An Interview with Violence Westerling

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What inspired you to start writing this book?

The painful, sudden ending of a long-distance relationship and the pains of trying to love someone living as two different versions of himself due to his high profile career. The hollowing fact that the ghost of his image across my screen, in my suggestion feeds, his voice on the radio will now haunt me forever.

I took ‘us’ and looked at ‘us’ like two astronauts on a mission of love together, with his tether getting cut in half. Thus, leaving myself to die alone and drifting through the void of space.

I was not granted any sort of closure in this breakup and through this book I found my own closure. This book is me finally saying goodbye, because he never did.

Tell us the story of your book’s current title. Was it easy to find, or did it take forever?

The title actually came rather quickly. It is a literal reference to the communication between him and I being suddenly severed and unfixable.

Describe your dream book cover.

Dream cover would probably be something dark in color, my name in bold, all caps, red letters at the bottom of the cover, the title in the center, possibly a black and white image of a broken communications radio or a broken moon, also in black and white.

Something that feels broken, lost, and powerless to change one’s inevitable fate.

Even a broken wire with frayed, sparking ends upon a solid black background and my name and its title in bold red letters.

If your book had a soundtrack, what are some songs that would be on it?

The Hollow – A Perfect Circle

Jungle (bedroom sessions) – Tash Sultana

Runaway – AURORA

The entire De-Loused in the Comatorium album – The Mars Volta

Coma White – Marilyn Manson

Aqueous Transmission – Incubus

Stuff like that. The plethora of emotions I felt while writing each poem would make this quite a clashing mix of angry nineties rock songs and slower, healing, or grieving songs.

What books are you reading (for research or comfort) as you continue the writing process?

Being as I am on a current journey of self-discovery through intense shadow work, I have been reading a lot of Carl Jung. However, anything controversial, hard to swallow, dark, philosophical, or freaky I will read.

What other professions have you worked in? What’s something about you that your readers wouldn’t know?

I’m a late bloomer. Having grown up with a rather rough and unfortunate past, I was not granted many opportunities to explore other professions. Nor did I receive any of the necessary encouragement to reach outside myself. I sort of lived my life from the passenger seat and was only recently granted the courage to take the wheel and drive.

Who/what made you want to write? Was there a particular person, or particular writers/works/art forms that influenced you?

I was born a writer, an actual writer with pen and paper. All of my stories start out as messy written pages filling entire notebooks, especially my poems. Typing is not the same as writing to me. My grandmother is where I gained my love of books but writing, writing was always in my blood. The darker, more emotionally ugly and raw side of any art form has always pulled at the void inside. Which is honestly the short answer to this question. From birth, I have always had this very prominent hollow inside myself and most of my inspiration comes from a life lived longing for things I have never even known.

Where is your favorite place to write?

Great question. I’ve had many preferred places to write over the years; a garage rooftop, the edge of a cliff overlooking the city. Though now, I tend to mostly write in my car. I love to hear birds and feel the air upon my skin when I write. Anytime from 3 a.m. to just past sunrise is always very pleasant to write.

What advice would you give your past self at the start of your writing journey?

Keep it to yourself, don’t indulge about it before it is done, others with only cause you to doubt your ambitions. Do not tame your voice to fit the accepted mould, don’t shy away from any painful truth. Also, submit earlier! Like, years earlier.

What’s one thing you hope sticks with readers after they finish your book?

My name. I have this really big thing about being forgotten. I’ve lived my life already feeling like a ghost. I guess I just want to leave something behind that will last, something that people will quote years after my death. Even if only by one person. I am not equipped, internally, for focused attention on myself or crowds so, what better way than books?

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