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First book opens doors for next ABR speaker

Emerging author to speak at American Book Review series

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  • BY APRILL BRANDON - ABRANDON@VICAD.COM
  • Originally published October 18, 2009 at 10:33 p.m., updated October 19, 2009 at 8:20 a.m.

  • Excerpt from the short story "Departure"

    By Andrew Porter

    "That spring we were sixteen Tanner and I started dating the Amish girls out on the rural highway - sometimes two or three at the same time, because it ...

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    • Excerpt from the short story "Departure"

    By Andrew Porter

    "That spring we were sixteen Tanner and I started dating the Amish girls out on the rural highway - sometimes two or three at the same time, because it wasn't really dating. There was no way of getting serious.

    This was in 1992, over ten years ago, and things had not yet begun to change in our part of Pennsylvania. I think of that year as a significant one now, a turning point in our county, the first year the town of Leola started growing and becoming a city and also the first year the Amish started leaving, selling their property and heading west toward Indiana and Iowa.

    There had been several cases of runaways among the Amish that year- mostly young men, barely in their twenties, tempted by the shopping malls and bars popping up along the highways near their farms. Leola was expanding quickly then, it was becoming more common, and it worried the elders in the Amish community. And I think it explains why that spring some of the Amish teenagers were given permission to leave their farms for a few hours on Friday nights.

    Out on the other side of town there was an intersection on the rural highway where they would go to hang out. It was a remote area. A strip mall with a K-mart sat on one side of the intersection and across the road there was a twenty-four-hour diner. You would sometimes see them on Friday evenings traveling in a long line like a funeral procession, their buggies hugging the shoulder of the road as tractor-trailers rubbered by. They would park out of sight behind the K-mart, tie their horses to lamp posts or the sides of dumpsters, and then the younger ones would go into the K-mart to play video games and the older and more adventurous would cross the street to the diner.

    The diner was a family-style place, frequented only by local farming families and truckers, and it was usually empty. Inside, the Amish kids would immediately disappear into the bathrooms and change into blue jeans and T-shirts that they had bought at K-Mart, clothes which never seemed to fit their bodies right. Then they would come out, their black wool clothes stuffed into paper bags, and order large platters of fried food and play country songs on the juke-boxes, and try to pretend they weren't Amish."

    IF YOU GO:

    The American Book Review reading series featuring author Andrew Porter

    When: noon Thursday

    Where: Alcorn Auditorium at the University of Houston-Victoria.

    Cost: Free and open to the public.

When Andrew Porter's debut novel, "The Theory of Light and Matter," was published in 2008, he wasn't sure what to expect.

Least among his expectations was winning a Flannery O'Connor Award. Or being named the 2008 "Book of the Year" by Foreword Magazine. Or becoming a finalist for both the Steven Turner Award and The Paterson Prize. Or having his book translated into multiple foreign languages.

"You fear the worst and hope that at least some people respond positively," the 37-year-old author said. "So I was thrilled, really happy at the reception the book received."

Porter is the next speaker for the American Book Review reading series Thursday. His speech will focus on his past as a writer, from how he got started writing, to the obstacles he had to overcome, to how he got to the point he is now, he said.

Growing up in Pennsylvania, Porter received his bachelor of arts in English from Vassar College and a masters in fine arts in fiction writing from the University of Iowa Writer's Workshop.

"The Theory of Light and Matter" is his first book and is composed of 10 of his short stories, many of which were written in the past five years, Porter said. It is being republished in paperback by Vintage/Knopf in spring 2010.

Although he has had numerous short stories appear in various publications, the success of the book has changed his life in certain ways, he said.

"When you put a book out there in the world, you develop an audience. So I've been asked to speak at universities and readings, to write essays and do interviews, and that aspect of my life has changed," he said. "But in terms of the day-to-day and the writing process, nothing much has changed. It's the same as it's always been. It's a daily struggle."

As for advice he would give to other aspiring writers, Porter said the key is simply hard work.

"People tend to romanticize the writing life, but for those that get published, it's all about overcoming obstacles and sticking with it," he said. "Young writers need resilience."

In addition to his writing career, Porter is also an assistant professor of Creative Writing at Trinity University. He is working on his first novel for Knopf, which will be released in 2011 or 2012.


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