Kathleen Alcott, "Natural Light"

It’s December 14. Kathleen Alcott, author of America Was Hard to Find, splurged on the annual membership.

How would you describe your story?

KATHLEEN ALCOTT: It's right at the corner of tender and vicious.

When did you write it, and how did the writing process compare to your other work?

KA: I wrote it in the last gasp of a sad summer, swimming every day in a very cold river. Swimming that much made my writing stronger, I think, because the first is an exercise in reducing superfluous movement. I was better prepared to put down only what was necessary, make only the required gesture.

What kind of research went into this story?

KA: None, except my own life teaching and grieving.

What, to you, makes the short story a special form? What can it do that other kinds of writing can’t?

KA: It can solve a formal problem in one go, or dance with perfection.

Where should people go to learn more about you and your work?

KA: Google is a strange country.

What's the best gift you've ever been given?

KA: I told my friend Connie a story of how, when my mother was dying, and on a great deal of palliative medication, she said something very funny, and fairly absurd, in response to the beautiful view of cliffs and ocean where I'd taken her. "This is alright," she said, in kind of mock boredom, "but I could do with one of those saxophones that blows bubbles." After she'd died I found a photo of my infancy in which, on the mantle, was a plastic saxophone, which did just that. The friend in question surprised me, a month after I'd told her this story, with the same toy.

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