Students are to post reactions (minimum 250 words each) to the
assigned listening/reading linked below. Students are encouraged (but
not required) to additionally respond to other student reactions.
KELLY LINK Monster Librarian Interview: Kelly Link is the author of the young adult collection Pretty Monsters. She has written two other collections, Stranger Things Happen and Magic for Beginners. Her
novellas and short stories have won a variety of awards. Neil Gaiman
called her "the best short story writer out there, in any genre." She
co-founded Small Beer Press with her husband, Gavin Grant, and edits
the fantasy zine Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet. Click heading to read the interview.
KELLY LINK NPR Interview: Author
Kelly Link says her short stories are inspired by what she calls "night
time logic." In fiction that strives for realism, she says, everything
has a place. Everything makes sense. It's kind of like dream logic, she
tells NPR's Audie Cornish, "except that when you wake up from a dream,
you think, well, that didn't make sense. Night time logic in stories,
you think, I don't understand why that made sense, but I feel there was
a kind of emotional truth to it." Click heading to listen to NPR interview.
THE WEIRDEST STORY IDEAS COME FROM YOUR OWN OBSESSIONS by KELLY LINK: "One
of the most useful pieces of writing advice I've ever come across was
something Kate Wilhelm said. To roughly paraphrase, she suggests that
every writer indirectly collaborates with her subconscious — she calls
this collaborator your Silent Partner — who supplies you with ideas that
you then turn into stories."Click heading to read the rest of the essay.
THE SPECIALIST'S HAT by KELLY LINK:
"When you're Dead," Samantha says, "you don't have to brush your
teeth." "When you're Dead," Claire says, "you live in a box, and it's
always dark, but you're not ever afraid." Claire and Samantha are
identical twins. Their combined age is twenty years, four months, and
six days. Claire is better at being Dead than Samantha. Click heading to read the rest of the story.
22 comments:
I was a bit iffy on The Specialist when it started, but it had me completely hooked by the end. I won’t spoil it, but I really liked it. The way Kelly Link describes her creative process, how she comes up with stories, is so interesting. For quite a while I read stories in more consumptively than thoughtfully but even I have tropes I like. I’ve never thought to list them all down like she suggests in The Weirdest Story Ideas but it’s a neat way of thinking about it. Of the interviews with her, the one that sticks out to me the most is “night time logic”. I’m writing this at night in fittingly dramatic lighting so I can imagine what she means. The Specialist illustrates this perfectly, where things don’t quite make sense but it all follows a mysterious, internal logic that we aren’t supposed to understand. I also liked what she said about writing genre fiction in the Monster Librarian interview. I agree that you need to read a lot of it to understand what you’re getting into, but more interestingly she suggests reading many genres so you can blend elements of them together. A fantasy story with horror elements or a science fiction story with fantasy elements is always interesting. There was another interesting comment about the tension between the established tropes and formula that a genre follows and pushing the limits of that. How far can you take an epic fantasy story before it becomes horror, or vice versa? It’s fun to think about, even if it’s more difficult to implement.
I love fictional realism stories, especially the kind Kelly Link mentions in her NPR interview, where characters are a stand-in for the reader as they figure out their world. In lofty stories, readers can often get bogged down by world specific terms, objects, or concepts. When “dream logic” is used though, as Link calls it, the story feels much more grounded, even when supernatural elements are involved. This concept reminds me of “The Radleys” by Matt Haig, where a family navigates troubles with their marriage, extended family, and identity as vampires. Although it is a vampire story, “everything makes sense” about the world building and character motivations. Even if the reader doesn’t understand why the logic makes sense, as Link also alludes to, a strong emotional reality remains that is enough for the reader to make a connection to the characters. In “The Radleys” example, the emotional reality might be empathy for Clara, the troubled daughter. Link also discusses her love for incorporating romance into her work. I admire her ability to embrace genres she’s drawn to, “even if [she] feels [she] shouldn’t be drawn to them.” I love books that cross genres, especially between fantasy and romance. I think blurring the lines brings new life into existing genre stereotypes, allowing a new type of story to come through. In the same vain, I believe all genres should be embraced equally, without categorizing some as “better” or “more mature” than others. By removing this stigma, writers will feel freer to embrace their favorite techniques and styles, regardless of the categories they belong to.
