“In The House of Nice People” by Alex Mattingly appeared in Issue 43 and can be found here.
We’d love to hear more about this story.
This story began as a craft exercise. I don’t like to outline very much, but I got in a rut where the stories I wrote were coming out really aimless and bloated. I decided that instead of planning each scene and beat of the story, I would try to get away with as minimal an outline as possible. At the top of the page, I noted things like the internal and external conflicts, what the narrator wanted, how the narrator would change, and let those basic building blocks structure the piece. It turned out to work pretty well—the scant details meant I could still be surprised by the story, which is always the real joy of writing, but there was just enough sketched out that the piece kept up its momentum. I learned a lot by writing this story, and I’m very glad for this chance to share it.
What was the most difficult part of this particular piece?
In early drafts, there were a lot more flashbacks that showed the two brothers growing up together. All that background felt necessary to heighten the conflict, and yet it seemed to drag everything down. They were hard scenes to cut, because at the time they felt crucial, but the story works much better without them.
Recommend a book for us which was published within the last decade.
I loved J. David Osborne’s short novel Black Gum, which I devoured in a single sitting. Nobody writes like he does. It was one of those books where I kept screenshotting passages to send to my friends. I also loved Leigh Stein’s Self Care, which I also read in a day. It’s one of the smartest, funniest books I’ve read in a very long time. Unlikable characters are my favorite people to read about.
If you could have a drink with any living author, who would it be? Why?
Tim Waggoner, whose blog Writing in the Dark has probably saved my life. I love his perspective, both on the nuts and bolts of writing and on the larger question of making a creative life meaningful. I would love to buy him a beer and just listen to him talk about his life and career and his thoughts about writing.
What are you working on now? What’s next?
I’ve got a novel out on submission, and another one under revision. I love writing short fiction, but there’s something really wonderful about spending weeks and months immersed in a novel. I feel very lucky that I get to do it.
Our thanks to Alex for taking the time to answer a few questions and share this story. Read “In The House of Nice People” here.
Alex Mattingly has published fiction and nonfiction in places like PANK, 3:AM, Annalemma, Midwestern Gothic, Joyland, North American Review, Moon City Review, Litro, BULL, Punchnel’s, and many others. He earned his MFA at Butler University in Indianapolis and served as consulting editor on Playing Authors: An Anthology, published by Old Iron Press.