Q&A: Jordan Hamel
Author photo by Ebony Lamb
Everyone is Everyone Except You, the excellently titled, eagerly awaited debut poetry collection by Poetry Slam champ, Jordan Hamel, is out now! He answers our quick Q&A.
1. How are you and what have you been up to lately?
I am SO TIRED. I have just spent the weekend at my mum’s 60th birthday bash/wine tour and 60 year olds have far more party stamina than 30 year olds, it’s incredible. They drank so much pinot gris and played so much ABBA.
Outside of that, I have just been working, promoting my book, answering Q&As, getting ready for my launches, drinking free wine at other people’s launches, mowing the lawns and recovering from the novel coronavirus.
2. If you were working in a bookshop, how would you hand-sell your book to customers? What would you say to convince them to buy and read it?
Dearest bookshop browser, do you ever go to bed at night dreaming of a worse tomorrow? Have you experienced the hilarious, uncomfortable, shameful, erotic, surprising process of growing into the person you are today? Are you someone who dreams of the infinite, alternate versions of yourself that you’d love to inhabit but can't?
Well, look no further, because I have exactly what it is you’re looking for! A book just for you!
But wait, there’s more! Order today and you’ll get poems packed full of small-town antics and big dramatic gestures, Suzanne Paul infomercials and malevolent life coaches, sexy priests and ugly heartbreak. All of this can be yours for just one easy instalment of $30.
3. What books (or other art/media) influenced you while working on this book, or generally in your life?
I think Everyone is Everyone Except You owes a lot to a few books I have read and reread again and again in the past few years: Head Girl by Freya Daly Sadgrove, Hera Lindsay Bird by Hera Lindsay Bird, He’s so MASC by Chris Tse and Conventional Weapons by Tracey Slaughter. All these incredible collections have been compass points for me.
Outside of books, I think it was influenced a lot by the songwriting and storytelling of two of Aotearoa’s greatest - Anthonie Tonnon and Marlon Williams. More generally, the book is packed to the gills with pop culture references (Good Will Hunting, Mad Men, Midsommar, The Mighty Ducks, The Simple Life, Passion of the Christ, System of a Down, and Survivor to name a few). I think it’s because, growing up, I was terrible at processing grief or emotions, so I often used TV and movies as coping mechanisms or as familiar worlds to escape to.
4. What good books have you read lately?
Oh, so many. Mainly New Zealand books, too: Super Model Minority by Chris Tse, Slow Down, You’re Here by Brannavan Gnanalingam, Milk Fed by Melissa Broder (not a New Zealand book but one of the most well-written and deeply weird things I’ve read in a while), Things I Learned at Art School by Megan Dunn, new collections from my climate co-editors Rebecca Hawkes, essa may ranapiri and Erik Kennedy, it’s all good stuff.
Buy Everyone is Everyone Except You (Dead Bird Books), $30