I love the short story by Kelly Link “The Specialist Hat” and at first I didn’t get it, but it's one of those stories you have to look closely just to understand what it really means. It's more of a “haunted” story as it takes place where the girls live in a haunted house. What I realized reading this story and her interview on the “Monster Librarian” where she talks about how she brainstores for stories and such, made me realize her stories are based on what she was obsessed with. She takes things from her childhood, things that she remembers and things that she loves, like horror characters or settings and turns them into a book which I thought was a fantastic way to write books. Every little thing in your life can be turned into a story, everything that is important to you, can be captured into a story. The interview also talks about how she gets in the mindset of teens because with the stories she writes about, she seems to write in the right perspective of teens and the reason she was able to capture that perspective correctly was because of things she remembered as a kid. Its very important to understand as someone who can have trouble writing stories, to understand that stories come from what you already know and what you experienced. Just remembering your childhood, things you experienced can be very important to storytelling. Overally, I did like “The Specialist Hat” story although it was confusing on my end to understand, still a good story.
I wanted to touch on one of Kelly Link’s comments “...that they would boldly read their romance novels. That's one of the things about figuring out what kind of story you want to write, is figuring out the kinds of things you are drawn to, even if you feel you shouldn't be drawn to them.” Romance is often looked down upon as a genre for being mostly consumed, and now, being mostly written by women. Even as an avid reader, and a lover of romance subplots I can’t help but shrink away when the masses point their beefy fingers at ‘the horny romance reading women’. Like most things, women are criticized and ridiculed for having a shared love for something that, especially nowadays, is mostly made for women by women. Of course, not to say that women are the only romance readers or that men face no ridicule for reading romance, in fact, they probably face it more– but I digress. I think that being unapologetic about the books you read, and in turn what you write, should never be criticized or looked down upon. I especially hate the false logic that people employ when they claim that you aren't really reading if you are reading fiction–especially genres like fantasy and romance. At the end of the day, if you are sitting down and reading something you are bettering yourself as a person and working to improve yourself, fictitious or not. Likewise, writing fiction does not make your work any less valuable than a piece of non–fiction. No matter the genre, when you write you open yourself up emotionally, make some sort of commentary on the world, and guide readers through what it means to be human, in one way or another.
One of the comments that Kelly Link made that really intrigued me revolved around whether it was better if characters knew the worlds around them or if they were surprised like the reader. She talked about how she enjoyed writing stories where the readers felt uneasy about what they were reading while the characters were so comfortable in their strange and unsettling environments. She specifically said, "I think there's a kind of useful dissonance, reading a world in which the people in that world are used to that place. And that's because that's true of real life; you often come into situations where everybody already knows what's going on, and you have to sort of piece it together." To me, that was a profound statement from a point of view I had never really considered as a reader or a writer. As a reader, I do think I enjoy reading books that have a premise that feels unfamiliar to me but familiar to characters as it feels like I am truly entering their world. In life, I am always trying new things and going into new "scary" environments that replicate that feeling of reading those of type books. As a writer, I would love to create an environment that replicates real life in that type of way because I feel like that would connect to readers on a much deeper level. I personally love reading books that have topics and characters that are foreign and new to me, yet have feelings that I have felt or didn't even know I related to until I read that book.
