Jennifer Savran Kelly lives in upstate New York, where she writes, binds books, and works as a production editor at Cornell University Press. Her debut novel Endpapers (Algonquin, 2023) was a finalist for a 2024 Lambda Literary Award and was a fall/winter 2023 Indies Introduce pick. It won a grant from the Barbara Deming Memorial Foundation and was selected as a finalist for the SFWP Literary Awards Program and the James Jones First Novel Fellowship. Her short work has been published in Potomac Review, Black Warrior Review, Trampset, Green Mountains Review, and elsewhere. @savranly
Where were you born and raised? How did it influence your writing and your thinking about the world? I was born and raised on Long Island in New York. My family moved around the island quite a bit, so I'm always interested in the idea of home. Is it a place or a feeling? Can it be lost or taken away? Undermined? Or is it something we make for ourselves? In my writing, I think this translates to the idea of foundational beliefs. I like to explore what happens when the foundational beliefs of my characters are shaken. Do they fold with the debris or rise from it changed, for better or worse?
What kind of reader were you as a child? What books made you fall in love with reading as a child? I read a ton and gravitated toward realistic fiction that helped me make sense of the challenges and triumphs of being a kid, and a girl, especially anything by Judy Blume. The Sweet Valley High series became an obsession, to the point where my nana put a cap on her purchasing: no more than two books at a time during my weekend visits, even though I could—and longed to—read more than two. I also loved the V.C. Andrews books and, like many Gen X girls, was drawn into the dark, mysterious world they granted us access to.
Describe your typical writing day. I usually wake by 6:00 a.m. and log into Bluesky to say hello to my #5amWritersClub buddies. Then I write for an hour or two, taking short breaks to feed and play with my cats, eat breakfast, and chat with my little family. Then I get ready for my day job. I began this practice when my son was a toddler, because it was the only time the house was quiet and I could focus. But I’ve kept it going for more than a decade because I’ve found it’s also the time of day when I can be most creative, before the demands of family, work, and life co-opt my brain. It brings me a lot of joy to sit quietly with my work as the sun comes up. I couldn’t imagine doing this any other way.
Tell us about the creative process behind your most well-known work or your current writing project. For my current writing project, I’m doing a number of things for the first time: writing from multiple perspectives, tackling a combination of two genres that I’ve never written in, and exploring themes that are further away from my own experience. I was feeling too intimidated to jump right in, so I bought myself a lovely notebook to write longhand in, instead of typing into a Word doc as I often do. Usually I use my writing notebooks informally, to take notes about characters or write scenes that are having trouble coming out on my computer.
But for my current project, my notes turned into something like a journal for my characters, where they began to tell me their stories, in their own voices, and then the novel began to take shape from there. For the first time, I wrote almost an entire draft of a novel longhand, because that was how it wanted to come out. Once I realized it was going in that direction, I bought two more notebooks, identical to the first, and I celebrated my progress by keeping every pen that ran out of ink along the way in a mug on my writing desk.
Do you keep a journal or notebook? If so, what’s in it?
I answered this a bit above, but I have a lot to say about notebooks! So here’s my longer answer:
I do the bulk of my writing on my laptop, but I always turn to my beloved notebooks when I get stuck in a draft or a revision or I want to test out an idea or I just want to play. It's probably because I grew up writing in journals — my own private place to unload my feelings and work things out. So writing by hand never carries the same kind of pressure that typing does.
In essence, my computer signals to me that it’s time to work, whereas a notebook signals it’s time to let loose.
As a nice side effect, my notebooks can be a lifesaver when I’ve been away from a project for a while and I’m not ready to dive directly into the manuscript. My notes grant me lower-stakes and quicker access back into my thought process, and they also remind me of my motivations for writing something to begin with.
I almost never outline because my brain doesn’t work that way, but often I’ll ask myself a series of questions about a work-in-progress that I don’t think I’ve answered yet, or not deeply enough. And sometimes I even make a weird chart to try to better understand the relationships between certain characters as well as their actions.
Taking the time to scrawl and revisit these kinds of notes helps me really understand what I’m trying to do with a story. And it never fails to spark a good number of new ideas — which is always amazing after who-knows-how-many revisions.
My writing notebooks are safe spaces where I can fail freely, where I never feel like I have to beautify or censor my words! My finished works deserve all the beautiful presentation they’ve been given, but I love that so much of my writing — arguably my favorite part — happens behind the scenes, for my own creativity and enjoyment, where it will most likely never be seen by anyone else.
How do you research and what role does research play in your writing? My research takes multiple forms. Sometimes it’s as simple as a photograph inspiring a character or story. Sometimes I want to know a little more about a topic I’m exploring in my work—just enough to enrich the story but not a deep dive. In that case, an Internet search does the trick. For example, I needed to know a bit about Victorian mourning customs for a few scenes in a novel, and I found everything I needed online. For my debut novel, ENDPAPERS, I had to do more in-depth research on the history of queer pulp novels and the Lavender Scare. In that case, I took a few books out of the library in addition to doing some online research. It’s easy to go down all the rabbit holes and to want to use every important thing you discover. But ultimately, I used only a fraction of what I learned in the novel itself. Still, it was important for me as the author to develop a deep understanding of these topics so that I could determine what information would be important for the characters and the story as a whole. As a fiction writer, I think the point of research is to serve the fictional world without distracting from it by jamming it full of facts.
