Caroline Kim, "Bread of Lifers"

It’s December 1. To officially kick off the 2022 Short Story Advent Calendar, here is a story about faith and carbs from the author of The Prince of Mournful Thoughts.

How would you describe your story?

CAROLINE KIM: A pissed-off Korean American teenager offers her version of tough love to the girl she babysits next door, whose family belong to a cult-like religion called the Bread of Life.

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

CK: I probably wrote the first couple of pages a few years ago during one of my bouts of starting a new story every day. I do this when I’m not working on anything in particular, just as a form of play. Keeping it to 500 words or so, I try out a variety of voices and characters, styles, structures, attitudes, time periods, whatever comes to mind. Eventually, I hit on something that feels urgent and I’ll focus on that.

I wrote the first half of this story in a few days and then hit a dead wall. A year later I found it when I was looking for something else. It took another few days of frantic writing to finish it. Then drafts of minor changes. So the bulk of the writing took about a week but separated by a year. Many stories come this way, in chunks with months, sometimes years, in between. Like with so much else in my life, I seem to need a lot of distance in order to see ahead.

What kind of research went into this story?

CK: None, really. I just let my mind range all over my childhood and use whatever it alighted on. I tapped into some feelings I had at the time that maybe my parents had put one over on me by moving me to America when I was too young to have a say and then telling me it was all for me. Also, when I was a kid I did have neighbors who were Jehovah Witnesses, and I did babysit for them once, but unfortunately they weren’t strange at all. I also had a poster of Prince on my wall. Did I kiss it? God, I don’t know. Probably.

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

CK: With a great short story, the initial contact is brief but its impact powerful and permanent. And in the urgency inherent in its brevity you can feel the melancholy ticking of time.

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

CK: My teenager daughter designed my website: carolinekim.net. Very grateful for her excellent eye!

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

CK: A beagle that came into my life at just the right time.

Babysitting coupons my daughters, seven and five at the time, gave me when their baby brother was born. What a lucky kid having two older sisters looking out for him.

A writing shed my husband got me for Christmas the first year of the pandemic. Quite the upgrade from the bathroom where I’d been using the edge of the bathtub as a desk.

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What did you think of today's story? Use the hashtag #ssac2022 on Twitter and Instagram to check in with your fellow advent calendarians.