Talking to: author of Duckfeet, Ely Percy

Duckfeet is Ely Percy’s second novel and is highly praised for its depiction of growing up in Scotland, the use of Scots and the characters that you feel you’ve known for years.

Author Ely Percy signing copies of their novel Duckfeet.

Having the chance to talk to Scottish author, Ely Percy, was a delightful experience. Not only inspiring, but educational because it gives you insight into growing up in Scotland and the rewards and challenges that comes along with that.

Filled to the brim with familiar characters that you understand, because you know and knew someone exactly like them, and experiences that translate onto any generation because they are so relatable, Duckfeet is a collection of sixty-five short stories that details working class heroine Kirsty Campbell experiences in high school. Spanning across six years, Duckfeet brings to life the experiences that one can only face in the ‘big school’.

The undeniably Scottish coming-of-age novel is a stroke of Scottish brilliance, as to is Percy themself. Entitled’s interview with Percy explores the core of Duckfeet, writing in Scots and becoming a writer.

People were getting so involved in the characters and I had not seen anything like that with something else I had written.

How did Duckfeet come about? What was the writing process for it?

I started writing Duckfeet in 2004. I started writing a short story, that was a call for a magazine, and the theme was shoes. So, I was sitting in my parents’ house, and I thought, 'do you know what, I have a shot at this?' I hadn't written many short stories at this point, and I had written a novel for my masters, and I was like 'I just want to write something short, and I'm going to focus on short stories', I did a few and I thought, I'll do this competition. 'I need to come up with something different from everyone else', that is what I thought. Then, I thought, 'make a list of all the different shoes you can get, high heels, trainers, brogues and all the rest of it'. I was sitting in my parents living room, my dad comes him and he had just come home from work, he had been wearing toe-caps, so he came in with a basin of water. Now, my dad has bad feet, and I just wrote that down.

As soon as I wrote it down, it was a flood, like this wee girl's voice just in my head, going "ma dad's got bad feet". And, I just listened and I wrote it down really fast, got to the end of it, put it aside, typed it up the next day, changed it a little bit, but the first story mostly came up fully formed. And, I thought, 'oh this is good, I'll have another shot'. The next time I wrote another story, I never thought it would be the same girl, but it was good with her being in high school. So, I thought what will I write about next, French class. So, I sat down and did the same thing again. I was maybe about ten stories in, and thought maybe this isn't a short story. They all link, and it is all the same characters. I knew about ten stories in who was you going to be pregnant, who was going to leave school at sixteen, I know who is going to stay on.

But, at the same time I realised that I needed to talk to people to make sure I was getting everything right. So, I started talking to everyone who went to school with me, and people who went to different schools, people who were older than me, younger than me, people my sister went to school with, and what I discovered was that people tell me the same stories over and over. That is what it boils down to. It was always about the person who was your best pal, the most popular boy, the most popular girl, class clown, a teacher you liked, a teacher who did not like you, a person who was a total waste of space, a person who had everything going for them but then they just chuck it all away with one stupid thing that they do. These were the stories that people were telling me over and over again. You could tell what people were most excited about because they would say, 'put that in your book, put that in your book!'.

So, I sat down and did the same thing again. I was maybe about ten stories in, and thought maybe this isn't a short story. They all link, and it is all the same characters.

At the same time, I was going to 'Read Aloud', a night in Glasgow where you went and read part of a work in progress. So, I was going every month and I was reading short stories. People would come up to me and ask, 'So, that Charlene, what is she all about? Charlene is so mean'. People were getting so involved in the characters and I had not seen anything like that with something else I had written. I had not really seen that with anything else from those nights at that point.

Did you find inspiration within people that you grew up with for your characters in Duckfeet?

I didn't like base the characters on any of my friends. I gave a first copy to one of my friends, and I told her that none of these characters were any particular person we went to school with. Everybody is completely fictional, although there might be a chance were you will think you have said something in this book, and you probably did. So, as she was reading it, she was texting me, going, 'no, sorry Charlene Clark is this person'. And, I would have never of thought. I was thinking, if that was that person do you not think I would have changed the name a bit more. But, she said, everybody was like someone, everybody felt familiar.

Someone, everybody felt familiar.

How was it writing in Scots, was that always something that you wanted to do with Duckfeet?