Which writer, living or dead, would you most like to have dinner with? Jorge Luis Borges. Growing up, I wanted to be an actor, and I studied acting in a BFA program for the first year and a half of college. When I walked away from it at nineteen years old, I had to find a new path, and it was around that time that I discovered Borges. His stories were like magic to me, like nothing I’d ever read before. In a way, they woke me up and made me hungry for more literature. It would be more than a decade before I dared to write a short story of my own, but he was a huge influence. I would love to sit and listen to any stories he would tell me, true or fictional.
Do you draw inspiration from music, art, or other disciplines?
All the time. As I alluded to above, I like to take writing prompts from photographs and other works of art. Less directly, when I love a film or song or any piece of art—or when I can’t stop thinking about something even if I didn’t particularly like it—I end up musing about what made it special and then trying to apply that to my writing. On the other end of the spectrum, I used to listen to music while I wrote, but I found it to be too much of an influence, so now I write in silence.
AI and technology is changing the ways we write and receive stories. What are your reflections on AI, technology and the future of storytelling? And why is it important that humans remain at the center of the creative process?
Like all technology, AI is a tool. And whenever a powerful new tool is developed, people tend to want to apply it to everything to test the limits of what it can do. So, even though so many people and industries are jumping on the bandwagon to experiment with it, it’s going to keep evolving and I think after a while, we’ll become more discerning about its strengths and how best to use it. I admire the artists who are experimenting with AI to push their work in new directions, but I have too many concerns about the technology’s environmental impacts, and I don’t admire anyone using it to replace human artists. For one, the reasons why we appreciate art, not to mention sports and all aspects of culture, are because culture is a reflection of human experience and we’re fascinated by the heights we as humans can reach. The output of a machine that’s programmed to do what someone has trained to do for their whole life, someone who’s overcome obstacles and pushed their own boundaries, will never be a substitute for what a person can do.
Tell us about some books you've recently enjoyed and your favorite books and writers of all time.
One book I enjoyed recently is How to Capture Carbon by Cameron Walker. Writing in a genre Walker refers to as Kitchen Surrealism or the Domestic Fantastic, she takes the reader on a magical, lyrical journey through seemingly ordinary challenges of growing up and raising a family. I also recently loved A Haunting in Hialeah Gardens by Raul Palma, a funny, page-turning tale of migration, capitalism, love, family, horror, spirituality, and more. I read it in two days and only put it down because I had to go to work. Another is Red Clocks by Leni Zumas, a character- and voice-driven novel about a future in which abortion is illegal across the country and how it affects the lives of five women.
My favorite books and writers of all time include Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson, Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin, White Noise by Don DeLillo, Labyrinths by Jorge Luis Borges, To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf, and so many more I can’t think of at the moment!
The Importance of Arts, Culture & The Creative Process
Engaging with art is allowing yourself to be led on a stranger’s journey, through all its complexity. It’s turning yourself over to an experience that someone else has created for you. And ultimately, hopefully, recognizing something of yourself in it.
This is why every one of us at some point picks up a book or a favorite band’s new album or…. To know that someone else has felt something that’s always made us feel so alone, to shed light on a problem that seems to have no solution, to share another person’s joy or triumph, to join them on a grand adventure.
The whole project of art, as well as platforms like The Creative Process, is to foster connection. And if we need anything right now, it’s a way into one another’s hearts and minds. It’s a way to feel seen and heard and to see and hear other people, especially ones we’ve never met before. It’s crucial at a time when the arts are being threatened—by technology, politics, and culture wars—to see artists supporting and inspiring other artists as they do here.
Interviewed by Mia Funk
Our Man
By Jennifer Savran Kelly
For our one-year anniversary I give Amanda a photograph of the two of us in Madrid. We’ve set the table to approximate our favorite Spanish restaurant, with the blue-and-white checkered tablecloths, the tall, skinny pitchers of Sangria bursting with citrus. It’s early in the evening. She’s turned up the Flamenco music, and she’s stomping and clapping, shaking her soul loose under the living room skylight. I rise to join her, but she’s off somewhere, dancing to the coat closet, and seconds later she’s back, with something—someone—in her arms. Dancing to me, she smiles, and when the music ends, her smile breaks into laughter.
“Do you like him?”
I look at the strange object. It’s a white cylinder or, more accurately, a tall egg, tapering at the top, roughly two-thirds her size. It has a full-body photograph of a man printed on it. He’s about my father’s age. He’s happy and ordinary and unassuming in his brown braided leather belt. He’s definitely someone’s dad or granddad, some customized gift whose gag has played itself out and now for some reason is in our living room, in Amanda’s arms.
“I read online that whimsical gifts are perfect for first anniversaries,” she says. “When I ran into this guy at a garage sale, I couldn’t resist.”
“Wow,” I say, still taking him in.