I thought Kelly Link’s “The Specialist’s Hat” was interesting—a fairly quick read with a nice build to it—but surprisingly found it somewhat lacking. I normally really like horror, ghost stories, the macabre, etc., and I found there were a lot of good pieces set up within the narrative that I liked: the thread of the father and his literary pursuit mixed with the alcoholism and strange encounters, the dollhouse-like view into the lives of the girls and the smallness they feel both in importance and identity, the teeth on the hat and the allure of the attic. Even typing this now, I just realized the parallel of Eight Chimneys and Samantha’s comments about the number 8 being particularly relevant to the story. But I think that’s my issue—concern? qualm? point of discussion?—there is a latent, underlying narrative being laid out by Link, just under the surface and subtly teased at, that I feel like is not fully gleaned enough of. It makes me think about the question of how much your reader should know, how much your character(s) should know, versus how much you as the author knows, and what balance between the three elicits the best reading experience. Here, I felt like I was mildly disappointed that I didn’t get enough answers—when reading the Monster Librarian interview, which I did prior to reading the short story, Link touches on the suddenness that she typically leaves a story with, usually following the arc of narrative rather than full satisfaction of questions—as if building a window for aesthetics rather than utility or convenience. It may look wonderful, may be pleasing to the eye and enjoyable, but it may not be the greatest at letting the sun in, or might not have a particularly clear view of the outside through its glass. This is how I feel “The Specialist’s Hat” felt to me—too much set up and not enough action or clarification for me to make much meaning. Link mentions wanting to leave her readers thinking forward for “what happens next,” but I feel like I ended up going, “and what did any of that mean?” Which is typically uncharacteristic for me! I love trying to piece together puzzles of narratives, so if anybody feels like they understood the underlying narrative here, feel free to explain it to my achingly tired mind. Overall though I thought it was an interesting reading experience, and at least certainly got me thinking about narrative balance and reader gratification vs. narrative satisfaction!
Idk how I feel about ‘The Specialist’s Hat.’ I really liked the beginning and was excited to figure out how these girls were dead, but it turns out that they were only “Dead”, which sort of felt like a cop-out almost. Like, I get it and why it was done like that, but halfway through I kept thinking to myself ‘ok, but how/why are they dead?’ only for it to be revealed that they were just playing pretend kind of felt lame. But, again, I understand that the horror element came from the hat itself and the babysitter who was the poet’s daughter, and *she’s* probably actually dead for real (assuming this takes place in roughly current year, considering Rash wrote his book in 1907). But I felt like the babysitter was sort of incidental and I wish she did a bit more. Idk, she was sort of just there to show them the hat and to establish she was Rash’s daughter, and I feel like they could have found the hat naturally and sort of pieced things together based on their own father’s writings and that may have given them a bit more agency imo. And then the ending just sort of… ends. I know in one of the interviews, the interviewer brings up the abruptness of her stories’ ends and she answers with “When I get to the end of a story, I think of that story as being absolutely over -- the endings are the endings -- in that I hope that the narrative has a coherent and satisfying shape, even if part of what is satisfying about it is that it's a little unsatisfying/unsettling. I also hope that the reader is left with enough forward velocity to go on thinking about what happened next, and that the characters and their situation and their actions will linger in the reader's mind.” And I get that, and the ending did make me think ‘oh, well what happens next?’ but that’s because, I think at least in this story, the dad getting bitten by the hat (?) and the twins thinking he’s the specialist was almost the first time something of consequence happened, but then it just drops it immediately. I love psychological and subtle horror that’s really atmospheric and not overtly horror, but this just didn’t really hit it for me personally.
Personally, I find Kelly Link's "night time logic" philosophy to be fascinating. When reading "The Specialist's Hat" after her interviews, the points at which her process shines through the most become very prominent and difficult to ignore. I must admit that at the beginning of the story, I did not find myself particularly attached or moved due to an initial struggle to wrap my head around the piece. Initially, I had believed it to be a fault on Link's side. But in retrospect, I now have come to understand that this difficulty to absolutely comprehend the story is an intended effect. The story did not completely make sense as I had hoped, but there was also a distinct emotional truth being communicated within the story. I felt that this effect was easiest to recognize near the end of the story, particularly when the story circles back to the idea of "playing Dead." While I will still admit that the story's train of thought still does not feel very coherent in my eyes, witnessing Link put her "night time logic" philosophy into writing has made me feel that "The Specialist's Hat" places focus not into the logistics of the plot, but the underlying message—which is a focus that many writers should emphasize on as they write. While I express interest towards Link's creative process and work, I must also say that I felt that the pacing felt inconsistent. Had Link been faster in communicating her emotional message earlier into the story and trimmed down the exposition, I felt that she could have elaborated on the message more and delivered a more resonating piece.
