(Above: Cover art for The Garbage Brothers, by Julia O’Reilly)

Edited by Randi Bjornstad

Paul Neville spent nearly four decades at The Register-Guard newspaper in Eugene, Oregon, first as a reporter and then an editor. During those 37 years, he covered myriad stories ranging from forest fires to government issues — and scandals — to the plight of migrant farmworkers.

Author Paul Neville; photo by Chris Pietsch

Now he has just completed his first novel, The Garbage Brothers, which he describes as “the story of an 18-year-old suburbanite who finds himself in the company of a motley and felonious crew of sanitation workers in Chicago.”

Here are his some of his thoughts about switching from reality to fiction, from day-to-day factual happenings to years of turning imagination into story.

“It wasn’t as big a career leap as it might seem,” Neville says. “Storytelling is storytelling, whether the stories you write appear in a daily newspaper or between book covers.”

Nonetheless, it was not an easy transition between sticking to “just the facts, ma’am,” and letting his imagination take over.

“I found at first that every time I put my fingers on a computer keyboard, I wrote and thought like a newspaper reporter,” Neville says. “So I made myself write The Garbage Brothers by hand on legal pads and ended up with a pile about 3 feet tall.”

That created its own pitfalls.

“The downside was that it took a long time for me to transcribe all that writing—my handwriting is atrocious—into my laptop for editing,” he admits. “But I found that writing by hand was the only way to let my book’s words and characters flow freely and unhampered by ‘newspaperthink.’ ”

Here’s his synopsis of the plot of The Garbage Brothers, intended to be a story both poignant and comical, set in the Chicago suburbs in the summer of 1969:

Jesse Wheeler’s comfortable and secure suburban existence crumbles after his father dies of a heart attack, leaving his family without means and his naive, underachieving son adrift and without prospects. After graduating from high school with abysmal grades, Jesse finds a job hauling garbage for Willard Sanitation Service with a crew of felons—Pickles, Zeus, Grits, and their foreman Billy Bart—and their alcoholic boss, Benjamin Willard III, in the blue-collar town of Freedom.

One of Jesse’s coworkers introduces him to his niece, a young woman named Iris, who was raised in poverty and dreams of becoming a fashion designer in Paris. Jesse’s relationship with Iris and his ability to survive the punishing lessons inflicted by his co-workers while winning their grudging acceptance fills this gritty coming-of-age story with laughter and heartache. 

Neville’s The Garbage Brothers has received early praise from several pre-publication sources:

  • Kirkus Reviews called it “A colorful, big-hearted novel about a summer of hauling trash … the reader can’t help but enjoy the ride, flies and all.”
  • Eugene author Elizabeth Engstrom, herself the writer of 18 novels, described it as “a crazy, wonderful cast of characters in this funny, poignant and satisfying story … a story for the ages.”
  • Bob Welch, who worked for many years with Neville at The Register-Guard, has written 26 books, mostly non-fiction, and also has taught many writing workshops. Welch deemed The Garbage Brothers “a delightful debut (novel), rich, raw, funny and gritty” but at the same time “with just enough grace to give us hope that humankind’s ‘bottom quartile’ can rise from anywhere, even the daily grind of garbage collecting.”

In fact, Neville drew from his own experience in developing his fictional garbage crew, having himself worked as a garbage collector in the Chicago area to help pay expenses while attending Northwestern University.

He also reached back into his own long journalism career, during which he had the opportunity to study long-form feature writing with a mentor, two-time Pulitzer prizewinner Jon Franklin.

But he found there still were gaps to overcome between repertorial creativity and writing fiction.

“It wasn’t long before I realized I had to let go of that outline and let my characters live and create their own stories,” Neville says. “I have learned that you have to give your characters and the universe they inhabit that freedom if your novel is going to feel alive and real—and true.”

Besides writing, Neville spends his spare time playing guitar and composing and performing music, traveling, hiking, and kayaking, but nothing more rewarding than “hanging out with the grandkids.”

Book Release Party for The Garbage Brothers

When: 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday, April 15, 2023; Neville will read from his book at 3 p.m.

Where: Tsunami Books, 2585 Willamette St., Eugene

Availability: The Garbage Brothers will be available in Eugene at Tsunami Books (2585 Willamette St.), J Michaels Books (160 E. Broadway) and Black Sun Books (2467 Hilyard St.), and online from Amazon, IFD Publishing, or paulnevilleauthor.com