Q&A: Chelsea Leigh Horne

Contributor Spotlight: Chelsea Leigh Horne and the Art of the Lovable Jerk

by Angela Pupino
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From Severus Snape to Walter White to The Hunger Games’ Haymitch, literature and pop culture are full of jerks. Despite, and sometimes because of, their misdeeds these jerks often become memorable and beloved characters. In Chelsea Leigh Horne’s short story “The Heartbreaking Misfortunes of a Nearly Genuine Almost Casanova,” readers are introduced to a more common kind of jerk— the twentysomething man desperately in search of love.
Daniel does some some pretty jerkish things throughout the story: inviting a girl over in hopes of seducing her, calling Chloe a slut, and modelling his “Casanova” behavior after men like Humphrey Bogart. But by the end of the story, I couldn’t help but feel a little bit bad for Daniel. There is something charming about his oblivious attempts at developing a formula to attract women and failure to understand when and where he went wrong.

I recently sat down with Chelsea Leigh Horne in her office at American University to discuss getting inside the head a male character, balancing humor and realism, and the art of making a familiar jerk lovable.

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Grace in Darkness is an a collection of short stories by DC-based women writers. In “The Heartbreaking Misfortunes of a Nearly Genuine Almost Casanova,” you chose to get inside a young man’s head and tell the story from his point of view. What inspired you to tell this story and submit it to this collection?
This felt like a good fit because it touches on of the aspect of the darkness inside of us and how we come out of it. The typical writer thing to say is that you don’t choose your narrator, they choose you. This early-mid to late twenties kid spoke to me in terms of the ways that men sometimes think they understand— but don’t really understand— women and the sometimes serious, sometimes hilariously awkward situations and misunderstandings that may ensue. As a female author coming in and writing as a male narrator, I wanted to play around with this trope that men have trouble writing realistic female characters and so, I approached the story applying reverse, really emphasizing some of Daniel’s traits. But just as we may laugh at him and his bumbling cluelessness, I hope that readers can feel for him too because after all, he wants the same thing that most of us want: to connect with and love someone and for that person to feel the same way back. In fact, I’ve encountered lots of people like him and I actually pulled bits and pieces of his character from lots of different people I’ve met. So I just rolled them into this conglomerate of characteristics that ends up looking a lot like Daniel. At the same time I wanted to make him charming, so that you understand where he’s coming from and don’t dismiss him outright. I hoped to make him lovable at the same time as completely clueless and just slightly odious. The key though is that by the end, it looks like Daniel has a moment of realization and may transform.

There are definitely young men out there who use the same (hilarious) tactics as Daniel to try to get women. I think I’ve also gone on dates with a few of them. How do you find balance between humor and realism in your writing?
I have some really awkward Google searches! The stuff that he Googled in the magazines are direct titles of search results I found on Google. The realism part is easy because you pull from real life, pick the things that are specific and focused, and exaggerate them for the purpose of telling your story. I like humor a lot as a mode of communication because I think it emphasizes key points, key aspects, and key characteristics of a story. Not only does humor help with pacing in a story, it is a great way to enter and explore a larger conversation. And in real life, humor is also a way that we simultaneously deflect and address very serious issues.

What was the hardest thing about writing this story?
The hardest thing, and also the easiest thing, was making Daniel lovable. Because that’s a quality I believe is important in all characters; it helps make characters more human, and more understandable. I needed to keep a balance between having someone that we can laugh at and make fun of, but still feel for. The narrator in this story is not a terrible person, he just completely misunderstands women and the world. He thinks the right way is to follow in the footsteps of the men he sees on the screen. At the end of the day, he just wants to be the best that he can. That’s something I think we can all relate to.

You’ve traveled to over 20 countries around the world! What countries do you most want to return to?
I’ve had fantastic experiences everywhere, so it’s really hard to choose! I do find myself going back to England and Ireland because those are the places that have the most draw to me in terms of the literature and history that I focus on in my scholarly and creative research. Every country has something amazing about it, so I keep trying to go to new places as well to discover more.

You are currently teaching a first-year writing seminar at American University on Dystopian Media. How do you balance your writing with your job and other obligations?
It’s hard, it’s a challenge. But when you love what you’re doing you find the time to make it work. It’s really about focus and determination. You have to pick at least a few days a week to sit down and write. Even if you’re stuck, that space and ritual of sitting down physically and grappling with the writing process is important.

What are you writing now?
I’m working on a few projects. I have two academic papers I’m writing for conference presentations later this year. My ongoing project right now is a young adult novel. It’s dystopian fiction where our young female protagonist fights to save her city from an environmental disaster crisis. Plus, there’s parkour!