Kelly Link's interview was inspiring to read as a lover of horror myself. Her method of talking about things she likes connects back to our classes, where we discuss creating story catchers and placing stuff we are familiar with. Link puts some elements of what she likes in her writing, and reading “The Specialist’s Hat,” you can tell how well-read she is with horror based on the energy that weighed heavily with a sense of dread. The story itself has a very paranormal touch to it because it reminded me of entities called Mimics that use their voice to lure people toward them plus, the specialist itself being represented as some sort of demonic entity that pretends to be the girls father. Kelly Link is inspiring because I would like to write more horror stories. Still, I felt many publishers preferred classic literary fiction over genre fiction, which discouraged me from wanting to write more within genre fiction. When she said to keep sending them out to publishers, it gave me a bit more confidence because while many might not like what I write, there will be one or two publishers that will. I know now that you don’t have to submit only to publishing companies but also to magazines, and I like reading about authors' routines when it comes to writing because it can help me figure out my writing routine. Kelly also writes tons of short stories, and she can write so much in a single story, which is the type of writing I’d like to get better at doing. I would also like to take a look at her story recommendations, hoping it will make me a better horror writer.
I found “The Specialist’s Hat” to be quite disturbing. It also had me hooked, as I was anxious to know how it would end, but the concept of them choosing what they chose (I’m being vague because I don’t want to spoil it) was horrifying in a way that is not entertaining to me. I am not a horror fan, and I don’t think I would read anything else by Kelly Link, but I can see the appeal. She did mention that she was a fan of the uncanny, which is a word derived from un-homelike, and I would say that concept was expertly executed in “The Specialist’s Hat,” as this was a house that sounded like a house but was filled with things that were not part of a home, which I think also ties into her idea of “not-quite-dreamy” logic from the NPR interview.
One thing she mentioned that stood out to me was that I have never heard of a writer starting from the beginning of a piece and revising until they get to the end each time they write, but I found that to be an interesting process, and one I might like to try with the piece I wrote inspired by our museum visit. I was also surprised to hear that she hadn’t written in about a year at the time of the first interview we read, but it seems like that could be due to the fact that she teaches writing, publishes, and probably has other duties to take care of in her own life – it seems like writing and reading are her life, and she still explores many parts of those fields even when she isn’t writing her own pieces.
I must admit I’m not a fan of Kelly Link’s stylistic choices. I don’t enjoy not being given all of the information when I read something, and I don’t want to have to fill in most of the story rather than appreciating what the author intended. Hot take: I don’t like Inception either for that reason. The entire concept of imprecise writing disagrees with me. Her “nighttime logic,” as she describes it, is an interesting idea, but one I find doesn’t work on me very well. There is a quote from Mark Twain, “It's no wonder that truth is stranger than fiction. Fiction has to make sense.” People expect fictional stories to make MORE sense than true ones. In true stories, things can happen randomly, by chance. This is what drew people in to George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series: characters get randomly killed. Another hot take: I do not like Martin’s writing either. I agree with Twain; fiction must make more sense than reality. A story should not be reliant on esotericism or as one act at the New York Renaissance Faire described it: “A flying implement of doom.” Credit to the Shakespeare Approves show. He used this term to poke fun at how and why people die in Shakespeare plays. It’s a contrived plot device that accomplishes anything the author wants, and I can’t stand it. I don’t see it as intentional and thought-provoking art, I see it was lazy writing. Not to say Link’s stories can’t be enjoyed, but I dislike the idea of being reliant on a sort of fog clouding readers’ minds, allowing you to do anything you want to accomplish the goal of the story. This is not to say stories can’t be unrealistic, I very much believe they can and SHOULD. Fantastical worlds are designed as escapism, but they should at least make sense TO THAT WORLD. If your world has laws, define and stay within them, otherwise you end up with whatever J.K Rowling did in the later Harry Potter books.
