Q: Do you often include children in your stories? What role do they play?
A: I do often write about children, though I find I normally write from their perspective. I love to use some of the formal elements found in fairy tales in my stories, and even in darker stories, children offer decisive action and reaction that is, I hope, relatable for the reader. In this story, the daughter at the end provides a way for the mythmaking narrative to make sense and provides insight into the narrator’s understanding of his relationship with his father. My wife and I are expecting our first child, a daughter, any day, and thinking about the stories that we will tell her helped to shape the emotional arc in this story.
Evan James Sheldon’s story “There is a City, He Told Me”
in Metaphorosis Friday, 30 August 2019.
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