Kerri Schlottman discusses inspiration and storytelling in this clip extracted from my recent podcast, also posted here.
Kerri is a literary author whose stories tend to shine a light on those typically in the shadows: characters leading traumatic lives. In this snippet, she discusses how inspiration for Tell Me One Thing came from reading a magazine piece she couldn’t forget. In an opening scene of this novel, republished in 2024, readers meet a central character, Lulu, a nine-year-old smoking a cigarette and sitting on a trucker’s lap at a gas station. The year is 1980. The other central character, Quinn, a photographer at the beginning of her career, happens to stop at the gas station and witnesses this scene, so compelling that she pulls out her camera and takes photos. Neither one would know the power of that photo until much later and after Quinn achieves significant success in the art world.
Themes include several we humans face that revolve around consent, inequity, doing the right thing, and making dreams come true. I have always enjoyed listening to authors discuss the genesis of their storytelling and I hope writers enjoy listening to Kerri Schlottman’s appreciation of storytelling as much as I did.
