Music Introduction
Robert:
Hello and welcome to I'm a Serious Book Person, the podcast where we gently interrogate people who claim to be just that. I'm your host Robert Watkins and in every episode I sit down with an author, a reader or just a fellow book obsessive. Or maybe they're all three at once. To dive into their favourite stories, the books that changed them and why we all still cling to the glorious dusty power of paper and ink. So grab your favourite drink and your current read because this is the place for those who truly love books. Let's get to it.
Robert:
Do you have a specific mourning period after finishing a great book where you can't even look at another cover? Have you ever had a heated one-sided argument with a fictional character while doing the dishes? Or maybe you've felt the urge to stop a stranger in the street just because they're holding a book you love. If your heart rate spikes at the words Signed Edition, congratulations, you're a serious book person. Today we're joined by the wonderful Sita Walker. You might know her from her stunning, soul-bearing memoir, The God of No Good, which captured our hearts with its honesty and wit. Now she has made her much-anticipated move into fiction with her gorgeous debut novel In a Common Hour. Welcome, Sita. I can't wait to find out what you love most about stories.
Sita:
Thank you, Robert. I can't wait to be on your podcast.
Robert:
Who knew that the word specific was so hard to say?
Sita:
[Laughs] I did.
Robert::
It's just the way the S's and the P's pop in it. I think it's the specific.
Sita:
It's very tricky. Yeah, kids say it wrong all the time. They say pacific.
Robert:
Yes. I'm sure that you'll be referencing kids all the way through this because of your school teacher nature and the fact that you have multiple children. So I'm excited to hear even more about what the young ones are doing these days. Our first question today is very simple. Sita Walker, are you a serious book person?
Sita:
Robert, I think you know already what the answer to this is going to be. And it is, of course not. I have never been serious about anything in my life, let alone books. No, I'm the opposite of that. Sorry.
Robert:
What makes for an unserious book person, do you think?
Sita:
I'm willing to pop it down if you read half and just simply not chuffed to go on. That particularly disturbs people around me when I'll just read two chapters of a book and go, I actually really like the writing, but I'm done now. I'm happy to move on. I like… there's no books that I'm massively snobbish about. I'll give anything a crack really.
I think that I don't go around saying how important books are. I quite like stories. I think that if I'm going to be serious about anything, I would be serious about stories. But where you're getting them is it's neither here nor there to me. If kids want to watch Netflix limited series or they want to listen to music or poetry or they prefer to read, great, cool. Go to.
Robert:
Do you think you can be an unserious book person and still actually just love books, though?
Sita:
Oh yes, yes, absolutely. I love books. I've always loved books since the very beginning. I grew up in a religious household and I wasn't allowed to watch a lot of shows. I was never allowed to watch The Simpsons. Always wanted to watch The Simpsons. Never could. So I read a lot of books and they've been my companions for years.
Robert:
Fun fact, I was also not allowed to watch The Simpsons when I was growing up. I don't know if it's because my parents specifically thought that Bart Simpson was too rude and that I would learn some unseemly behaviour from him.
Sita:
Yes.
Robert:
Or if it was just generally religious households didn't like The Simpsons. Funnily enough, I don't actually think it's that offensive.
Sita:
I don't think it's that offensive either. And I actually don't think, Mum, if you're watching, that my mum had ever seen an episode of The Simpsons. I think maybe she heard ‘Eat My Shorts’ and was like, Oh, you can't watch that rude child because you'll, like you said, end up like Bart. Just never going to happen.
Robert:
Never behave ever again because you've seen him do one bad thing.
Robert:
My next question for you, I think is a nice sort of like jump from there in that you acknowledged that you grew up reading a lot because of being in a religious household. Was there a particular person who influenced your love of storytelling?
Sita:
I think that a couple of things. So the first thing is that I think the households sort of spirituality wasn't necessarily the reason why I was reading all the books. I've been thinking about that. My family loved books as well. So there were always a lot of books. And of course this was pre-Internet. So there wasn't a lot to do. And it was in Toowoomba. So two strikes, not a lot to do.
