If only Susan Juby had paid more attention.
Growing up on what was essentially a hobby farm outside Smithers, B.C., her family's approach to self-sustainability proved to be more a source of embarrassment than pride for the then-teenager.
"We had chickens, and pigs and a horse and that was just sort of expected. If you had a little acreage you had some creatures on it. There was a huge garden and a root cellar. And I took no notice of any of it," says the Nanaimo-based author.
Reached Tuesday while on a trip to her hometown to visit family, promote her two new novels, and complete her current project, her 11th book to date, Juby recalls her teenage desire to leave the countryside behind and live in town.
When, in recent years, it became not only important, but also somewhat "trendy and chic" to live off the land, Juby tried to follow suit, though quickly realized how little she knew about the process and its inherent challenges. However all was not lost as she went on to pen not one, but two novels centred around an inexperienced, 20-something New Yorker, Prudence Burns, who attempts to lead a self-sustaining life after inheriting Woefield Farm, a fictional derelict plot of land on Vancouver Island. Joining her are a motley crew of equally earnest yet unseasoned farmhands, each facing their own set of personal challenges. The first book in the series, The Woefield Poultry Collective, was released in 2011. Its sequel, Republic of Dirt: A Return to Woefield Farm, was released in February.
It's been a busy spring for Juby as she also released a second book this year. The Truth Commission follows three art high school students as they try to get to the bottom of a dark secret and start a truth-telling club with dire and hilarious consequences. Before The Woefield Poultry Collective (and with the exception of her 2010 memoir, Nice Recovery, profiling her experiences with substance abuse from age 13 to 20), all of Juby's novels have been geared towards young adults. That said, her readership has continued to be an approximately 50/50 split between teenagers and adults -including for the bestselling Alice series (Alice, I Think; Miss Smithers; and Alice MacLeod, Realist at Last). The series was adapted into a television show and aired on the Comedy Network for one season in 2006.
"People over 25 would write and say, 'I know I'm not supposed to read this but I really like it.' Adults reading teen fiction has really come of age. A lot, a lot of adults read teen fiction now," she says.
For teen novels, the convention is for the majority of characters to be young adults themselves with storylines centring around issues of interest to that age group, like coming of age.
Writing for adults offers more freedom, for example, in the Woefield Farm books, her main characters range in age from 11 to 70-something, and the issues they grapple with are not necessarily related to growing up, rather pertain to broader issues, like creating community.
No matter what age group Juby is writing for, her focus is always comedy. "It's what I love to read. If somebody can make me laugh, I'm devoted to them for the rest of my life. It's always been that way. I've always really admired funny writers. I think it's just what I'm best at. I'm not ever going to be a hauntingly lyrical sort of writer. I'm probably always going to be much better at comedy. I'm not sure, I think it's maybe such a major coping mechanism for me, the funny stuff, that that's what naturally comes out. It's what I find appealing about writing, is putting together a scenario that is unexpected and absurd. If I can make someone laugh, I feel a job well done," she says. In addition to her own challenging experiences with growing her own food, the concept for Woefield Farm was further inspired by time spent in the community the books are set in, Cedar, located just outside Nanaimo, which she came to know while boarding a horse there.
"I saw very prosperous, lovely little farms and then ramshackle, rock farms and I thought, 'Oh, well obviously I'd have to give them a terrible farm to start with,'" she says.
Further inspiring was the book Cold Comfort Farm, a novel published in 1932 by English author Stella Gibbons.
"It's about a young woman who goes to a farm where everyone is extremely dysfunctional and she is not a neurotic, she's very optimistic and organized and gets absolutely everybody just dialed in and on their way. And I thought, 'What would she look like today on a derelict farm?'" she says.
When Juby's publisher asked if she was interested in writing a sequel to the first Woefield Farm book, she jumped at the opportunity, having a host of notes already compiled.
"It felt like that's a story that could continue. The characters, they're well-developed for me, and so I could think of all sorts of mishaps that could befall them and further adventures of, and things to explore," she says.
When asked whether she'll pen a third novel in the series, she says only time will tell. "I could absolutely see writing another one. We'll just have to see what happens," she says. Her most recent book, The Truth Commission, is another work geared toward young adults. Juby teaches creative writing at Vancouver Island University and the novel contains illustrations by one of her former students, Trevor Cooper. "As I was working on The Truth Commission I noticed that all of the visual arts students I had in my classes drew constantly. It didn't mean they weren't paying attention but it was a nervous habit. They were always drawing something," she says.
One such student, Cooper impressed Juby with both his writing and his illustrations. Thinking about The Truth Commission's main character, Normandy Pale, Juby realized that, like her charges, there would be no way that Pale would be able to stop herself from drawing, and so asked Cooper to come on board for the project.
"I loved what he brought to the book," she says.
Juby enjoys her time in the classroom, finding it helps to keep her feeling inspired and enthused.
"I love seeing students find their stories and their voices. I really like being a part of that. There is still a part of me that is shocked and amazed that I'm published. Ten books in I remain shocked and amazed that somebody's actually published me. And so I like to share that. When people write a good sentence and feel great about it, it's a good spot. It's wonderful to see somebody just beginning and start to improve drastically through some of the things we can teach, so that's wonderful too," she says.
Juby's current writing project is a follow of sorts to The Truth Commission. While it's not focused on the same characters, it shares the same setting.
When asked about her creative process and where new and interesting characters come from, she says part of it is the result of observing the world around her.
In addition, her approach often involves looking within. "They say that writers return to the same themes over and over. And I think most human beings have enough drives, fears, deep-seated obsessions and desires to populate many, many, many books and that's usually what is animating my characters, is something inside of me that I have not quite dealt with, or that I'm afraid of. A lot of wishful thinking - I wish I was this. And it's a way to explore that without having to do it in real life," she says.
While Juby is not a big fan of lessons and morals in stories, one of the major things she hopes to impart in her own work is a sense of hope. "And the possibility for people to find community and the power of people getting together, even the weirdest, least likely people, finding their team, or some kind of connection with one another. Everything in there is about that. A lot of the comedy comes from trying to make that happen, rather than people being in opposition to one another, hating one another, writing one another off. Finding a way to make each other stronger and better," she says.
