“Kelly Link’s Mastery in ‘White Cat, Black Dog’ Takes on a New Form” - shondaland
Published: Mar 31, 2023Inspired by traditional lore and fairy tales, Link’s latest short story collection will surely transport readers to new realms.
In 2018, when Kelly Link was given a grant from the MacArthur Foundation, commonly referred to as a genius grant, she was shocked. “They drop it on you like a hammer,” she says. “It’s not something that you apply for. It’s not something that you even know about until they’ve made the decision.” But the grant, given to Link for “pushing the boundaries of literary fiction in works that combine the surreal and fantastical with the concerns and emotional realism of contemporary life,” gave Link the time she needed to focus on her work. “It bought me a lot of time,” she says. “It literally bought me a lot of time in which I could do that work at a more sustainable pace.”
Earlier this month, Link released her latest collection, White Cat, Black Dog, made up of seven hefty short stories, each of which is based on a fairy tale. An aging businessman sends his three sons on three quests, which backfire for everyone involved. A New Yorker loses his husband to the husband’s former fiancée and has to go searching for him in the depths of hell. A group of people do their best to survive in a post-technological world haunted by vicious creatures. Link’s stories are always equally uncanny and relevant, and this collection is no exception.
Link, who’s also the author of Stranger Things Happen, Magic for Beginners, and Pretty Monsters (all short story collections), is also releasing her first novel next year. She also owns a bookstore called Book Moon with her husband, editor Gavin Grant, as well as the small publishing house Small Beer Press.
Shondaland talked with Link about engaging with the patterns of stories that we know, her work as a bookseller and editor, and how writing can sometimes just be … miserable.
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