Caroline Casper is a freelance writer of short fiction and nonfiction who also works as Head of Content for an academic digital magazine called Hippo Reads. She holds an MA in journalism and is currently working towards an MFA in creative writing at the University of San Francisco. She is also working on a collection of short stories focusing on real women on issues of truth and authenticity, and women’s complicated relationships with loss, ageing, and objectification. She lives in San Francisco with her husband. Literary Roadhouse reached out to this up and coming writer to ask what motivates and inspires her.

Literary Roadhouse: Why do you write short stories?
Caroline Casper: I think I’m drawn to short stories because of my background in journalism—where the training forces you to tell a riveting story in a short amount of space. I also really like the creative process of short story writing…how themes develop from subconscious threads and connections you may not set out or “intend” to create. It seems to me that short stories allow room to meander and experiment with form, even if that experimentation is just an exercise. Sometimes I find it easier to find creativity in confinement of space.

Literary Roadhouse: Who are your favourite short story authors?
Caroline Casper: My favorite short story authors are Alice Munro, because she’s brilliant and I think her stories manage to mimic the complexities of humanity like no others—there’s so much happening off the page or below the surface—and she’s always doing fascinating things with plot; and Junot Diaz, whose short stories are fabulous. Lorrie Moore is also brilliant and always makes me laugh.

“Eminence,” her first short story, was published in Carve Magazine in 2013 and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. “Eminence” also won first place in the 2014 Story South Million Writers Award, as selected by a panel of judges.