Was there a person that influenced, there's definitely people that influenced my writing in terms of my reading. Probably writers, probably Enid Blyton was the biggest influence on my life. I don't know if everyone said Enid Blyton, but… I… those her books were everything to me. They were the reading that I was doing every night. And then they were the stories that I was playing out with my friends every day. So The Famous Five on a Treasure Island is an incredible piece of literature.
Robert:
I just want to pause you there… We've only had one test listener for our podcast, and that's our producer, Murray's dad, John. And he specifically mentioned how much he loved Enid Blyton when he was growing up. So he is going to be so excited that you said that.
Sita:
Thank God, I thought you were going to say we can't talk about that racist b**ch, to be honest, but I think it was a long time ago, guys.
Robert:
I think he acknowledged to me in listening to it, that lots of people find her problematic these days. But you know, I think it was the same thing. He talked about how those stories were really an escape as a kid, and I'm sure that you found it the same.
Sita:
Nobody ends a chapter like Enid Blyton. Like I think she taught me how to end a chapter. This is how to do it. You know, every single chapter absolutely slapped. You get to the end and you're going, I can't put it down. I must.
Robert:
What's next?
Sita:
Find out what happened to these kids. And it wasn't about all of the things that we look at it as adults, like the lens that we look through and go, oh, well, she was problematic in this way and in this way. It was about the adventure. They're having the adventure. We were in it for the, for that.
So I think that taught me that taught me a lot. I loved adventure books. I loved any mysteries. I was big into Nancy Drew.
But keep it light. I don't like sort of, I was never as I got old, I never a Stephen King sort of horror kind of vibe. I didn't even like those goose bumps kind of monster-y, horror-y stuff. Wasn't into it. It's the adventure.
Robert:
So you say that that was kind of your influence on your reading. What was your influence on your writing then? Who is, who is the biggest influence on that?
Sita:
I think the biggest influence on my writing because I wasn't always a writer. So my, my first book, I was, came out in my 40s. Like I wasn't planning on being writer. I didn't think, oh, I'm a writer. I wasn't that at all. But I think when I wrote that book, my biggest influence was the students that I taught because of all the bad things that they had done. And all of the mistakes that I've been correcting over many, many years of being an English teacher where I go, OK, well, you know, this piece is totally generic.
This is how I would make it unique. Don't use too many adverbs, you know, don't like vary your sentence length so people aren't bored. We don't need to go on and on like get to the point. I think get to the point of what you're writing about was a real lesson that I learned over many years. And then when I started writing a book, I went, oh, I actually know how not to do the wrong thing because I've been telling kids for so many years.
Robert:
I'm pretty sure I listened to a podcast once where very famous Australian writer Helen Garner said, adverbs, get rid of them.
Sita:
Oh, they've got to go. They've got to go. And do you know what doesn't get enough love? The noun, the noun is incredible. Like I've just taught year eight for a couple of weeks and I've gone, I don't want to see an adjective. Please stop. I don't want to see an adverb or an adjective. Just give me a whole bunch of nouns and then you can show me with the nouns the picture of what's happening. It's a real change because I think in primary school, they do a lot of like imagery. And this is how you do a metaphor. This is how you do a simile. This is how and then you get a thousand, you know, dancing snowflakes and all the rest of it. But nouns, they go, oh, we never knew. Nouns could be so incredible.
Look, this is no one will find this interesting except for you and maybe not even you. Nouns guys.
Robert:
There's maybe the primary school teachers that they're feeling attacked right now, but… But I’m down with it.
Sita:
I'm sorry. You guys are doing a great job. It's very hard. There's a lot of data. I understand. But… you know, can you talk about nouns with the kids, please? We beg you.
Robert:
If we had to give this episode a title, it would be… ‘Free the Noun’.
Sita:
Free the Noun.
Robert:
Free the Noun. How many people have we offended?
Robert:
Our next question today.
Sita:
Yes.
Robert:
And it's… it's quite interesting because obviously we've addressed your love of the problematic or now problematic Enid Blyton. What is the book that you think has had the most influence on your love of storytelling?
