Bryan Bliss, author of Dispatches from Parts Unknown
Young Adult Literature Category
Each week leading up to the 37th annual Minnesota Book Awards, we are featuring exclusive interviews with our finalists. You can also watch the authors in conversation with their fellow category finalists here.
What inspired you to write this book – or inspired you while writing it?
I have always been interested in the different ways people not only grieve, but also heal from grieving. The tagline for the book – Grief can make you do funny things – feels more and more prescient as time moves on. So as I wrote, I wanted to make sure that I was being honest about what it means to lose something fundamental in your life, but also show that such grief isn’t a monolith. There isn’t one way to grieve. And sometimes, you even find joy in unexpected places and things.
What is one detail you wanted to include in this book, but couldn’t find a place for?
I really wanted to include more of the near-encyclopedic knowledge of early 80’s and 90’s professional wrestling. Give the kids what they want, I say!
Tell us about someone (whose name isn’t on the cover!) who proved instrumental to the creation of this book.
As always, my editor Martha Mihalick. She’s edited all of my novels and her contributions cannot be adequately expressed with words.
Please tell us something about yourself that isn’t widely known. (It doesn’t have to be about the book in question – or even about your writing at all.)
I am an Episcopal Priest and work as a chaplain and a teacher at a local school.
Share your thoughts on the role and value of libraries.
My Mom once said: “I sometimes can’t believe that libraries exist.” They’re radical and subversive in the best possible ways. Free access to knowledge through books, the internet, and other sources? Yes, please. A place to escape the cold? Let’s go. Reading? My favorite thing! I grew up in libraries, learned to write by checking out books, and continue the love affair today.
Bryan Bliss is the author of the National Book Award longlist title We’ll Fly Away as well as Thoughts & Prayers, Meet Me Here, and No Parking at the End Times. He is an Episcopal priest and creative writing teacher, and he holds master’s degrees in theology and fiction.