“I thought you might like to photograph him.” She balances the inflatable dad in front of her and puts her arms around him, pretending to laugh at something he said like she's posing for one of those stock photos that come in picture frames. Her delight infects me. I pull out my camera and snap a few shots, adjusting the aperture as I go.
Our Man, as we now call him, lives in the kitchen. Amanda has set up a spot in front of the breakfast table where every morning she props him in a tableau for me to photograph—eating breakfast and reading the paper, wearing an apron and cleaning the table or windows, chopping vegetables. He’s wonderfully absurd doing chores with his two-dimensional arms that never move from his sides.
After a few days, I find a new, exciting addition next to Our Man: dry-erase markers. Amanda has begun to draw on him—mustaches or make-up or sometimes both. I marvel at how well she seems to know what will inspire me. I spend more and more time in the kitchen, photographing Our Man in these domestic scenes, capturing the shine of his lips and the glare on his bald spot.
When I’ve run out of ways to photograph him at home, I seek bigger and better photo opportunities, taking him out on the town, taking pictures of him at the zoo, the park, the art museum, the lake. When I break for lunch, I bring him with me into restaurants and seat him in a chair next to me, and the servers always bring him a side dish and a drink on the house. His unusual shape makes him interesting to strangers, who pet him and laugh like he’s some nice, funny animal. Everywhere we go, he draws attention, and soon I realize I can use this to my advantage.
Instead of setting up my own tableaus, I leave Our Man out by himself, with two boxes: one filled with clothing and one with markers. I wander off behind a tree or a wall and wait. It’s amazing how many people not only stop to gawk at him but also dig right in, dressing and making him up as they laugh, propping him up to look like he’s watching the lake or the animals or the art. When they leave, I get to work. It’s surprisingly intimate, photographing the work of strangers, the results of their hands on Our Man, smelling on him the traces of their shampoo or whatever they ate for lunch. I see that intimacy in every picture, all of which have gone beyond the absurd to take on a strange emotional tenor. When strangers dress Our Man, he becomes vulnerable—to their touch, to their admiration as well as their mockery. Once, after some teenagers clothe him in a dress of Amanda’s and draw full beauty make-up on him, a woman follows behind and deflates him. We’re at the water’s edge and I photograph him limp and lifeless, waves lapping at his face, threatening to drag him out to sea. When Amanda sees these photos, she cries and says maybe the project is going too far. I think she may be right, but I can’t stop. I still have too much learn.
I search thrift stores for new outfits and experiment with what clothes and props I leave out with Our Man. Nine out of ten times if I leave both men’s and women’s clothes, people choose the women’s or both. But when I leave only women’s clothes, no one touches them. I make notes. Men in women’s clothes only funny if choice.
By and large, people love Our Man. His unassuming smile, his vanilla outfit. He can be anything to them—a pal, an uncle, a man about town. There are no more acts of hate, but still Amanda worries about him. About us. She leaves notes on Our Man like, Be careful today! And, Look over both shoulders. I photograph them.
I feel close to understanding something important about Our Man. I come up with a new idea. Instead of photographing him, I take pictures of the people who dress him up, first with Our Man in the shot, and then without him, close-ups of their expressions as they examine the fruits of their labor—laughter, amusement, curiosity, and even sometimes doubt or regret, fear or shock. Our Man elicits so many feelings. He’s showing me so much about the human heart. Amanda says she has to admit these photos might be my best work yet.
But something is still missing. One morning I meditate over the photos, losing myself in Our Man’s happy gaze, in the stares of the people who’ve dressed him, in everything their eyes seem to know—or think they know—about him.
When I leave for my photo shoot, I leave Our Man behind and bring the clothes and some of Amanda’s makeup. I go to the park in a black tank top and bicycle shorts and hang a sign on my chest that says “DRESS ME.” I remain perfectly still until someone stops. At first he merely circles, like a cat sniffing, but soon he takes a careful leap. A fedora, gently placed. He assesses me, deciding if it’s right, planning what’s next. My pulse quickens at the sight of blue lipstick and eyeshadow and again at the tickle of the stranger’s hand on my lips and eyes. With every addition, I feel myself coming alive. As he clothes me in a man’s pinstripe suit with a pink, frilly apron on top, I’m grateful for the sensation of being held.
When he departs, I photograph myself, then peel off the suit and wait again.
An hour goes by before finally another person stops. With confident hands, they make for a floral sun hat to protect my head. Then slide me into baggy overalls, leaving my arms and ankles to be teased by the wind. Snap. A few minutes later someone else approaches, reads me anew: bubble-gum lipstick, blush, and pigtails. My giddiness increases. Snap. Another: plaid dress shirt and dark tie—impenetrable armor. Snap. Soon I’m submitting to a pair of strong arms enfolding me in a tight black dress ablaze with embroidered fire, allowing my feet to be steered into combat boots.
When the sun gets low in the sky, I pack up and hurry to the darkroom.
Photographs in hand, I rush home, eager to show Amanda my many faces—the ones she’s seemed to know even before I have. I find her in the living room, scanning the bookshelf and swaying to a silent rhythm. “Guess who,” I say.
Beaming, she waltzes to me, her arms an invitation. She glances at my pictures. “That’s easy,” she says.
