The Story Behind the Story with Author/Poet Hollay Ghadery of Ontario, Canada.

Let’s welcome Hollay to the Scribbler.

We are most pleased she has accepted our invitation to share the SBTS of her newest book. A very busy lady and an award winning author I know you will enjoy learning about.

Read on my friends.

Hollay Ghadery is a multi-genre writer living in Ontario on Anishinaabe land. She has her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Guelph. Fuse, her memoir of mixed-race identity and mental health, was released by Guernica Editions in 2021 and won the 2023 Canadian Bookclub Award for Nonfiction/Memoir. Her collection of poetry, Rebellion Box was released by Radiant Press in 2023, and her collection of short fiction, Widow Fantasies, is scheduled for release with Gordon Hill Press in fall 2024. Her debut novel, The Unraveling of Ou, is due out with Palimpsest Press in 2026, and her children’s book, Being with the Birds, with Guernica Editions in 2027. Hollay is a co-host of Angela’s Bookclub on 105.5 FM, as well as HOWL on CIUT 89.5 FM. She is also a book publicist and the Poet Laureate of Scugog Township. Learn more about Hollay at www.hollayghadery.com.


Title: Widow Fantasies

Synopsis:

Fantasies are places we briefly visit; we can’t live there. The stories in Widow Fantasies deftly explore the subjugation of women through the often subversive act of fantasizing. From a variety of perspectives, through a symphony of voices, Widow Fantasies immerses the reader in the domestic rural gothic, offering up unforgettable stories from the shadowed lives of girls and women.

The Story Behind the Story:

Widow Fantasies has its origins in the seven year mark of my marriage. It was at this point when I began to daydream about planning my husband’s funeral. I felt completely depleted and depressed running a house, raising a handful of young kids, holding down a full-time job, and trying to find time to write or do anything for myself. My husband was there, but wasn’t really contributing—at least not without being asked, sometimes multiple times. He didn’t do much of the background work to keep our family running. In fact, I was often in charge of his affairs too: taxes, scheduling appointments, doing his paperwork. I felt less like I had a partner and more like he was another dependent. I was more than happy and ready to take care of my kids as a mother, but was not so thrilled to be constantly mothering my spouse.

I spoke to a therapist and apparently my daydreaming—my fantasizing—about being husband free was not uncommon. Many women in oppressive heteronormative relationships have these fantasies, and they even have a name: widow fantasies. Thinking about how women use fantasies to escape the subjugation of their lives gave rise to all the stories in this collection. The exploration of my feelings also led to a conversation with my husband. Obviously, it was a good, healthy conversation because we’re coming up on 16 years together and he is now an equal, if not the biggest, contributor to our domestic partnership. (He is also the biggest supporter of this 
collection of stories.)

Website: Please go HERE.

A question before you go, Hollay:

Scribbler: Where is your favourite spot to write? Are you messy or neat? Your beverage of choice?


Hollay: I am neat. I cannot think in disorganized spaces! My brain is messy enough. I cannot have my external world reflect my internal one.

An Excerpt:

Georgette’s outside the grain elevator, stance braced as if preparing to stop a train. One of her arms is outstretched, the other is holding her phone to her ear. Her wiry grey-blonde curls spring out from beneath her bandana and she’s talking fast, but from the lip of the front lawn ten feet away, Leyla can’t hear what she’s saying.

The wind picks up and smacks Leyla with a treacle gust of fresh hay from the fields. The chickens squabble.

Lani, swaddled against her chest, grunts and lets loose a lamb’s cry, her little chin quivering.

Leyla’s eyes dart around the yard. She bounces in place, patting Lani’s bottom to calm her. Kent’s truck is still parked by the hay wagon where he left it. The little school bus is bumbling
away from the end of the lane. Ava and the twins wave from the back window. Beetle, in barking pursuit, propels himself up the dirt hill that leads into town, black legs flying like licorice whips.

Everything looks fine, but Leyla’s sure she heard Georgette shout.

She feels it first: the sweep auger, which usually hums, is thumping. It was stuck for the second time this month, and Kent left to fix it after breakfast. He needed to climb into the grain bin and kick it loose. He’d done it a dozen times before.

That was at 6 a.m., so over an hour ago. In her mind, she sees the stove-top clock, splattered with bacon grease. She feels Kent’s arms wrap around her waist while she pushes the bacon around with a fork. His warm, minted breath on her neck. The coffee pot gurgling and how he said he’d be back for breakfast in a few minutes. How she had to close her eyes against the urge to shrug off her own skin.

The wind blows an empty bag of chick feed across the lawn and Georgette howls into the phone.

“My son!”

Years from now, what Leyla will remember most about that morning was how her breasts had been milk-swollen for days and it was agony to have Lani pressed against them. She’ll remember how, the night before, Kent had heated cabbage leaves for her to put in her bra as relief and how, even then, she’d wished he’d go away.

She’ll remember running barefoot across the lawn toward Georgette and the grass being so dew-slick that she slid trying to stop. She’ll remember that when the wind hit the maples, they shook like wet dogs.

Thank you Hollay, for being our guest this week.

We wish you continued success with your writing endeavours.

And a BIG THANK YOU to all our visitors and readers.