
Amanda Mitzel's deeply sad, reflective, and image-rich story "Vivanaut" caught us by surprise with its intricate narrative, which moves the reader among both time and space and also between the internal areas of the mind and a setting of outer space. We caught up with Amanda through the interview below.
What's your favorite thing to clean?
Vases. I really like the smooth glass of vases.
Describe your workspace.
It’s a little desk in the corner of my bedroom, overlooking the woods. On it at the moment: a vintage piggy bank clown, a neon sign that says L-O-V-E in hot pink, and a copy of Clive Barker’s In the Flesh.
Name at least one thing in your junk drawer that you're pretty sure no one else has in their junk drawer.
A glossy playing card with a drawing of a cartoon camel, smiling under a thickly-starred night sky.
Does your day job affect your writing topic or approach?
By day, I go on adventures with my five-year-old, and I write during little breaks here and there. At night I review the medical charts of stroke patients and inpatient code events, so my daytime writing is very much restorative and helps me balance out the heaviness of work and “real” life.
What is your least favorite word?
I think all words deserve love, but I have a really hard time with tender. Something about it being appropriate to describe both a loving touch as well as the texture of steak just throws me.
If you were to get a line from a book or poem tattooed on your body, what would it be?
“The violets in the mountains have broken the rocks” – Tennessee Williams, Camino Real
Do you consider yourself an organized or chaotic writer?
I am pure chaos. I seem to require having multiple projects going at once, and I hop from lily pad to lily pad if one starts sinking or another just happens to look more enticing.
Where do you go when you need to work out a writing block?
I listen to music. Either drinking it in slowly like a potion (“Lazarus” by David Bowie, anything and everything by Tori Amos), or dancing really hard to it (“Lonelyhearts” by The Atlantics is the very best for this). It gets me immediately out of my head and starts all that good Shakti flowing.
If your story was a cocktail, what would it be?
A short glass of Lambrusco. It would have been Uncle Duke’s favorite, and I like to think the interviewer’s breath smells faintly of it.
What are your long-term writing goals?
I want to create a big, fat stack of novellas-in-verse.
Advice on creating that you’ve learned by trial and error?
If you try to ignore the creative side of you, or put it on hold, you will eventually break open like a dam. Best advice: don’t build the dam. But if it happens, let it break and pour out and drown you. It will be uncomfortable but also beautiful and electrifying, and there will be nothing to do but ride the winding river down.
Amanda Mitzel writes horror and free verse poetry in a cabin in the woods. She has had work featured in Strange Horizons, Grim & Gilded, and more. Her chapbook, We Are All Made of Glory & Soft, White Light, was published by Bottlecap Press. She can be found at amandamitzel.com and on IG @amanda.mitzel.
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