He compares the act of writing and then rewriting as straightening out every strand in a bowl of spaghetti to see if they are different lengths.

Arthur Nersesian is not a believer in the default life. As he puts it, “Most people mate, have kids, settle down, and turn their lives into modest little money making machines.” His first novel, “The Fuck-Up,” was well received, and was very quickly released as an MTVBook so that hipsters everywhere could have an easy-to-carry copy.

Since then, he has released books such as “Manhattan Loverboy,” “Unlubricated,” and “Dogrun,” all of which have met with excellent reviews.

To most people, this would classify him as a success. However, he does not seem to have any illusions about his work. “If I spent the same time that I put toward writing working at Starbucks, I'd have a lot more money now. I'd also have job security, health insurance and a modest pension plan.”

He usually starts writing in the afternoon and types late into the night. He compares the act of writing and rewriting as straightening out every strand in a bowl of spaghetti to see if they are different lengths.

His newest book, “The Swing Voter of Staten Island,” was begun in 1991 and will be released this October. “It went through so many drafts and incarnations that I think I can probably publish that first draft as an entirely different book,” he says.

Many think that in order for someone to successfully portray a completely different person in a work of fiction, the writer must put himself directly into the position of his subject. Although many writers are perfectly capable of doing so, few of them are willing to tackle these varied personas in the first person.

Let’s be honest. Chuck Palahniuk, while a very good writer, has essentially rewritten the same characters for the past ten years. If you have read “Fight Club,” you have a good idea of the mindsets of any other character in any of his other books. Nersesian has managed to slip in and out of characters like a snake sheds its skin; the transition is almost always clean and the end result is very believable.

“To paraphrase Flaubert, you have to become Madame Bovary. Even if Bovary means going to a strip club to track down her favorite porn actress – like Leslie Cauldwell in ‘Suicide Casanova’, or having sex with some handsome guy you feel indifferent about in order to kick-start your acting career like Hannah in ‘Unlubricated’ – and I'm a straight male.”

The only real similarity among the characters in his books is their young age trying to do the best they can with the materials at their disposal. Sometimes things end well, sometimes they don’t, but the point that his books make is that the journey is important, not the destination.

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