“Have you met any single mums?”

This question was asked of me by a woman, a stranger, who happened to be sitting on my terrace with a few other strangers – I don’t remember the event. She asked this question immediately after I answered her question about what am I writing now. “I’m writing about a  thirty five year old single mum with a very unusual occupation who lives in Newtown,” I said, and so, she asked her question.
I said something like “Not specifically but I’ve known a lot of single mums in my time.” I think I then got up, poured more drinks, handed around more nuts, and smiled inanely while festering inside was the conversation that should’ve happened: something like this …
“I’m not writing a documentary.”
“No, but don’t you think you should write about what you know?”
“I’m writing fiction, not a biography of a single mum.”
“No, I get that, but readers like a ring of truth.”
“Do they?”
“Well yes, don’t they?”
“Only if they read non-fiction. I’m writing fiction. I’m making it up.”
“But don’t you want people to believe you?”
“Of course, that’s part of the deal. When you read fiction you agree to believe it: you know it’s made up but you suspend your disbelief in order to enjoy the story; it’is a sideline of our imagination.”
“But I want to know that the writer can be trusted to tell me a believable story. I don’t know, I just want to trust the writer.”
“But by buying a book of fiction you already know it’s made up, you accept it as fiction. A fiction writer starts way out in front in the believability stakes. Even a moderately good writer knows not to blow a lead like that.”
“But he would blow it if he didn’t know what he’s writing about.”
“If I was writing a manual on how to be a good single mum or a study on the lives of single mums living in Sydney then, yes, I agree that I would need to meet and talk to a lot of single mums, but I’m not writing a book like that.”
“Isn’t the life of a single mum very different from yours?”
“Not really.”
“What?”
“I think the pressures are the same, I don’t live alone, I have other people to consider and I have other people I’m responsible for, and I believe that, basically, men and women respond to life in the same range of reactions, but one thing I don’t think readers want is to read the familiar; they want to read the unusual.”
“Yes, but, the unusual within believable bounds.”
“How many witches and warlocks did JK Rowling interview; how many vampires did Stephenie Meyer interview; and how many men-tuned-into-bugs did Kafka interview?”
“But they’re fantasy novels.”
“Did you believe the Harry Potter stories?”
“No, they’re fantasy.”
“I mean IN the story: did you feel excited, on-the-edge of your seat.”
“Sometimes.”
“Well there you are, you believed it. You’re heart wouldn’t race if you didn’t believe it.”
“Single mums aren’t fantasy.”
“Let me tell you a story. Astronauts never get bowel cancer because before they climb into their high-tech suits, for rehearsal or for the real thing, they have to have an enema. Now if I wrote a story about an astronaut who gets bowel cancer would you believe me or would you throw the book against the wall because I didn’t know what I was writing about?”
“I don’t know; it would be the way it was told.”
“Do you believe that astronauts could get bowel cancer?”
“Well, I didn’t know that, that, enema thing that astronauts do?”
“What, don’t you believe they have to have enemas?”
“No, it’s not that. They do I suppose; sounds feasible.”
“Good because I just made it up. I don’t know anything about astronauts and enemas; but you were willing to believe it. You were willing to believe made up stuff.”
“… I just don’t think that a sixth two year old gay man living in Bali should he writing about a thirty five year old single mum living in Newtown.”
“…..more nuts?”