First Chapters Q&A with Gerii Pleitez

Gerii Pleitez is a fearless new literary voice. Her debut book On The Sunday, She Created God is a transgressive coming of age story that is both brutal and beautiful. A punk, post-feminist, punch in the face. Gerii's visceral poetic imagery strikes at the heart of what it is to be young, to desire and to want purpose in a world which if often without. She is also the founder of Kara Sevda Press, Australia's first publisher dedicated to illuminating the voices of local women of colour. The imprint is the cutting edge of modern literature and publishing; underground, digitally distinct and iconoclastic in it's ethos. On The Sunday, She Created God was the first book released on the imprint and will be followed by a journal publication featuring work from women of colour to be released in 2020.

Gerii Pleitez will be reading from On the Sunday, She Created God at First Chapters on Friday 4 October.

1. Brunswick Bound has asked you to read a piece from your published work. Tell us what we can expect from the piece you have chosen?

You can expect for prose which is both beautiful and brutal. Prose which picks at the details in life and amplifies it to the reader. 

2. How would you describe the kind of books that you write?

I write transgressive feminist fiction which is intended to be a finger in the eye of the establishment. 

3. What was the first book that you read (or had read to you) that left an impression on you?

In Latin American culture, there is a lot of verbal folklore type storytelling. This informs the genre of magic realism. These stories of war, the devil living in a rich neighbourhood, stories of haunted women were a great influence on my imagination when i was growing. Oral history was important to my story telling and creative practice. 


4. Do you believe that books should answer life’s big questions?

I believe the best books inspire you to try and face those questions. They give you power to search out and find these questions, to interrogate your humanity, you connection, your purpose. 

5. Do you have any writing quirks?

Other than using alcohol to channel my creativity. I'm a working class writer so often I write on trains, trams, planes, on receipts, sometimes in novels on the back in the spare pages. I write as often as i can and anywhere. It infuses my writing with frenetic energy and immediacy.


6. What is your favourite word or phrase?

I love using words in strange ways. I like using poetic language to shock and similarly I love using colloquialisms and swear words for much the same purpose. I love the spectrum of language and I consider idioms, sounds as colours to paint with. Similarly I love bastardised forms of language like Spanglish.

7. What have you found most surprising about publishing a book?

People are reading it.

8. What is the question that you hope never to be asked in an author Q&A?

Why do you think starting a press solely for WOC is necessary?


9. What question do you hope you will be asked and why?

Experience and creative practice type questions; I love these questions because the only time i think about this is when someone else wants to know. Everything else is automatic.

10. Which author that you have read do you think should be better known or more widely read?

To name a few 
me  (haha that was tongue in cheek) 

Find out more about the First Chapters event series on the Brunswick Bound website.




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