Scott Snyder's first book, a collection of stories called Voodoo Heart, is out now from the Dial Press. He teaches creative writing at Columbia and Sarah Lawrence and he lives in Stonybrook, NY, with his wife, Jeanie.

Felicia C. Sullivan: At a recent reading you noted that the characters in your stories were all knocked off course by accidents of the heart? Can you talk a little more about that? How fragile a heart is, and how its wounding can be more devastating than any broken bone.

Scott Snyder: Absolutely. The book was written over the course of a few years, but for most of that time, I was in the process of falling in love with someone - Jeanie, the girl who eventually would become my wife. So in a lot of ways the stories are built around the fears and hopes that are part of that experience. In some ways, ÒHappy FishÓ (the oldest story) is a fantasy about never having to grow up. While ÒWreckÓ (which I wrote after I met Jeanie), reflects those fears that pop up when we first start feeling vulnerable to someoneÉMaybe it's better to stay single. Maybe I don't want to be attached, and so on. On the other hand, ÒBlue YodelÓ is all about someone deeply in love, who's terrified of losing the person he cares for. ÒVoodoo HeartÓ is about the fear of making that final commitment. So to some degree at least, the accidents the characters suffer are the most hurtful things possible - they're like a loss of one's self.

FS: It almost seems as if many of your characters carry an invisible sign on their heart that reads: Danger! Enter at your own risk! They want to love but are afraid of the wreckage, so perhaps it's easier to not love at all. I'm thinking of the title story in particular - how a man respects a wrecking yard and unwritten rules about not reselling mint cars, cars which are haunted. How he hides a ring for his girlfriend under his floorboard but can never manage to give it or himself to her, completely. And a third link to a nearby women's prison and one inmate's uncanny ability to see people. Are your characters afraid of love? And what would be the consequences of that supreme risk?

SS: They are afraid of love in some respect or other. Love's pretty scary. You're suddenly vulnerable to someone, vulnerable to the world (what if something happens to the person you love?). You see yourself reflected in the person you're with...But it's also what they want the most, too. And most of them, when they take the plunge, end up much better off for it, despite the wild ride.

FS:The stories that bookend Voodoo Heart take place around the time, or after, the Great War. In "Blue Yodel," Pres, a man who scans rivers for barrels and watches out for jumpers at Niagara Falls, falls in love with a woman one strange summer where blimps mysteriously and repeatedly emerge from the wood and more people than ever were risking the leap over the falls. It was as if the world was on the verge. And at the end of the summer, when Claire disappears, Pres is convinced she's been whisked away in one of the blimps, dropping her personal items like breadcrumbs, and he makes it almost his religion to follow her. In "The Star Attraction of 1919," a traveling pilot veers off course, falling in love with a runaway bride, a woman bound for flight. And soon he admires the way she's become part of the amusement, a flying bride, an attraction. There's innocence to these stories, events that take place around the World War I, but somehow the characters are not ravaged by it. There is hope and wonder - men flying machines, new inventions, new frontiers. What drew you to this time period and was the placement of these two particular stories a deliberate one?

SS: That's a great question. I think what draws my to that historical moment is the way it exists on this kind of knife's edge. On the one hand, there's all this burst of invention going on; all these amazing things are born around then: the airplane, the standard auto, the motion picture...There was this sense that anything was possible. This sort of "What are we going to pull out of our hat next?" feeling. On the other hand, there's this looming recognition with regard to all the terrible things that ingenuity can be used for, too, this realization hovering in the background as a result of the war. Planes can be used to drop bombs. Blimps can be used for surveillance. And so there's a sense of underlying fear even as the country moves into the roaring 20's. This feeling that maybe all these inventions we found so wondrous have other, darker applications, too. So it's a moment that allows for a lot of wonder and a lot of terror. Romance and horror.

FS: And I hear your novel will also take place at the turn of the century and the plot revolves a mental patient and flight? Am I right?

SS: That's right. It's coming out well, I think. I'm on chapter 5.

FS: Your stories are so wonderfully imaginative and they linger long after the page has cooled. A Wall Street trader armed with a speargun guards a dumpster outside of a Florida pawnshop, all the while trying to win back his girlfriend who abandoned him for a brain-damaged rock star in "Dumpster Tuesday." A wealthy runaway meets a wheelchair-bound man whose life's mission is to teach people how to "turn bad luck into good," in "Happy Fish, Plus Coin." How did these stories come to you? Did it start with a word, a character, a first line or image?

SS: Thanks for the kind words. Usually something will catch my eye on TV or in the paper, some fact or profile, like a piece about a fat farm or a show about traveling salesmen from the 1900's. Usually, after a week or so, if I realize I'm still thinking about the thing, I try to figure out what's interesting to me about it Ð what's so scary or attractive or exciting about a man hit in the head by a bullet fired at the beginning of a raceÉOnce I think I have some sense of why it's interesting to me personally, I build a story with certain themes or questions in mind.