The Specialist's Hat by Kelly Link hooked me in the beginning. I enjoy cold openings that immerse you in some sort of mystery straight away. However, as soon as Link started providing paragraphs of exposition, the book lost me. I think showing, not telling, in any sort of story is what can either make or break it. I wish rather than telling the reader that Claire and Samantha prefer to play inside, she would show us somehow. Showing and not telling in a book is much harder to do than on the screen, but it's not impossible. An abundance of information at the beginning of any story is a surefire way to lose your audience. Why should we care? We barely know these characters, surely we are going to forget that Charles Cheatham Rash ran away to sea when he was thirteen. There's also no implication of that information being relevant to the story whatsoever. There is just *too* much exposition in this story, and not enough story, in my opinion. After a long information-dump, Link proceeds to explain to the reader why Claire and Samantha have a babysitter, rather than showing them. I will say I did enjoy Link's take on "night time logic". I might also just not be fully comprehending the story, and maybe Link intentionally explains to the reader all of the backstory stuff. All in all, I'm not totally sure how I felt about it.
I really liked how in the NPR interview Kelly placed an emphasis in her inspiration from living in a town where the population comes and goes. I come from a town similar (with tourists instead of students) and it is a really unique inspiration for me to write as a town like that has unique things to offer based on what time of year it is and what the dominant population of the town is. I thought it was cool how that became such a big inspiration for part of her book since it's not one of those things that we think about often, since its completely normal to everyone who lives there. I also really resonated with how she grew up always reading books and always interested in them because of her parents always reading them to her. It makes me curious if that kind of behavior from a parent psychologically shapes kids in such a way to enjoy reading and actively seek it out as they grow up. I also thought it was cool how in the Monster Librarian interview she explains how she was a "weird" kid in many ways growing up, but as readers we can see how she turned it from being a negative into a positive by using her weirdness and creativity into really unique books and stories. It's like you can tell as a reader that she definitely is the type to have a boa constrictor as a child and wear it "as a belt." I think she's a really cool person and you can see that reflected in her writing.
I find the style of Kelly Link’s work fascinating. I enjoy how each word feels intentionally place and adds a sense of mystery that you can’t seem to place. How seemingly a single word can have two different meanings in a story evokes an emotion that is a mix of fear and wonder. The ability to elevate these mysteries in the cracks is impressive. Her dreamlike sense of reality in writing also invokes a sense of both fear and mystery. You feel as naked as the main character does, you do not know anything like the main character does, you feel vulnerable. I love stories that reach out of the page and point at the reader themselves, bringing the reader personally somehow into the pages. A sense of normalcy in the mystery adds many details in one burst, then when a character doesn't know or thinks this isn't normal. Watching characters do unnatural things like it's their daily commute tells you details about the person, the action, the society as a whole, and in the end makes the reader or the MC feel like the out-of-place one for being “normal”. This technique is hard to wield, but I find that Kelly Link uses it masterfully. It’s the tiniest of details that add the hint of horror that makes the scene scary. Giant monsters can only be so scary in paper, but it's the seeing a bunny eat a crab normally that makes you question what you just read and adds the spark of horror to really get the reader really scared.
The idea of a writers silent partner is really interesting, mostly because it makes a weird amount of sense. Especially with the way many writers seem to find themselves straying from their original plot or outline. Many describe it as the story writing themselves or the characters truly coming to life on the page. I wonder if it's just this silent partner/subconscious coming through onto the page. Kelly Link's work almost feels like it was written by the subconscious. It feels like a dream in ways.
After engaging with Kelly Link’s work across interviews, commentary, and her short fiction, what stands out most is her total commitment to exploring the strange edges of storytelling—those liminal spaces between waking and dreaming, realism and the surreal. In both the Monster Librarian and NPR interviews, she emphasizes a concept she calls “night time logic,” which feels like the core of her narrative philosophy. It’s not just about weirdness for weirdness’ sake—it’s about capturing emotional truths in ways that traditional realism can’t always reach. Her stories feel like lucid dreams: you don’t always understand them logically, but they resonate deeply.
