Ele Pawelski, author of The Finest Supermarket in Kabul, and Jennifer Haupt, author of In the Shadow of 10,000 Hills, talk crossing the lines between fiction and nonfiction. Both have travelled extensively through conflict zones and have crafted fictional works that incorporate pieces of their harrowing, moving experiences.

Jennifer Haupt: How long did you spend in Kabul, and why did you decide to write a novella instead of a memoir?

Ele Pawelski: I was in Kabul for just under 18 months in 2007-08, and of all the places I’ve lived – Kenya, Bosnia, Uzbekistan, South Sudan, Afghanistan and Kosovo – Afghanistan stuck with me the most. It’s so much deeper and richer than its portrayal in the news, and revealed an abundance of stories everywhere I looked.

After moving home to Toronto, friends suggested a memoir project while I sorted out a new career. Around the same time I joined a writing group, Moosemeat, with the idea of expanding my circle of friends and finding a group of like-minded artists. As time passed, I absorbed more and more fiction written by Moosemeat writers, and scribed some of my own. Truth be told, I couldn’t quite get the memoir going. Then, in January 2011, I read a very personal news story: a suicide bomber had targeted a convenience store in Kabul where I’d frequently shopped. I recognized the ads in the shop windows from online photos of the incident. Thankfully, I didn’t know anyone who’d been hurt in the attack. But it felt like I did.

Just like that, I knew the tale I wanted to write. Seven years later, The Finest Supermarket in Kabul was published.

JH: Do any of your characters incorporate real people you met in Kabul?

EP: Definitely a couple of my characters are based on people I spent time with in Kabul, and the human rights lawyer is fashioned after myself. As I wrote my book, I liberally inserted my own experiences and encounters, which added authenticity and a memoir-like aspect to the storylines. For example, the reporter’s plane ride mimicked one of my own when I traveled through Kandahar on my way from New Delhi to Kabul; and I also experienced a highly ranked judge’s inappropriate text messaging, among other incidents. I chuckled at my editor’s note about another scene being unbelievable because it had really happened! That one stayed in.

JH: Was there a question or idea that drove writing this novel that had significance for you as an author?

EP: This is the longest piece of writing I’ve produced to date. When I started, I hadn’t thought the stories would become a novella. As it took shape, I reflected on my time overseas. Encouragement of my family struck me as pivotal to my ability to ride the ups and downs of being so far away. One of the themes of my book is how much family, particularly parents, is a foundation for our life choices and the paths we take. Many of us are driven to make our parents proud. I have a close relationship with my mother and siblings, who all visited me in some of my postings. In my novella, I wanted to look at how family connections can still nourish in the face of disagreement or distance.

JH: How have your real life jobs and experiences influenced your fiction?

EP: My love for writing began back in university where I wrote film reviews for my college newspaper. While working overseas, I drafted project proposals and implementation plans, and occasionally helped create communications products. A couple of my real-life stories were printed in Canadian national newspapers, and in the past ten years, I’ve published two academic papers. I definitely enjoy putting together a solid premise or argument based on research and evidence. Once settled at home, I began to write more earnestly and more creatively. My storylines and plans for future books are all rooted in real life experiences or anecdotes I’ve been told.

JH: What could you accomplish in fiction that you couldn’t in nonfiction?

EP: My attempts at a memoir had been all about poking fun at my experiences and the places I lived, which partially reflected my personality but also kept me from being vulnerable in exposing my thoughts and reactions. As I wrote my novella, I realized that fiction was providing distance, which allowed me write in a more serious way. The truth was, I wasn’t ready (and in hindsight I’m not sure I’ll ever be ready) to let the world inside my head and heart. But I could explore and exploit vulnerabilities I created in my characters, vulnerabilities that could imitate my own.

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EP: As a long-time journalist, how difficult was it to switch gears to writing fiction?

JH: I am still a “recovering journalist,” as my first fiction mentor called me. It’s so much easier to be an observer, a reporter, than to have to twist the juice out of your soul to infuse a novel with the stuff that’s truly worth writing about, worth reading.

I went to Rwanda in 2007 as a reporter exploring the connection between grief and forgiveness. I went there to interview genocide survivors. I also went to interview humanitarian aid workers about why they were drawn to this tiny country still grieving a decade after the 1994 genocide. What I discovered was a deep connection with all of these people from different cultures and backgrounds. That connection was grief, but more than that it was compassion. I wanted to convey the stories I found in Rwanda, including my own, as more than a reporter conveying facts.