Sita:
Oh, look, it's very difficult to pick just one. This is an unfair question because if you just had one book, you would hate storytelling.
Robert:
You don’t have to just pick one.
Sita:
So I've already mentioned the famous five series. I think when I was a teenager, I read Looking for Alibrandi and that was the first time I really saw, you know, someone an ethnic person. And I was like, oh, great. You know, I can see that this person, I mean, Josie is Italian and, you know, my family's Indian-Iranian, but she… she was a brownish person. And I was like, oh, I can see I really understood her. And I love that book. And also it was a little bit saucy. So I was like, oh, this is doing amazing things for me. I just loved it. I loved Looking for Alibrandi. So I think that was a formative book.
And then when I got older, I think I discovered through teaching Steinbeck, who I absolutely love, like of all the classic writers he is my fave. I love him and he's so handsome, too. If you ever Google ‘John Steinbeck’, you're in for a treat.
Robert:
I think one of our producers is trying to have a look. Of Mice and Men or Grapes of Wrath.
Sita:
Of Mice and Men is my favourite to teach.
Robert:
OK.
Sita:
Also it's very short. We love a short novella. The Grapes of Wrath is wonderful, but it's not my favourite. My favourite is East of Eden, which I hear they're making into a series with Florence Pugh, which I'm very excited about because I love her. But East of Eden is a beautiful, beautiful book. And I love how Steinbeck infuses his novels with sort of a spirituality that you don't really read in other novels of the time. I think he's remarkable. And in terms of form, he's incredible as well. Of Mice and Men is the greatest thing ever in terms of its form, I think.
Robert:
I'm pretty sure I learnt or read Of Mice and Mern… Of Mice and Men in high school as well and it broke my heart and then I saw the movie that also broke my heart. Like it is very powerful as much as we want to free the novel, I think we need to celebrate the short novel.
Sita:
Oh, it's wonderful. And it's great for kids. I don't let them read ahead. I don't let them take the book like home and read it. They just read one chapter each lesson. And then we do the last two chapters in one lesson. And it does. It kills them. The reactions are fantastic. They're all… the kids who finish first.
Robert:
Are you like standing back and watching?
Sita:
I sit back and I watch. I love it. I love that last lesson to watch them read the end Of Mice and Men. And, you know, some kids will just slam the book down on the table. Like, we can't believe it ended like this. And then they'll want to talk about it, but everyone else isn't finished. So I'll go ‘Go and get a drink. Take a walk, I know, it's tough. We've all been there’. It's wonderful.
Robert:
I think we've learned that Sita likes quiet reading time in class as well.
Sita:
Everyone likes quiet reading time. Why wouldn't you?
Robert:
I mean, honestly, I think they should bring it back for people who work in office as well. Just give us an hour a day to sit back and read.
Sita:
They should. You're not allowed a phone. You're not allowed a laptop. You just have to sit there for 15 minutes and read. And they struggle in the beginning because, you know, they're all addicted.
Robert:
Yeah, their attention spans…
Sita:
As we are. We're all… everyone is. So it's a struggle, but by the end of the year, they're all keen for it.
Robert:
Interestingly enough, now that we've talked about quiet reading time, I think there are always places that we associate with where we want to go, when we want to either read or write or, you know, develop a story. And I'm interested to know if you have a favourite place that you go so that you can kind of escape from the world and go into a story.
Sita:
Yeah, just my room.
Robert:
Just your bedroom.
Sita:
I don't like to go…
Robert:
Outside?
Sita:
Outside. No, I love to go. I love the outdoors. I love to go outside, but I don't like to read outside because I'm always a little bit uncomfortable, like the grass. I would never recline on grass and read. I mean, it's. There's creatures, you know, and I do love the great outdoors. I love creatures. I love beetles and bugs and birds and trees.
Robert:
Doesn't sound like it.
Sita:
I know, I know, I know it doesn't sound like it. [Laughs] But I do, guys. I just don't like to lie down in the grass and read. It's hideous. Also, where are you going to put your elbows your head? I feel the same way about the beach. What a terrible place to read. People are like, we go to the beach, we lie down with a book. I'm like, I'm getting burnt. There’s sand, sand in my book. All over me. So no, indoors, on my bed. It's a beautiful thing. And I need my room because I've got a busy house. So otherwise it would be in the family room.
