Kirsten Kashock - An Impossibility of Crows

In this episode, host Terry Shepherd dives into the "uneasy space" of literary horror with poet and dancer Kirsten Kashock. They discuss her unsettling new novel, An Impossibility of Crows, a story that examines the haunting boundaries of devotion, inheritance, and control.

The Horse-Sized Crow

Kirsten reveals that the book originated from a single, startling dream of a crow the size of a horse. While the image was jarring, she felt curiosity rather than fear, leading her to create a female "mad scientist" protagonist—a rarity in a genre typically dominated by male figures like Frankenstein.

Logic, Longing, and Motherhood

The conversation explores the character of Agnes, a scientist who begins the novel having lost her parents, her job, and her child. Kirsten explains how Agnes’s scientific mind attempts to "solve" her daughter Mina’s birth defect through a breeding program, inadvertently crossing the line between care and control.

Key Discussion Points:

• Generational Inheritance: How Agnes is shaped by her mother’s poetic journals and her father’s history in the Vietnam War.
• The Isolation of the Pandemic: How writing during the global lockdown informed the book's themes of solitude and scientific obsession.
• The Voice of Science: Kirsten describes the effort of developing Agnes’s scientific tone and the use of a journal format to sustain tension.
• The Art of Revision: Why Kirsten views the first draft as "vomiting the clay" and revision as the essential "sculpting" of a story.

"The things that we bury do not stay dead." 

For readers who seek the "pleasurable dread" of the dark and the unsettling, this interview offers a deep dive into the craft of a writer who isn't afraid to get "close to the bone".

Connect with Kirsten Kashock:

• Website: kirstenkashock.com 
• Latest Book: An Impossibility of Crows 

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