From Point A to Point B: An Interview with Lori Sambol Brody

This week’s interview for our tenth anniversary series is with Lori Sambol Brody, a Split Lip contributor and former assistant flash editor. As an editor, Lori has a keen eye for unique voice and language, and she is a true champion for the pieces she falls in love with. Lori’s own short fiction has been published in Smokelong Quarterly, Wigleaf, Craft, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. She is a flash fiction rock star; her stories have been chosen for the Best Small Fictions and Best Microfictions anthologies, Wigleaf Top 50, and the Longform fiction pick of the week. She lives in Southern California but still chose her last new car because it has heated seats; if the temperature is below 55°, she’ll put the heat on high. We spoke via email about her new accordion book, 1970s nostalgia, and what makes a story a story. 

Maureen Langloss: You recently made an accordion book of “Mandragora,” your story in Passages North, and sold copies to raise money for National Network of Abortion Funds. Such a generous, fun, and unique thing to do. I received my copy and cannot get enough of this stunning little book. The artwork! The story! Your tantalizing first line! “I bring my homunculus to Grief Yoga.” Can you tell us about the inspiration for this project, how the book was designed, and how you chose the charity? 

Lori Sambol Brody: One of my interests is book arts and book binding. This is the perfect companion interest to writing. Usually I make blank books, but I decided I wanted to make a book with one of my own stories in it. I love the format of the folded accordion book that uses only one sheet of paper. It’s easy to put together and is very tactile—the unfolding of the book mirrors the unfolding of a story. Luckily, my sister is a graphic designer and volunteered her time and talent to design the book and format the text and pictures (and design the cute pop-ups). I sent her a mock-up of a folded accordion book (with no text at all) and she did the rest. This project could not have been done without her. And the $10 I sold the book for is not at all proportionate to the time and effort it took to put the book together!

Because the story is about a late-term miscarriage/stillbirth, I knew that I wanted to donate the profits to an organization that supports reproductive rights. During the making of the book, the Supreme Court seemed poised to overturn Roe v. Wade (they still have not ruled on the issue) and Texas passed its incredibly stringent law that empowers citizens to act as abortion enforcers. So, I wanted to give to an organization that supported abortion, especially one that provided funds to women so they could travel to obtain abortions.

ML: I love that your accordion book turns the written word into a beautiful object, a work of art in and of itself. Your book got me thinking about objects and their significance—about the mandrake root bought on Amazon that appears in your story. Is there an object or kind of object that is particularly important to you in your life, that you treasure or find fascinating? Can you tell us about it?

LSB: I am an incredibly sentimental person (which may be a surprise to many people I know) and find it hard to let objects go, especially objects that belonged to my mother and my grandmother. I have telegrams that were sent to my grandparents congratulating them on their marriage! One object does stand out: my grandmother displayed, in every apartment she had, an old perfume bottle, covered with white ceramic flowers and pale green leaves. My grandmother (and my mother) were never that careful, so a great many of the flowers and their leaves are broken off. I don’t even know the story behind it, but as a child I loved it and was not permitted to touch it. My mother inherited it when my grandmother died, and when my mother died, my sister said, “Of course this should go to Lori.” It’s on my dresser. Come to think of it, I half hope that it will break, so I can let it go! Memories are also a burden.

ML: Oof, I feel this. They can be a burden! But this perfume bottle sounds like a treasure. Because we are celebrating our tenth anniversary at SLM, we are thinking a lot about memories—and also about decades. What is your favorite decade from history and why? Do you ever write about it? Can you share a story if you do?

LSB: I am a sucker for anything about the 1970s—probably because I feel like I am forever reliving my junior high school years! Not necessarily a good thing, of course. The fashion (bell bottoms, fringed vests, go go boots), the avocado green or harvest gold kitchen appliances, the music. And Watergate and the end of the Vietnam War. To me, it seems like such a transitional era—continuing and then recovering from the revolution of the 1960s, forming a bridge to the selfishness of the 1980s. Seeing it as a transition era makes sense; I have used the time period as a background for coming of age stories, such as in “Butterfly.”

ML: Yes to bell bottoms and avocado green appliances! Let’s stay in the past a beat longer but move a little closer to 2022. For this interview I revisited your poignant memoir, “Fill in the Blanks,” which you published in SLM in 2016. Can you believe it’s been six years? I love the fractured form you chose to tell the fractured experience of your car accident. I was particularly struck by the ending—which I absolutely adore and reminds me of Virginia Woolf’s writing—because it seems to apply not only to the moment of the accident but also to the passage of time in general:

Words get lost, I leave _____ as I write. Words are found. It’s hard to say if that’s any different than before.

In the end: there’s only life unspooling, continuing.

How does it feel for you to revisit these lines after six years have passed, after two years of Pandemic (which is also a kind of gap or blank), after at least one of the kids you talk about in the essay is now an adult? Has the sentiment behind these lines appeared elsewhere in your writing?

LSB: Thank you for your kind words about the piece. That car accident feels like such a long time ago, although I still have PTSD when I drive. I still agree with the sentiment at the end. After any trauma, life still goes on—although life can look very different, take a detour, or an unexpected turn. I count myself incredibly fortunate that I have the same quality of life after the accident—and that I was not heavily impacted by the pandemic (it could have been so much worse). And life stretches on. “I Want to Believe the Truth Is Out There” has a similar ending (at least in one version of the story; there are two timelines)—after big events, life goes on. 

ML: I adore “I Want to Believe the Truth is Out There.” I especially love how many layers of meaning you tuck into such a compressed flash. When you were assistant flash fiction editor at SLM, you often commented that a submission “wasn’t a story.” I still hear your voice with this critique in my head when I read subs. What do you think makes a piece of writing a story? 

LSB: A story requires some movement. The movement can be very slight, I don’t need a big New Yorker story epiphany, but, as a reader, I want to go on a journey that takes me from point A to point B. The story may open up at the end, or narrow down to a point. It’s not just a description, or a slice out of someone’s life. 

ML: Shifting to one last very important topic before we go, what is your favorite snack food and why?

LSB: Salt and pepper ridged potato chips! The perfect mixture of crunchy texture, salt and oil, and a little heat from the pepper. 

ML: A little heat is key in any good snack … or car seat … or piece of flash fiction! Thanks for coming on this little journey into the past with me! 

And, friends, you can get your own copy of Lori’s accordion book by DM’ing her on Twitter @LoriSambolBrody or visiting her website: lorisambolbrody.wordpress.com. If you’d like to make your own book art, contact Lori’s sister, Staci Sambol, and check out her cool design company, Slub Design.