I do have dreams. So my dream reading slash writing place would be, you know, I would have a three story sort of teetering house on the river in Brisbane, and I would have one of those little gazebo verandahs that they sometimes having Queensland coming off the master bedroom, overlooking the river, of course. So that would be ideal. But yeah.
Robert:
Post the big movie adaptation of In A Common Hour, or The God of No Good. Producers out there, please reach out.
Sita:
Yeah, please do.
Robert:
That might be your actual set up. Interested to know then, is that also where you go to write or is that just where you go to read?
Sita:
I write anywhere. I've have been asked this question, where do you write before? And I because of the nature of my busy lifestyle, I'm writing everywhere. So I write in my classroom during the famous silent reading time. I write, yeah, in my bedroom, in the lounge, on the deck. Sometimes I write on the way to work by recording like a little voice note. And then I found this thing that converts it to text. And then I email it to myself. I'm sure there's an easier way of doing this, but I do a 17 step process to get the voice note to my computer. But yeah, so everywhere really, I can't be precious about it. But again, if I had to choose, yeah, probably my deck or my lounge room.
Robert:
Does it need to be a certain set of circumstances to be able to do it? Or is it just because you're grabbing it in snatches, it can just be at any time with whoever around?
Sita:
No. Ideally, no one around. But that's never going to happen. So I just have to get over it whenever.
Robert:
Wait till that little lunch bell goes. Then you've got 15 minutes to bash out 200 words.
Sita:
Yeah. Yeah. I like to go by words. Words is great. I love a deadline. I love a word count. I love a you've got this many words. And then I divide it up into weeks and go, OK, I've got to do, you know, 2000 words this week and whatever they are going to be, they're going to be on the page. So that's how I do it. It's not romantic, sadly.
Robert:
I think it still sounds kind of romantic.
Sita:
Aw, thanks.
Robert:
But we just have to get you that three story house with the gazebo… verandah to sit out on.
Sita:
That would be incredible.
I mean, even just working part time would be good. The gazebo can wait. I don't want to tempt the gods, you know, just… just little, little wishes.
Robert:
No manifestations going on here.
Sita:
No, I think manifestations. I'm all about the manifestations, yes. But I also am about bargaining. Yeah, I'm like, if I do this, like if you give me this, I will give you guys whatever you like, but you have to make it clear to me. We've gone way off topic. [Laughs] Way off topic. But yeah.
Robert:
Thank you so much for joining me today, Sita. It has been a delight to hear about how much you love stories.
Sita:
Thanks, Robert. It's been a massive pleasure being here and really fun, actually.
Robert:
Sita, what a total treat it has been to spend this time with you today. Your insights into the messy, beautiful heart of storytelling have been so inspiring, and we feel incredibly lucky that you shared them with our little podcast community. Whether you're getting lost in the lyrical, character-rich layers of her novel In a Common Hour or laughing and crying through the pages of her memoir, The God of No Good. Sita's writing is a masterclass in heart and heritage. Her work is in turn hilarious, devastating and always profoundly beautiful. I truly believe that these are the kind of books that change you just a little bit by the time you reach the final page. They are stories of family, faith and the ties that bind us across generations, and I urge you to add them to the very top of your reading list immediately. We have links to both of Sita's books in print, e-book and audio in our show notes for today's episode.
Sita:
That was very sweet.
Music Interlude
Robert:
If you enjoyed this conversation, please remember to follow I'm a Serious Book Person wherever you get your podcasts. A quick follow really helps us reach many more book lovers. Also, you can keep up with all the incredible titles and authors that we discussed by following Ultimo Press on all our social media channels. Finally, I would like to acknowledge that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, and I pay our deepest respects to their Elders past and present. I'm a Serious Book Person is hosted by me, Robert Watkins, and is produced by Andrea Johnson and Murray Nance. Until next time, keep reading.
