Each month we celebrate an Australian debut release of fiction or non-fiction in the Kill Your Darlings Debut Spotlight feature. For April that debut is Fed to Red Birds by Rijn Collins (Simon & Schuster), a beautifully evocative portrait of an enchanted mind in an enchanting place. We spoke to Rijn about her publishing journey and the inspiration behind the book.
Stay tuned later this month for a review of the book from Debut Spotlight critic Simon McDonald, and a video reading from the author on our Instagram.
For those who haven’t read the book yet, can you give a brief summary?
Elva has left her rainforest home outside Melbourne to move to Reykjavik, in search of the Icelandic mother who left her as a child. Finding work in a cabinet of curiosities, she spends her days studying Icelandic and tending to taxidermy and gothic mememto mori: the strange things people hold onto, and hold close. Her grandfather is a famous Icelandic author and she manages to hide her obsession with his iconic book, until obsession tips over to compulsion, and the secrecy takes on a darker element.
It’s a story of snow and solitude, of family secrets and the power of language, and the ever-present search for home.
Fed to Red Birds is an exploration of identity and intimacy, against the spellbinding backdrop of Iceland. It’s a story of snow and solitude, of family secrets and the power of language, and the ever-present search for home.
Can you tell us about the book’s journey to publication?
During the writing of this novel, I was accepted into the Hard Copy manuscript development program through the ACT Writers Centre. It was instrumental not just in honing my manuscript, but also in providing insight into the publishing industry. I took part in in several Literary Speed Dating events at the Wheeler Centre here in Melbourne, where writers have three minutes exactly to pitch their project to publishers and agents—daunting, but definitely an adrenaline rush! Through this I pitched to Melanie Ostell, my wonderful agent, who offered me a contract, helped me refine my novel, and then sent it out on submission. It only took a few days to get a publication offer…such an extraordinarily joyous moment.
The enchanting backdrop of Iceland feels like its own character throughout the book. Can you tell us why you decided to set the book in Iceland and the importance of setting to this story?
In my fifteen years as a short story writer, place has always played a pivotal role in my writing. I love to travel, my academic background is linguistics, and I teach in a language college: exploring different lands and languages, and the stories they hold, has always been a passion of mine. The snowy, solitary places are highest on my list.
I first fell in love with Icelandic at university many years ago, while researching Germanic languages. I took several trips there, but getting accepted for a one-month writing residency in a tiny fishing village up near the Arctic Circle changed my whole perspective, and my manuscript. I loved every moment; the intense cold, the thigh-high snow, the northern lights, the stunning landscape, but mostly the reverence for words and their wonder, for sagas and storytelling. The remoteness was integral also, as much of my writing revolves around identity and isolation. I’m relentlessly fascinated by both, and the effect they can have on intimacy. I knew on my return from my residency that Iceland was where my novel lived.
What does your writing process look like? Any particular strategies or philosophies that help you find inspiration or put words on the page, or self-care strategies that help you when writing gets difficult?
I love the research stage. For Fed to Red Birds I took taxidermy classes, got lost in a snowstorm near the Greenland Strait, and translated Icelandic punk songs to English and then tried to learn them on bass guitar. This is such a joyful process for me, and an integral part of my writing. When I know I’m on the right track, I write longhand in little red notebooks. I type them up, print them out, and take the notes to a café or pub to add and edit; back to longhand and repeat.
You can’t really appreciate the productive times if you don’t also honour each fallow period, and the fruit it might later produce.
It’s all about the secondary location for me! It almost always shakes words loose. When I’m well on my way with a manuscript, I have a little AirBnB cabin in the forest I love to rent, with some Big Mama Thornton blues and a bottle of wine for company. When I get stuck, it’s the sensual simplicities that bring me back on track, such as blues songs, a swim, cooking a fragrant feast, meditating at my altar. You can’t really appreciate the productive times if you don’t also honour each fallow period, and the fruit it might later produce.
After mostly writing short fiction in the past, what made you decide to develop a longform novel? Did your practice or approach change with this project?
Fed to Red Birds began as a short story that wouldn’t let go. I needed to know more about Elva, my protagonist, to know whether she flourished or faltered, and the only way to find that out was to write it. It was initially a frustrating process because my short stories, especially flash fiction, have taught me to pare back, so I had to learn how to approach the storytelling from a different perspective. It proved to be quite illuminating, and I now have a solid approach that I’m applying to my next novel.
What’s one thing you know now about the writing process and publishing journey that you wish you’d known when you were starting out?
The unpredictability. Some of my short stories had been rejected by one publisher only to be accepted by another a week later; I’ve had stories ready for publication only for the magazine to fold. Some readers are moved by the taxidermy elements of Fed to Red Birds, and the tenderness my protagonist shows her creatures; others are unprepared for the rather visceral elements involved. And then there’s Covid, and the turning of the tables it brought all of us. For someone who doesn’t sit well in uncertainty, this has been quite a lesson. I know now where to focus: on producing the best work I can, and trusting it will find its readers.
What other writers or books influenced your writing (either this book specifically or your writing more broadly)? Are there any great books you’ve read lately that you’d like to recommend to KYD readers?
Raymond Carver has always influenced my short stories, and to inspire my non-fiction writing, I tend to turn to Olivia Laing and Helen Garner. Other favourites are Josephine Rowe, Carmen Maria Machado, and Evie Wyld. But I would enthusiastically advise KYD readers to explore Shirley Jackson, both in short story and novel form. We Have Always Lived in the Castle is a masterclass in suspense. The gothic elements are sublime, from rotting architecture to food streaked with ash and dirt. It’s both a touching story of family devotion and a tale of pure horror: such a difficult balance to achieve. It’s often open on my desk as I write my current novel.
Fed to Red Birds is available now from your local independent bookseller.
