"Dirty, clever and fresh. Eva Moran’s crafty and she’s just my type." Lynn Crosbie

Eva Moran’s anecdotes about anal sex, complete with aphoristic life lessons learned ("Fuck The Asshole. Do Not Be The Asshole") are frankly funny and read like a scatological Maggie Estep, or maybe a cruder, female Bruce McCulloch. Her author bio at the back of the book threatens that, "After this publication, Eva will never write again!" which one sincerely hopes is not true.

Have you ever wondered what Woody Allen would be like if he were a woman stoked on chick-lit who lived in Toronto? Eva Moran has. Porny Stories is a collection of fiction that examines the neurotic, desperate, and impotent lady-world of Toronto, and shows a lot of leg while doing it. Bad boyfriends, jobs, and decisions plague the main character of each story in this titillating diary of explicitly dirty laundry. The status quo eludes the main characters. Lover after lost lover, one missed opportunity for a better life after the next, the characters can never seem to get it right, but they keep trying in all the wrong ways. Basically, this is a book about badly needing to get a new life and desperately wanting to get laid and how each character will die trying... or, well, not die... but will conjure many drunken shenanigans trying. The seemingly autobiographical approach of the pieces makes it feel like you are kneeling at a keyhole peering into a room full of bawdy comedy... tantalizing!

TDR caught up with the mysterious and saucy Eva Moran for this exclusive Q&A quickie…

[November 2008]

EM: Who the hell doesn’t?

EM: I started writing Porny Stories in Montreal some time ago—just one story here and there. Most of the writing took place in 2007 and 2008.

TDR: What is your background, education?

EM: I grew up in Montreal—St. Lambert to be precise—and in Toronto. I’m Irish, Italian, Scottish—mostly Irish. I went to school. And then I went to more school. And then I went to even more school. I have been to six Universities: Carleton, Glendon (York), UVic, Guelph, Concordia and Ryerson.

EM: Because sex is my favorite subject. I think there are three important questions we ask our good friends after a time of not seeing them: Are you well? Anyone you know dead? And who are you fucking? I usually skip to the copulation question a little too early in conversation. Also gender identity fascinates me. Like, is anyone gender sure? Gender sureness weirds me out. I’m not saying it doesn’t happen. I just can’t quite wrap my head around what it means to be a woman and then pin that woman thing down and then put it on and strut about town positive that I am womanly. And then throw in woman seeking love and BRANG!—the gears grind and I become an inefficient she-bot. So, I write about my obsession and confusion.

EM: Well, he is one of, if not my favorite writer working in Canada so it was great. He gave me a lot of freedom and… I don’t know what to say. I was working with one of the most intelligent, talented people of our time: I’m lucky. I feel lucky.

EM: For this book: David McGimpsey, Julia Tausch, Sean Bell, Woody Allen, Miranda July, Lorrie Moore, Kurt Vonnegut, Earnest Hemingway, Margaret Atwood, Monty Python, The Kids In The Hall, and loads of other people and groups.

EM: I have no idea what you mean by this question.

EM: I love a good bum.

EM: Something by Miranda July. I lent my friend my copy of her book so I can’t look up a title for you (I have no memory for titles… or character names… or names… it’s terrible really). But if you know the story about the girls who are best friends and then they move out together and there is all this sexual tension and rejection and then the main character becomes a peep-show worker… that one. Or, the last story in the book. I like her stories because they are about desire, cruelty and entanglement. But they are still so light in imagination. They rethink/rework the love story. Or, show us the grit of love. Or…. I love Miranda July. What else can I say?