EP: Over the time you spent in Rwanda, where your novel is set, what were your initial impressions and how did they change?

JH: I have to admit that I was afraid at first, being the only white person on the streets, hearing people whisper “mzunga” as they passed and seeing what I interpreted as mistrust on their faces. It was unsettling passing by young stony-faced soldiers with guns on the street corners. But after a few days, I was exchanging nods and greeting of “Amahoro,” the Kinyarwanda word that translates to “peace” but means so much more. It is an apology for the past and forgiveness; it is hope for the future. I realized that the looks I saw on faces where concern for me, not mistrust.

EP: I’m intrigued by fiction that is inspired by or based on true stories. How much of the book reflects your own experiences or those of others you met in Rwanda?

JH: The souls of the characters in my novel all have pieces of real people I met in Rwanda, some genocide survivors, some humanitarian aid workers, a few lost souls looking to resolve their own grief — including the woman I saw looking back at me in the mirror. I could never have written this story without experiencing the sorrow and hope, grief intertwined with love like strands of DNA, in this tiny country that could very well be one extended family. That said, none of the characters are directly based on one person.

The descriptions of the country are all based on my recollections and feelings when I was in Rwanda. It’s a beautiful country once you get out of the capitol city of Kigali, with rolling hills and lakes. I also used my experiences tracking gorillas – and interacting with them at close range! – to develop a relationship between one of my characters and the gorillas who still live in the Virunga mountains.

EP: How did you research your book?

JH: I love going down the research rabbit holes of the Internet! read a lot about the history of the country as well as memoirs written by genocide survivors. I also read a lot about Atlanta during the Civil Rights era, as part of my novel takes place during that time period.

EP: How did your Jewish background affect you in Rwanda?

JH: Fifteen years before I went to Rwanda, I visited the Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial site in Germany. The former prison barracks and crematorium where some of my relatives may have been imprisoned and murdered, as well as the photos and artifacts in the museum where harrowing to see.

During the two weeks I spent traveling in the 10,000 hills of Rwanda, I couldn’t help but think of my visit to Dachau. Thousands of people visit Dachau each year; we Jews vow to remember the atrocities that happened there. Never again. It struck me that I was nearly always the only visitor at the dozens of tiny bloodstained memorials I visited. There was always a guide, usually a woman, a lone Tutsi survivor whose family members were murdered at the church or school.

I remember at one church, I was met by a woman in her mid-forties, my age at the time. She had survived by laying on the floor among the dead bodies. Now, she gave tours so that no one would forget. I talked with Julia about her family members and friends who had been murdered here. We cried together; my tears were, in part, for my relatives and members of my tribe who had been murdered during the Holocaust. I experienced a powerful connection with this stranger who lived halfway around the world from me, in a culture so different than mine, through both love and grief. Compassion. I wanted to share that experience with others through the characters in my novel.

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Main photo courtesy of: Juraj Varga

Silverback gorilla photo courtesy of: Mark Jordahl

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Ele Pawelski recently published her debut novella, The Finest Supermarket in Kabul, with Quattro Books. Her short stories have appeared in the Nashwaak Review and in Flash Fiction Magazine. Before moving back to Toronto ten years ago, Ele lived overseas and managed human rights projects in Afghanistan, South Sudan, Bosnia, Kenya, Uzbekistan and Kosovo. Still an avid adventurer, Ele keeps a bag packed for spontaneous trips, adding to the 70-plus countries she’s worked in or visited. Follow Ele on Twitter: @Eleinthecity

Jennifer Haupt went to Rwanda as a journalist in 2006, twelve years after the genocide that wiped out over one million people, to explore the connections between forgiveness and grief. She spent a month interviewing survivors and humanitarian aid workers, and returned to Seattle with something unexpected: the bones of a novel. Haupt’s essays and articles have been published in O, The Oprah Magazine, The Rumpus, Spirituality & Health, Psychology Today, Travel & Leisure, The Sun and many other publications. In the Shadow of 10,000 Hills is her first novel. She lives in Bellevue, WA and you can also find her on Facebook, Instagram (@jenniferhauptauthor), and Twitter @Jennifer_Haupt.