Ben Fountain

Ben Fountain impressed earlier this year with the impeccable Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk, a searing satire on the effect the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have had on those back home. Billy Lynn, the youngest member of a marine unit that has gone viral on the internet, does a victory tour of the US, ending with taking part in a halftime show at an American football game.

Fountain's writing is tender and political. He gets to the heart of the hypocrisy of supporting troops not war and channels the mindset of America's youth. The book was released here to great praise earlier in 2012 and is on the National Book Award shortlist. We talked to him about the book, about writing short stories and about the upcoming American election.

Hey Ben, how are you today? Where are you right now?

I'm at home in Dallas, Texas. Actually, I'm kind of hurting today. I got thrown off my bike yesterday and landed head-first. Luckily I was wearing a helmet, otherwise I'd be dead. But my left arm and shoulder are pretty sore. I'm limping around like an old man, trying to get as much sympathy as I can.

What attracted you to the story of Billy Lynn?

The general context of the idea was my feeling that the US went totally off the rails during the Bush years... that there was a vast disconnect between the reality of our actions and the narrative we were telling ourselves to justify those actions. The specific impetus for the story came from watching the halftime show of a Dallas Cowboys Thanksgiving Day game in the mid-2000's. It was pretty much as I write it in the book, this insane mashup of militarism, high-concept patriotism, pop culture and soft-core porn.

The novel takes place over a few hours but spans a few years in scope. How did you keep up the pacing of the book?

By trying to keep it simple. I have difficulty dealing with time, for whatever reason. So I thought, just make it a straight-line narrative that plays out over the course of one day. There are flashbacks and digressions of various lengths, and part of the challenge was figuring out where to slot those in, but mostly it's just a straight line from 10am to around 7pm.

The book reads like a metaphor for America's youth. What opportunities are there for the youth of tomorrow?

America's youth are completely screwed. The public education system in the US is, generally speaking, mediocre at best, and criminally deficient at worst. It's now considered normal for young people to graduate from college with thousands of dollars in debt, which I find appalling and immoral. Then you've got a very difficult job market, as everyone knows. It used to be, if you sold your soul to corporate America, at least you got something back for it--the reasonable expectation of stable, lifelong employment, good benefits, an adequate retirement. None of that is true now. When kids come to me and ask for my advice as to whether to pursue art or do something more 'practical', I tell them there's no safety or guarantees in corporate America anymore, so you might as well go do what you really want to do.

Congratulations on the National Book Award shortlist. How did it feel to be on there and who else have you read on the list?

Thanks.  How does it feel?  Like we used to chant back at Bob Dylan when he sang 'Like a Rolling Stone', it feels good! I've read Kevin Powers' The Yellow Birds, which is a wonderful book, and deserving of every honor that comes its way. I haven't gotten to the other finalists, but fully intend to.

How are you feeling about this month's election, following Obama's slow start to the debates?

I may start taking Dramamine because I feel like puking every time I think about the election. If Romney's elected, we will have another major war. Period. And it will be a disaster in every way imaginable. This is Obama's election to lose and he may do just that.

Having come from a short story background, how easy was it to adjust your mind to writing a novel?

Well, it's all writing, all telling a story, and it starts at the level of the line, doing one sentence at a time.  There's much more psychological stress in writing a novel, given the investment of time and effort and how all that will be wasted if the novel doesn't succeed, and certainly more content to juggle, but in the end, they're not so different.

What are you currently reading?

I just finished a wonderful novel that's coming out next March called Mary Coin, by the very fine writer Marisa Silver. Before that, Muck City by Bryan Mealer, an excellent book that follows a Florida high school football team over the course of a year. I'm trying to keep my French up; these days I'm reading the amazing Haitian writer Rene Depestre, who ought to be on everybody's shortlist for the Nobel Prize.

Can you talk about the actual writing process for the book?

Get up, go out to the desk, do it every working day.  Trust that the story will reveal itself in the writing. 

What are you currently working on?

Short stories, plus a few short nonfiction pieces. And I'm getting my thoughts and material together for a stab at another novel.  The one I'm thinking of will be set in Haiti.