Robert Skinner was born and raised on Kaurna country, in South Australia. His writing appears frequently in The Monthly, and has also been featured in The Best Australian Essays, Best Australian Comedy Writing and Internazionale. He currently lives in Melbourne, where he works in a bookshop and plays football at the lowest level.

How did I’d Rather Not come to be acquired by Black Inc.?

There wasn’t much to acquire at first, only the faint whiff of a book. You can put it down to the far-sighted optimism of Chris Feik. We have been working together since 2016, nudging the book into being. I spent a lot of that time trying to convince him of the merits of very short books, and he spent a lot of time patiently explaining the minimum number of pages required to glue such a thing together. 

You’re not only a writer, but a bookseller, too. Has becoming a published author changed your approach to selling books?

I have spent many hours standing at the shop counter watching people pick up my book and… put it down again. It’s no way to live.

I’d Rather Not was recently shortlisted for Small Publishers’ Adult Book of the Year in the 2024 Australian Book Industry Awards. What was it like to find out you were on the shortlist?

I was thrilled at the prospect of winning a bundle of cash, or – barring that – maybe a car. Someone from Black Inc. quietly informed me there was no cash prize, only prestige, which is a difficult thing to send home to your mum. And of course the prestige is diminished somewhat when one looks at the shortlist and sees a reprobate like David Marr on there, too.

Since I’d Rather Not was published last July, you’ve done all manner of events – bookshop talks, writers’ festivals, now awards nights. Do you have a favourite story from across the industry events you’ve attended?

Most of it involves heavy drinking. One of the material benefits of writing a book is that it gets you invited to events on someone else’s dime, in places that you might not otherwise get to visit (for e.g. Tathra, Cairns) at which you can meet locals, old friends and heroes. It’s hard, under those circumstances, not to get carried away…

What’s one book you think that everyone should read?

They should read loads and loads of any old thing, if they’re into it.

What are you writing now, or next?

I have turned my hand towards the writing of sexts, postcards, admiring emails, various pieces of samizdat, and letters to the council. I will write another book if and when some fury drives me to do so.

Read the previous instalment of Behind the Book, a Q&A with Jordon Lott from Bolinda Audio. 

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