Peter Orner, "Shouting Wenkie"

It’s December 3. Peter Orner, author of Still No Word from You, is running unopposed.

How would you describe your story?

PETER ORNER: Hard to say, the insanity of what consumes a lot of our time on earth, love and politics. 

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

PO: Strange as it feels to say it, I remember exactly where I was when I started this story. It was in 2006. I was walking down the street in Oakland, California, and had this vision of an old neighbor of mine sticking a gun out of a window. So it took me, what, 17, 18 years to finish this story?

What kind of research went into this story?

PO: I may have done some horticultural research, if there even is such a thing as a flower spikelet. Otherwise, no, I just saw the gun in the window and went from there...

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

PO: Ah, I love this question, and I've spent decades trying to answer it. It comes down, for me, to how a short story distills a moment. A longer form tends to dissipate moments through sheer accumulation for better sometimes and for worse a lot more times. A story lets a moment be without larding it up with too many extra words. 

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

PO: I've got a randomly updated website, peterorner.com. Three story collections—the last one is called Maggie Brown & Others. Two novels and two essay collections, the most recent is called Still No Word from You: Notes in the Margin, which is about, among other things, my take on why the short story is so singular. 

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

PO: I'm very popular around my house at the moment because I bought my seven-year-old a trampoline. I secretly bought it for myself. 

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