That idea comes to life in The Specialist’s Hat, a story that perfectly embodies Link’s genre-defying voice. It’s eerie, quiet, and deeply unsettling, not just because of what’s happening, but because of the way she denies the reader firm footing. The twins at the heart of the story drift through a gothic house filled with grief, ghosts, and language that doubles back on itself. It’s horror, but it’s also a meditation on loss, childhood, and storytelling itself.
What’s powerful across all these texts is how Link treats readers with respect—especially younger ones. She never talks down to her audience. She trusts them to follow her into the weird and unexpected, and in doing so, she carves out a space where magic, death, and emotional resonance can coexist. Link’s work is a reminder that stories don’t have to follow the rules to be meaningful—they just have to be true in their own strange way
I totally agree with you about The Specialist—at first, I was unsure too, but by the end, I was totally hooked. Kelly Link has this way of pulling you into her world where nothing fully makes sense, yet it all feels incredibly real in its own strange way. That "night time logic" really clicked for me too, especially after reading her interviews and reflecting on the idea that things don’t have to make logical sense to feel emotionally true. It’s like the story is operating on its own dream-like wavelength, and you just have to go along with it.
I love the idea of tracking your personal tropes like Link suggests in The Weirdest Story Ideas. It's something I never considered, but it’s such a cool way to build on your own interests and habits as a reader or writer. Plus, it helps you dig into the elements that really resonate with you, which I think can shape the stories you create.
As for mixing genres, the possibilities are endless. I find it really exciting to imagine how fantasy and horror can merge, or how sci-fi and fantasy can intersect. There’s something powerful in combining the tension of one genre with the other’s expansive world-building. It challenges the boundaries of traditional storytelling, pushing what we think a genre should be. That whole balance between respecting established tropes and pushing the limits of them is such an interesting concept. It’s like a creative tightrope walk between staying familiar and breaking new ground.
Definitely makes me want to explore more genre-blending stories and experiment with it myself
I totally vibe with your take on fictional realism and how Kelly Link’s "dream logic" concept brings stories into a grounded space, even when the supernatural elements are at play. It’s so true that when fantasy or magical realism is written with that internal logic, the emotional truth of the story becomes what draws you in, even if you don’t fully understand the mechanics of the world. The Radleys is such a great example of this! The way the story keeps you rooted in the family’s struggles, despite their vampire identities, makes the supernatural element almost secondary to the human connections and emotional growth. Like you said, it’s that strong emotional reality that keeps the reader connected, even when the world is a bit strange.
I also agree with what Link says about embracing genres that you’re drawn to, even if they’re not always “respectable” or expected. There’s something refreshing in her willingness to mix things like romance and fantasy or horror. The boundaries between genres don’t have to be so rigid. When genres blend, it feels like you’re creating something new—something that breathes life into both genres. Fantasy and romance can create stories that feel timeless and immersive, and I think it’s a great way to challenge the assumptions people have about what’s supposed to belong in each genre.
Your point about embracing all genres equally is spot on too. The stigma around certain genres being “less mature” is definitely limiting, both for readers and writers. Every genre has its own unique power, and by letting writers feel free to explore without judgment, we open up so many more possibilities for storytelling
(Destroyer of Worlds)
Kelly Link, from her interviews, has made it clear that one of her most successful and used techniques is to draw on ideas from her own life. That is, she has found great success in incorporating vivid memories from her past into her writing. It is difficult to discern what exactly from reality is the inspiration for the Specialist's Hat, but it is clear that Kelly Link is very intimate with the world she is writing in.
I had a mixed reaction to this story because of that. Because the story was very unique, and not something I could easily wrap my head around at the beginning, it was truthfully difficult for me to really engage with it. I think this made some sense, because Link said in her interviews that she liked to work with the outermost ends of a narrative, where things are technically real but they really don't feel like it. Because it had this dreamlike quality, I had to reorient myself to its world in a way that I don't think I would have had to do with another story.
