By Page H. Gifford
Correspondent
Author Jody Hobbs Hesler’s will discuss her new novel Without You Here with Friends of the Library on Nov. 6 at 10 a.m. It is told through the eyes of eight-year-old Noreen, who deals with her aunt Nonie’s suicide. Hesler said that the loss, compounded by the family’s fears that Noreen will follow her aunt’s troubled path, reverberates through her life, planting doubts about her judgment. Noreen grows to be a young mother stuck in an increasingly precarious marriage whose imminent crisis will force her to choose between allowing history to repeat itself or setting a new course.
In her previous book What Makes You Think You’re Supposed to Feel Better, she examined similar subjects through short stories.
“I’ve written stories ever since I could hold a pencil. Like other writers I know, I’m in the habit of experiencing the world as an observer, as well as a participant, and disconnection, longing, and loss, are the emotions that tend to spark my interest and imagination the most,” she said. “This disconnection might occur within families or other intimate relationships or even within a character’s sense of self—from denial about a loss to mental health issues.”
She added that sensitive topics or dealing plainly and directly with human experience define literary fiction’s domain. Literary fiction’s superpower is inviting empathy.
“Literary fiction is scientifically proven to increase a reader’s empathy. When fictional characters experience realistic emotional challenges, readers respond with genuine emotion.”
She added that, “I aim to connect with readers meaningfully and deeply, and I hope they extend the same compassion and understanding they develop for my characters toward the real people they encounter in the world around them.”
Some of her research is the result of life experience. Loss, longing, rejection, regrets, and more that we all can relate to during a lifetime.
“I’ve lost a few people to suicide. I’ve reckoned with my anxiety and other demons, and I’ve witnessed loved ones reckoning with theirs, but my characters and their situations are invented. So the emotional truths in my fiction come from real life one way or another, but the exploits, conflicts, and struggles I illustrate belong to my characters.”
To write about Nonie in Without You Here, she had to understand Nonie’s mental health issues. She died in 1980, so Hesler needed to understand what mental health care for panic disorder might have looked like at that time. For background on mental health issues, she interviewed a psychiatrist with a specialty in anxiety disorders, a therapist writer and friend, and an EMT. She read several books, from memoirs to more academic volumes, detailing the issues Nonie would have had. She watched helpful YouTube videos, from Australian government-sponsored mental health documentaries to archival footage of relevant psychiatric sessions from the late 1960s.
But that’s only the beginning of the research included in her current book. Young Noreen breaks her arm in one important scene, so to portray it accurately, she needed to understand her injury. To learn more about broken arms, she interviewed a family doctor and the daughter of a family friend about her broken arm, which was similar to Noreen’s.
“Noreen and Nonie were both bigger risk-takers than I ever was, so I also needed to study what’s involved with jumping a train, among other things. I also discovered a fascinating subculture newspaper for train jumpers,” she said. She feels her extensive research is key to maintaining her connection with her readers. “To earn a reader’s trust, my details need to ring true. Research and accurate representations are my means for earning that trust.”
She says every personal experience influences her work.
“Anything that makes me learn, grow, struggle, suffer, and celebrate is grist for the storytelling mill. But whatever began as a personal and specific experience only shapes the lens I apply to whatever story I’m telling,” she said. “My characters and their experiences are entirely separate from me. They’re their self-contained little worlds.”
“It’s important to note, though, that this isn’t a book about suicide. It’s a fictional story about characters, their connections, and their struggles. I worked hard to render Nonie and Noreen as well-rounded, fully-fledged people, not defined by a single event or diagnosis, so when I give a reading, I’m talking about Noreen and Nonie.”
She has written for many journals and magazines including Writer’s Digest; writes and copy edits for Charlottesville Family Magazine, and serves as assistant fiction editor for the Los Angeles Review. She teaches at Writer House in Charlottesville and when teaching a writing workshop, she refers to particularly sensitive issues as “hot potatoes.”
She adds that her job as a writer of literary fiction is to serve the story.
“Hot potatoes only enter a story if they’re necessary to it. Mental illness, addiction, and trauma are never superficial props plopped in at random to draw attention or provoke a reaction. They’re only included if they’re fundamental to the story being told. This thorough truth-testing poses the biggest challenge in representing these issues.”
She hopes her readers understand we’re all human and struggling with something. “Compassion and connection are precious and essential,” she said. “When we encounter a character who struggles with something familiar we can step outside our own experience and see something new. Sometimes a character’s struggles can help us understand and articulate our own.” She adds that seeing how difficult an event or issue is for a character might help us develop greater compassion for ourselves or loved ones or friends, strugglingwith something similar. “When fiction resonates, it’s sort of magical.”
