Hadley Moore Interviewed by Deborah Kalb

We are loving this new interview with short story writer Hadley Moore. This exchange completely captures Hadley’s sharp wit and sly humor. A huge thanks to Deborah for her insightful questions.

Below we included one of our favorite quotes from the interview, but we hope you’ll read the entire piece here.

Q: Do you see common themes running through your work?

A: Well, existential dread! And gallows humor.

I don’t write autobiographically (not a stance, just a statement), but I can see my obsessions coming out in my work. Broadly, these include death and loss, and the terror that comes from confronting (or not confronting) those; race; family; voice and who gets to speak; secrets and why they’re kept; and bizarre or idiosyncratic religiosity.

Also, there is something about names and naming in many of these stories—who is named at all, or by whom, and how.