: How can people help?

CFM: The children who show up at the shelter with no new clothes or school supplies like back packs or notebooks, they really need to start school with something … I would love it if when parents do their back-to-school shopping for their own children, they would also purchase one item to be donated to an in-shelter family.

VM: Let’s talk about writing now. In Frankenstein, Mary Shelley wrote: “Nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose — a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye.” Do you see the act of writing as a sort of tranquilizer? Do you follow a writing schedule, do you have a fixed time when you work on a book?

CFM: Let’s put it this way: when I’m not writing, I feel anxious, depressed, hopeless, and like an utter failure. When I am writing, I am scared pantless, but I am also thrilled by the process and prospect of maybe pulling off something wonderful (this despite the devil’s doubt who sits on my shoulder forever, telling me the book isn’t working). Despite the devil’s barbs, writing and the state of mind that results are surely preferable to the alternative.

VM: After you worked on the screenplay for When Women had Wings, how did people treat you in regard to you knowing Oprah Winfrey? I mean, did they just fall all over you because you’d met the great and powerful O — and I do not mean that in a trite or silly way — it’s just that she is such a major pop culture icon; she must have made some kind of impression on your life. And — do you think the resurgence of her book club is good for literature?

CMF: After the Oprah-thing happened, it was much more difficult to figure out who my friends were. And I hate that. I mean, suddenly people who previously would not give me the time of day were trying to introduce me to their bachelor sons. I was being invited to sit on major boards (of course, they wanted the “O” introduction which I will not do. Everyone hits up O for money an influence. I’m not comfortable doing that nor do I have that kind of access). The whole cult of celebrity phenomenon is totally out of control. And you know, there is a reason celebrities get paid so much money. They have to buy their privacy.

Do I think her book club is a good thing? Absolutely! It’s a great thing. I see no down side to it. I know there are intellectual snobs whose noses are out of joint because they think they are the only ones qualified to set the nation’s reading list. But, HELLO! Nobody is listening. There was no national reading list until Oprah came along. Compare the books she taps versus the average daily fare on the New York Times Bestseller List and, well… case closed.

VM: Follow that up with the idea of book clubs. How do you feel popular culture, the Internet, and the open accessibility of books has influenced reading as a social experience?

CMF: The upsurge in book clubs is tremendously positive. Authors, publishers, readers — we all benefit. And sure, some clubs are more challenging than others — so goes life. But I support any program, any wild hair scheme that promotes reading. Our challenge is to life the level of public discourse. If online chatrooms are inundated with discussions about Danielle Steele’s latest romance, well, that’s depressing. We need to challenge each other to read more, read wider, read deeper.

VM: And, I’ve got to ask — Is there a difference between being “Floridian” and being “Southern”?

CMF: I could go on about this forever! I get fed up with folks who say Florida isn’t the South. Obviously they’ve only traveled to our urban centers. Are we diverse? You bet! And part of that diversity is a sub-culture that has legions more in common with the southeast and the other Gulf Coast states than with Ohio, New Jersey, Canada, or Havana. You travel ten miles from the coast or the Interstate and you’ll be served sweet tea and cheese grits. The Panhandle is a delicious mix of Gulf Coastal and southeastern cultures. The plains of south central Florida is cracker cowboy country. The perception about us, and understandably so, is off-kilter. When I won the Southern Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction, the gentleman who introduced me explained how on earth a book set in Florida could have won. The answer was that Florida was a Confederate state. That really seemed to shock a few folks. So, I’m left in this strange quandary of feeling very much like a southerner (including bearing huge guilt over this land’s horrific past) and being not quite accepted because I’m from Florida. How bi-polar is that!?

***
Doing this interview with Connie May Fowler was a genuine treat. I hope she remains a literary force for generations to come. I suspect she will — she’s a true survivor. I certainly enjoyed reading, The Trouble with Murmur Lee. And I’m going to have a battle of the Oyster Roasts one of these days, North Carolina vs. Florida, no holds barred, double-elimination, a real smack down.