However, this did cause a different kind of appreciation for the story in the end. Even if I personally had trouble engaging with it at the start (just in the sense of really getting into the house and in the minds of the children/family), it didn't really feel similar to anything that I'd read before. I am also thrilled when that happens to me, and that caused me to keep reading. I guess overall that this is a testament to how successful stories can be when an author finds their own unique voice and isn't afraid to show it.
I was really interested in Kelly Link’s writing process. Personally, it can be very hard to stick to writing, whether it's for fun or for an assignment. Even if I go into an idea excited, if the environment is not *just* right, I’ll tab out and find a rabbit hole to waste hours in. It’s nice to know that a published author has similar struggles.
The background noise and environment is something every author has a different preference over. I don’t like sitting in cafes specifically, the sound of coffee machines drives me crazy, but I do like sitting in an area with other people. There’s this term called body doubling, it's a tactic used by ADHD and autistic people to help keep them focused on a task. You work alongside another person on separate tasks, maybe with the occasional check-in to make sure you’re still focused and not distracted. The presence of someone else sort of kicks your brain into gear and helps you complete the task. I wonder if writers who prefer cafes or other public spaces are subconsciously (or consciously) utilizing this tactic to keep them writing.
She also mentions going over and constantly revising her work before starting anything new. You can definitely see it in her work. Every word feels intentional, meticulously crafted, purposeful to the greater narrative. It adds to such a unique voice informed by her experiences and passions (especially the horror angle). But she does mention this practice is better for short stories compared to novels, which makes sense. I can only image going over 100+ pages every time you want to continue writing.
I really dig the whole premise of night-time logic. It isn't based off what makes sense at any given time, but simply feels true. Like how those kids just knew their guardian was dead without ever showing it happen. It just feels true. However, I feel like it has some flaws that don’t lend themselves very well to longform storytelling. It’s a powerful tool for creating mood and ambiguity, but I think over a longer narrative, readers may start wanting clarity or resolution. When reading a series, it's okay to leave the readers with questions, but I feel that night-time logic might just make everything feel too trippy and confusing after a little while. I think this type of storytelling is perfectly suited to short fiction, especially stories that resemble Grimm’s fairy tales or folk tales. It works well when you're aiming for something surreal, uncanny, or emotionally symbolic rather than literal. It also reminds me a lot of creepypastas or urban legends. Stories that aren’t always polished or logical but leave you with a lingering sense of unease. They’re often short, strange, and memorable. Just like Kelly Link's short story we just read. I think that Link's approach resembles a far older tradition of storytelling. It's one that values emotional truth over any narrative sense. I probably wouldn't want every story I read to operate on this logic, I think it would make for really good bite-sized stories that I would love to check out. I'm definitely going to go check out Kelly Link's stories after this!
^ This was Pondcsum (mohin) btw, I'm going to post again with my name
I really dig the whole premise of night-time logic. It isn't based off what makes sense at any given time, but simply feels true. Like how those kids just knew their guardian was dead without ever showing it happen. It just feels true. However, I feel like it has some flaws that don’t lend themselves very well to longform storytelling. It’s a powerful tool for creating mood and ambiguity, but I think over a longer narrative, readers may start wanting clarity or resolution. When reading a series, it's okay to leave the readers with questions, but I feel that night-time logic might just make everything feel too trippy and confusing after a little while. I think this type of storytelling is perfectly suited to short fiction, especially stories that resemble Grimm’s fairy tales or folk tales. It works well when you're aiming for something surreal, uncanny, or emotionally symbolic rather than literal. It also reminds me a lot of creepypastas or urban legends. Stories that aren’t always polished or logical but leave you with a lingering sense of unease. They’re often short, strange, and memorable. Just like Kelly Link's short story we just read. I think that Link's approach resembles a far older tradition of storytelling. It's one that values emotional truth over any narrative sense. I probably wouldn't want every story I read to operate on this logic, I think it would make for really good bite-sized stories that I would love to check out. I'm definitely going to go check out Kelly Link's stories after this!
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