10 Questions for Alicia Upano
- By Abby MacGregor
“She is a beacon in the dark night, dressed from nape to heel in white. Standing at the threshold, she is a study in contrasts: her black hair blunt against her chin, the ivory of piano keys, while her red lips take shape to mouth the name of a friend inside. The bar is closed and it’s well past curfew. It is January 1942. A few miles west, the Pearl Harbor shipyard remains aglow with destruction. Battleships will burn for months.”
—from “Ada, After the Bomb”, Winter 2018 (Vol. 59, Issue 4)
Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
I made a book in first grade with construction paper and that felt like magic. My father said, around this time, that I would cross into oncoming traffic with my head buried in a book. Reading—then and now—is my catalyst to write.
What writer(s) or works have influenced the way you write now?
All those early books—so many vampires and witches and babysitters—made me a dedicated reader, and I otherwise wasn’t aware of much other than the canonical works assigned in class until high school, thanks to a program that brought local writers into public schools. These writers and their work modeled for me how Hawai‘i could exist on the page in thrilling and evocative ways.
As an adult reader/writer, I’ve been particularly drawn to books that deal with the passing of time, a sense of the big world, and often with multiple narrators. Some I particularly loved while drafting my novel include Half Blood Blues by Esi Edugyan, Lost City Radio by Daniel Alarcón, Forgotten Country by Catherine Chung, and A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki. And many, many others.
What other professions have you worked in?
Academic publishing. Nonprofit communications. Newspaper reporter. Random jobs included selling surf shorts at the swap meet, answering phones at a lumberyard, and working as a cashier at a grill that sold triple cheeseburgers and lots of Nantucket Nectars.
What inspired you to write this piece?
This is a reimagining of one of the plotlines in my novel, Big Music. I wanted to play with compressing time and omniscient voice with these two ill-fated lovers who meet at a jazz club in Honolulu after the Pearl Harbor bombing.
Is there a city or place, real or imagined, that influences your writing?
Hawai‘i. Like my own history—I’m hapa—I’m interested in how people and events converge here, particularly in Hawai‘i’s more recent history.
I’m also drawn to stories about the Philippines, which is where my paternal family is from. While traveling through Baguio a decade ago, a hotel clerk pinpointed my grandfather’s province from my last name, and that connection to land struck me as something both foreign and significant.
Do you have any rituals or traditions that you do in order to write?
I imagine I used to, but I now have a toddler and the only prerequisite is that I be ready to work wherever I am, so I’ve often got drafts and books in tow. Sometimes I detail my writing plans to a friend for accountability, but it’s really been a way of thinking through my projects—what I’m excited about, what needs some TLC, what needs research, etc.—and all that planning helps me focus when I finally sit down.
Who typically gets the first read of your work?
It’s changed over the years, but generally, various writing friends and groups. Lately my partner has helped me talk through rough drafts while our babe sleeps, and that’s been immensely helpful.
If you could work in another art form what would it be?
Dancing, which is not to say I know much about the art form, but I revel in the idea of being rooted in my body rather than lost in my head.
What are you working on currently?
A number of short stories involving Hawai‘i, spanning from the early 1900s to the present. I’m also looking forward to refining my novel manuscript, Big Music.
What are you reading right now?
A couple literary magazines that just arrived in the mail. In terms of books, I recently enjoyed John Dominis Holt’s Waimea Summer, David Mura’s A Stranger’s Journey, and Roxane Gay’s 2018 selections for Best American Short Stories.
ALICIA UPANO is the recipient of the 2018 James Jones First Novel Fellowship and the fiction winner of the 2016 Poets & Writers Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award Hawai‘i. Her creative work has appeared in the Asian American Literary Review and Bamboo Ridge, among others. Born and raised in Hawai‘i, she’s lived in Asia and on both U.S. continental coasts, and currently resides on O‘ahu with her family.
