… E.J. Noyes
1. What’s the time of the day when you feel most like yourself?
When I wake up. I’m a fully formed human right away and pieces gradually fall off me as the day goes on, until by 8 p.m. I’m like a deflated balloon. It makes for an interesting dynamic in our house because my wife is the exact opposite, so trying to find suitable times to do activities is always fun.
2. What’s your coffee order?
Almond milk, no sugar. Or oat milk if I go to a place that (gasp!) doesn’t have almond milk. And I’m a one-and-done kind of gal. A morning coffee and that’s it.
3. How would you describe yourself in three words?
5’7”, likes gin.
Is 5’7” technically a word?
Okay… Weird, empathetic, irreverent.
4. What do you think of garden gnomes?
Perfectly acceptable garden decorations. Though, I do have a totally irrational thought that they come alive and mess with things at night when you’re not watching.
Maybe that’s the point? Like are they gardening at night? Should I get some gnomes so I don’t have to weed my gardens anymore? Or…are they partying when we’re not watching, in which case–can I join in?
5. What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?
From my older sister: Nobody cares about you. Which probably requires a little bit of clarification. When I was in my mid-to-late teens I was almost paralysed by the thought of doing new things for fear of not being good at it, and (mostly) of people watching me and thinking I was an idiot because I couldn’t do the thing. My sister basically said nobody’s watching you, and if they are, they don’t think you’re an idiot and they’re not judging you because they’re so busy worrying about their own things. And it’s always stuck with me, that people (including me) are usually so focused on their own issues that they don’t care about you in a mean or bad way at all.
6. What makes you smile?
Other people enjoying things.
My wife and my cat. Give me my wife playing with my cat and I’m a bag of smiles.
7. Do you believe in soulmates?
I do not! I refuse to believe the universe would be so cruel as to introduce the possibility of soulmates not being able to be together. What if people spend their lives trying to find a soulmate but they live somewhere completely different and there’s no chance they’ll ever meet? Or they miss each other by some weird twist of timing? Nope, too cruel.
8. What author would you follow till the ends of every literary genre they chose to write in?
Colleen McCullough. She was my first literary love, the author who made me fall in love with words. I’d always loved reading as a kid, but the moment I picked up my first book of hers I felt like I’d never seen words before. She made everything so fresh and clever, and taught me things about history too!
9. What makes you cry?
Everything… Happy things, sad things. I’m just a bag of emotion, really.
I really hate people being treated badly, that turns on my eye taps in a big way.
10. What’s your best feature?
Oh, you, tee-hee, I don’t have a best feature. But if I did…it would obviously be modesty.
But for real…shit, I really don’t know. Some people say I’m funny, some say I have nice eyes. I tend not to analyse myself all that much. Insert shrug emoji here.
11. If you were a book, which book would you be and why?
A really expensive self-help book that’s actually full of useless and ridiculous “help” but everyone seems to think it’s useful, and praises book-me as the next life-changing thing. So, like…fraudulent, but harmlessly so.
12. Favorite flavor and scent?
Flavour: Salt… I love it. I CRAVE it. I add way too fucking much of it to my food and probably have super-blocked arteries already. My wife recently made me get this low-sodium stuff because she said I’ll be dead in a decade if I don’t chill out with the salt. Fair.
Scent: Fresh laundry. I’m addicted to the smell of clean clothes and always notice fresh laundry scent on other people. Sometimes I take a moment when doing grocery shopping to smell the cartons of laundry powder which gives me the boost I need to make it through groceries without ramming some ignorant person with my trolley.
13. In a crowded room, what makes you notice a woman?
Whether or not she’s my wife and if she’s not, then I un-notice her. Ahem.
Okay, now I’ve kept myself off the couch for tonight, I’d say laugh for sure. I’m big on humour and levity and irreverence, so someone who’s finding something to laugh about in the nightmare scenario of a crowded room will always get my attention.
14. What’s your one big regret?
Oof, I really had to think about this one. I don’t actually think I have any. I don’t tend to dwell on big things I should have or could have done. But if I have to put something, I guess…not buying some good and profitable cryptocurrency when it first came out?
15. What would be the title of your autobiography?
No, Darling, I don’t love Kittimus Prime More Than I Love You.
16. Three women you’d have over for dinner and what would you serve?
Cleopatra – SO intelligent and canny, spoke a whole bunch of languages, just a badass woman. And, apparently, she had a beautiful speaking voice which would be nice for an evening of dinner and conversation.
Ina Garten – She cracks me the heck up. I think I’d be able to put aside my self-consciousness about having a food person over for dinner just to benefit from enjoying her company and humour.
My BFF – She’d help me make dinner and clean up afterwards. But also, she’s the kind of person you can stick in a room of strangers and by the end of the night, she’s everyone’s friend. So that’ll take some of the pressure off me to do the talking and entertaining thing.
And I’d serve a full-on nibbles platter spread, all the good shit—cheeses, olives, breads, meats, veggies and fruits, dips, crackers, nuts etc. Endless drinks of my guests’ choice. Eaten reclining on cushions and daybeds. All of which basically translates to me being a lazy host.
17. What’s the one thing you’d want the 18 year-old you to know?
Buy shares in Apple or Microsoft.
18. What’s in your fridge right now?
Food. Badum tish. The usual suspects, but I suppose the standouts are:
-Too many bottles of SodaSteam soda water taking up the door (my wife’s addiction).
-Almond milk (see above re: coffee).
-A tonne of veggies because I love veggies. Some we grew, like these zucchinis! Ain’t they beauties? Yes, even the curvy one.
-Chocolate.
-A lot of pickles.
-So much yoghurt.
-The WORST brie we’ve ever eaten (from Christmas). We’re having a standoff about who has to finish it, but pssst—I’m just going to toss it out in this week’s rubbish collection. It’s not giving in; it’s clearing space for better cheese.
-A very restrained amount of alcohol.
-Last night’s dinner which is my today’s lunch.
19. If you could choose one song to be played every time you enter a room, what song would that be and why?
“I’m a Little Teapot”
And if the whole room doesn’t do the actions, I’ll walk out and in again until they do.
20. What’s the one book you wish you could read again for the first time?
If This Is A Woman: Inside Ravensbruck: Hitler's Concentration Camp for Women by Sarah Helm. I’ve always been fascinated by the workings behind WWII, and this book absolutely GUTTED me. It also had a domino effect of sending me down a path of WWII I hadn’t walked before, and then on to read a number of incredible books (some personal accounts by women who were in Ravensbrück). And, it was the brain niggle which made me write my historical fiction, Lena.
E.J. Noyes new release, Schuss, hit the Amazon shelves yesterday and can be found here: https://mybook.to/NoyesSchuss