Books
All in the family
by Ruth Nichol
But the families in Anna Taylor's stories are not always as happy as her own.
Anna Taylor’s first book, Relief, is something of a family affair. The short-story collection is dedicated to her mother, Erin, who also provided the real-life experience that inspired one of its 11 stories, The Beekeeper. “She’s my closest adviser and she is always my first reader – she’s a wonderful critic,” says Taylor. “I really trust her opinion when it comes to my writing.”
Taylor’s sister created the intricate diorama that features on the cover of Relief, and her maternal grandfather provided the surname she has chosen to publish the book under. Taylor, who in the rest of her life is known as Anna Horsley, decided to adopt the writing name of Anna Taylor partly as a tribute to Brian Taylor, who died in 2007.
“He was a wonderful man, and he was also a writer. I was very close to him, and I felt it would be a fitting tribute to honour him by taking his name. At the moment, I’m only Anna Taylor for the book, but I will eventually take the name for my -personal life as well.”
Given how close Taylor is to her own family, it’s not surprising that families feature prominently in her stories – although they are not always as happy as hers. (Nor are they quite so talented: Taylor’s sister Loren Horsley not only is an artist but also starred opposite Jemaine Clement in the film Eagle vs Shark). Take the family in the powerful and disturbing title story, for example, who are far from happy. Don has been accused of sexually abusing his former step--daughter. His sister Judy is utterly – desperately – convinced of his innocence. But is the relief she feels when the charges are dropped really justified? Taylor cleverly sows seeds of doubt in the reader’s mind, without ever making it clear whether Don is innocent or not.
Relief is noticeably darker than most of the other stories in the collection. That’s partly because it’s one of two stories Taylor wrote after completing an MA in Creative Writing at Victoria University’s International Institute of Modern Letters in 2006. The other nine stories made up the portfolio that won the prestigious Adam Prize for Creative Writing, awarded annually to the top student on the course.
“I’ve considerably rewritten all those nine stories since then, but I didn’t write Relief and In the Wind till last year. I realised that they were the stories I needed to make the collection complete – that it needed a darker element.”
Taylor admits she may have been influenced by Irish short-story writer William Trevor, whose work she was reading at the time. “A lot of his stories are really dark, and that inspired me a bit.”
Trevor is one of her favourite writers, along with other short-story greats such as Alice Munro – “She’s my ultimate hero” – Jhumpa Lahiri, Lorrie Moore and Richard Ford (but only his short stories – she can’t be bothered with his novels).
Taylor knows that short stories are neither fashionable nor terribly popular. But they’re what she’s drawn to both as a reader and a writer. And as far as she’s concerned, they can be just as satisfying to read as a novel.
“They can be the real thing, I really do believe that. I think it’s such a shame that people see the short-story form as less than novels.”
Like the writers she admires, Taylor is most interested in what lies beneath the surface of her characters’ lives. Her settings are recognisably New Zealand but never specific.
“I like being anywhere and nowhere – I don’t like to restrict myself by naming places. What really interests me when I’m writing is the ways we relate or fail to relate, the ways we fail ourselves or each other. That’s the focus of the stories for me.”
Taylor has always written. She was a sickly child who spent a lot of time at home in bed, daydreaming and reading. By the age of seven, she’d started writing alternative endings to her favourite books – “I tried to write them in the same tone and style” – and by 11 she’d embarked on her first novel. “I got a fair way through it before I lost interest.”
She kept writing as a teenager and young adult, but it wasn’t until she signed up for the undergraduate courses at the International Institute of Modern Letters – after several years of feeling “pretty lost” – that she really began to write in earnest.
Now writing is her life. She works as a tutor for several creative writing courses, and writes the rest of the time.Until recently, her favourite writing location was in bed, fully clothed, under the covers, with her laptop propped on her lap. Sadly, though, she has had to give that habit up. “I got really bad OOS in my arm, and I’ve had to get a proper desk like a normal person. Those days are over, but it was luxurious while it lasted.”
