Writer Seth McDonough has a few things to be happy about:
1) He has successfully told the story of ostensibly boring ol’ John Smith with a touch of wit that makes that character un-uninteresting.
2) He is a new dad with a two-month-old daughter.
3) He found success with his first self(ish) help book, How to Cure Yourself of Narcissism.
4) He has a debut novel, A Boring Book.
McDonough, whose mother was a school principal, spent much of his childhood moving across the province. (But despite all the travel, his knowledge of geography was terrible, he laments.) When he reached university age, he chose to study philosophy at the University of British Columbia (UBC) with a minor in English. While many of classmates pursued law, the usual “logical” pathway for a person with a philosophy degree in hand, McDonough took the road less travelled — he embarked on a career in writing because “had an idea.”
For 20 years he dabbled in different professions as he journeyed on his quest to write a book.
From being a scheduler at the Vancouver Crisis Centre for 14 years to working as a roller-blade hockey coach for a year, McDonough experienced a lot. But for the author in him to bloom, the job he had in retail for six years proved to be the ultimate testing ground. It was in retail that he had the chance to meet a lot of people, each with their own quirks, and observe, which inspired the characters and chapters in his books.
In 2020, McDonough got his first breakthrough — he published his debut non-fiction book, How to Cure Yourself of Narcissism.
But A Boring Book, published last month, is the work that’s he's fondest of — it was the one he started with.
If How to Cure Yourself of Narcissism was a non-fiction social guide to living with narcissists or dealing with our own narcissism, A Boring Book is a romantic comedy of manners featuring the world’s dullest character.
“It was actually the first one that I started out with so it’s close to my heart. It's the book through which I learned to write and when I finally decided to start publishing books, I wanted to give it some time just to make sure it was perfect. So that's why I published How to Cure Yourself of Narcissism first,” he said in an interview.
“I think of it as a sibling to my daughter, because it’s so close to me,” he added. The book was published in December 2022, while his daughter was born in October, making them near-twins.
McDonough thinks of himself as an observer, primarily, which is why his six-year stint in retail helped him pen his books.
“My study is people,” he said. “I love the interplay of personality and foible and how people will sometimes unintentionally or intentionally be rude or inconsiderate. I love to try and capture that in a comedic way.”
McDonough likes to think of himself as a puppeteer of words. He finds humour in life's little moments, — like a chance meeting at a coffee shop —and takes pleasure in building a whole world around them.
The process for writing a book is like “the final music that plays,” he said. “But to get there, say it's an opera, I need the story. And then I need the personalities. And then I'm Mozart, writing the music.”
For McDonough, it starts with the overall plot. Then he brings in characters as obstacles or catalysts, and writes dialogue to help flesh out those characters.
Adding in social foibles is the final touch.
Inspiration for the book and his ultra-boring protagonist came to McDonough when he was on a bus one day.
“I noticed this fellow who was talking to someone else, and I just thought, 'Wow, what a boring person you are.'”
But he soon realized that the “boring person” was in fact also a nice person.
“I decided to name [my character] John Smith, the most boring name I could think of,” McDonough said.
“I'm his ghostwriter. Along the way, I came to like him and really appreciate him because he is highly earnest and caring about other people. He's trying to do his best to help them, he just doesn't have any inventive means of doing so. So the book is his story of trying to make a dent in the suffering of the people around him without having the imagination to carry out interesting schemes. And the attempted romances along the way.”
Despite what the name suggests, A Boring Book is not intended to put the readers to sleep — in fact, McDonough attempts to tell the tale of the dullest character in the funniest, most creative and playful, way.
Although he's not sure which of his books will be published next, he hopes to bring out a sequel to A Boring Book this year. Called A Fantastic Book, the sequel will feature John Smith's opposite — an interesting character.
Later in the year he'll publish a book he wrote with his sister when he worked at the crisis centre.
“My sister Taryn and I, we used to write holiday stories every year,” he said. “We’d taken this tradition from my mom, who was a school principal. She would write a holiday story every year for her students at the assembly. And the deal was, every student's last name had to be incorporated into the story. So if there was a student whose last name was Larson, then at the end of the tale, we'd say, and the character learned there, Larson.”
“My sister and I continued that tradition when I was at the crisis centre for all our volunteers. And over the years, we wrote so many stories, 14 years' worth, that I decided we'll compile these stories into one long book. So I'm looking forward to finishing that up. Because I think the stories are fun seeing where the names take us as it were.”