The thing is people would ask me about the linguistics and I would have to say, hang-on, I'm not a linguist, I'm just somebody who has got a good ear. I can listen to two people speak on a bus, and see when I get off that bus, I can still hear them. Then, I start adding bits to their conversation because I can still hear their accent. As much as maybe that is not what they would say, I'm just adding it in my own head.` So, I guess, that was something that felt quite natural to me.

People told me nobody would read my stuff because it is in Scots, it was too niche, too hard to understand and they are wrong. I have had people from Paris, Canada, all over, reading this book. And, it is just a small publisher as well.

My sister said, Kirsty doesn't sound like us. Also, Charlene says 'hingmy' and 'hingwy. And, Chris, again, lives in Renfrew but slightly different housing estate and he says things like 'i'm gonnae wear a pair of the shoes'. But there was a collection of different accents in Renfrew, like a spectrum.

But Kirsty's voice just came all at once, and other characters I had to think more about because I didn't want folk to sound all the same.

People told me nobody would read my stuff because it is in Scots, it was too niche, too hard to understand and they are wrong.

What was your connection with Kirsty, if you had one?

I think all the characters are a wee bit of me, but none of them are me. I always feel I take on a bit of my characters personalities. But, I do think I learn from the characters. For example, I would think 'what would I do in these situations?', but really it is what would Kirsty do in these situations. Kirsty wouldn't do that, what would she do instead. Sometimes I think, or I think about doing things because my characters would. It gives me a bit of confidence.

Was it easy to revisit your childhood for inspiration for Duckfeet?

I was still in touch with people I went to high school with. In 2004, when I was interviewing folk, I was only out of high-school five, six years and had access to them. I discovered in a pub one day that my sister had taken stories that I had shown her and handed them around in this pub. And, folk were coming up being like 'brillant' and that is what encouraged them to talk to me about Duckfeet. It was not difficult to talk to people because it was a case of 'let's go down to the Viscount and I'll tell you what it was like for me in Renfrew High or whatever'.

I did not really sit down and think 'I want to represent these kind of people', it was more about who was in Renfrew at the time and who was I in contact with.

Is there anyone that you have not mentioned in the book but would have liked to now looking back?

The problem was the book ended up being twenty thousand words longer than the publisher wanted, and I have had people say to me, 'why didn't you write more about Charlene in the mental hospital'? That's because it wasn't her point of view! Kirsty could visit her and hear stories but she could not possibility tell their stories. But I do plan to write Charlene's story in a adolescent psychiatry unit, because I was in an adolescent psychiatry unit for three months. So, I think it would be quite easy to pick six or eight characters and explore them. That needs to be their own novella, it can't be from Kirsty because she is too removed from the situation.

I'm planning on writing a collection for three queer characters, a story about a gay boy coming out in the book, and another one about a bi-girl. I've also got a gay trans boy that you never find much about because he is just a name on a register because someone like that would never came out in 2001 in a Scottish High School. Maybe, at sixteen, seventeen, away from college but not twelve.

That could be another story about these characters having to travel to Edinburgh or Glasgow for college or whatever and coming into themselves. The world is expanding but I could do not do it all in Duckfeet. Kirsty should not be telling the stories of the LGBT characters because she isn't LGBT. She has a very limited viewpoint because she can only tell the stories through her cis-heterosexual viewpoint. That is okay because she has told you about everything else in that viewpoint, she has told you about drugs, bullying. But. she does not always get it right, she is not the best ally, I think. I think Charlene is the better ally.

But, yeah, I think there is a lot of stories I would have liked to expanded on.

I have had people say to me, 'why didn't you write more about Charlene in the mental hospital'? That's because it wasn't her point of view!

Do you have any advice for writers coming about just now and wanting to be published?

I used to tell people read as much as you can, but actually listen to people as much as you can. Not just writers, just ordinary people. Listen to the folk on the street or the folk on the bus. I'm not a very visual person and I wrote a novel in a pub because I had to listen to people for inspiration. So, I listen to people rather than watch. But, watch people as well, watch their body languages. Wee things like that are good for writing. You'll hear a lot of advice saying 'show don't tell' but I think that can be very vague. What do you mean, show don't tell? What it means to me as what you don't say because that is just as important as what you do.

Duckfeet is on its way to becoming a Scottish classic with its accurate portrayal and relevant dialogue. If you have not read Duckfeet yet, I could not recommend it enough.

You can purchase Duckfeet on Amazon