FS: Tell me about your revision process. I know that once you sold the story collection, you spent a great deal of time retooling the piece. Might you elaborate on your revision process?

SS: I've always revised a lot. One of my teachers once told us this great Capote quote, something like: "Editing isn't the cleaning up after the party. It is the party." I think that's very true. All the stories went through serious revisions, many drafts. And I did take this long year after selling the collection to re-write a lot of the manuscript. I just had this feeling after Dial took the book that I could make the thing better. I'd had a real growing year just before Ðgetting married, moving away from home togetherÑand I just felt like I had a lot more to say. Dial was great, they gave me a lot of time, and I ended up taking out three early stories and writing all this new material that ended up becoming over half the finished book - ÒVoodoo Heart,Ó ÒThe Star Attraction of 1919,Ó and plenty of re-writes of some of the earlier stories.

FS: You've had many fascinating jobs Ð might you share one funny or incredibly strange experience (s)?

SS: I worked for Disney World for a year after college. I was a janitor at first, on Main Street at the Magic Kingdom. Eventually, I worked my way up to being a character - I played Buzz Lightyear, Pluto, and Eyeore. The entire experience was incredibly strange, but one moment that sticks out in particular occurred during the character training. It happened at the start of this class on gestures Ð the class was designed to help you learn your character's moves. It was me and these two other cast members, a girl and guy, and we were all dressed in costume. I was Eyeore, the guy was Chip, and the girl was Mickey Mouse. We were standing there in this gymnasium, all nervous, waiting for the class to begin, when the instructor put on this pop music station and told us to start dancing. ÒDance however you want,Ó he said. ÒLive it up. Because this is the only time you'll get to move like you inside the costume.Ó The girl dressed as Mickey was a great dancer. She started doing all these hip-hop moves, and then out of nowhere she came over and started dancing with me. Until the day I die, I'll never forget that image: Mickey Mouse freaking me.

FS: You're an Elvis man (and rightly so!) What's that all about?

SS: He does play a pretty big part in my life. It's actually kind of personal. I first got into him when I was still a teenager. I was a pretty nerdy kid, nervous, insecure (who isn't though, I guess) and at some point I just wanted to find something that would be both completely uncool and completely mine. Elvis seemed like a good candidate. I was living in New York City and Elvis wasn't exactly the rage. I started listening to his stuff a bit, telling people I was a fan, but what happened was that out of nowhere I really fell for him. I loved the music. And even more than this, I found great inspiration in his story, especially his early years. When Elvis was a teenager, for example, he had little reason to believe in himself. He was poor, scrawny, covered in acne. And yet he came to school dressed as though he was already a rock star, in pink pants, a gold blazer, his hair swept up in a pompadour, eyes lined with mascara. That confidence was a real touchstone for me as a kid, and still is. Over time, I got into all the different phases of Elvis's career and became a more well-rounded fan.

FS: If you had the chance to assume a writer's life (ie, you could be Nabokov for a year), which writer would you choose and why?

SS: Man, that's tough. I might have to choose Hemingway simply for that house in Key West. We went down there a couple years ago and the place was incredible - the writing studio was like every writer's fantasy: ceiling fans and wood floors, a huge roll top desk. Shuttered windows looking out over the palm trees to the ocean. And there was this family of six-toed cats living there, too, lounging by the pool...Sigh.

FS: What book (s) have you read in the past year that has surprised you?

SS: I loved Owen King's story collection, We're All In This Together (Bloomsbury). I'm a huge fan of two books that are about to come out in the fall: Kelly Braffet's Last Seen Leaving and Karen Russell's St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised By Wolves (Knopf).

FS: I'm always intrigued about where people make a home. Why Long Island?

SS: My wife, Jeanie, was accepted to medical school out here in Stony Brook. I thought it'd be a great move Ð the quiet, the space. I could write. I grew up in the city though, and I didn't anticipate how different the culture would be out here. For one, I didn't have a car, so I ended up walking a lot. But the roads here are pretty inhospitable. No sidewalks, thin shoulders. The only people walking are generally down on their luck. So it became very depressing. This was right before I sold the book and Jeanie was in school all the time, so I started to get a bit of cabin fever Ð I started worrying that I wasn't ready for all this, that sort of thing, which is where ÒVoodoo HeartÓ came from. The big change came once I got a car and started getting out of the house again, not just writing in my room. Now I love it out here. The last few years have been the happiest ever. Strong Island rocks.

FS: If you could host a salon in your home of artists, writers, icons in your home, living or dead, who would they be and why?

SS: Predictable as it is, I think I'd have to raise a chalice with Elvis.

Visit Scott Snyder's Website

Read an excerpt from "Dumpster Tuesday" (to be published in SSN Issue 4).