Max Delsohn is a writer who grew up in Thousand Oaks, CA, and spent ten years in Seattle, WA. His debut short story collection, Crawl, will be published by Graywolf Press in October 2025. His work appears in or is forthcoming from McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, The Rumpus, VICE, Joyland, and the Graywolf Press essay anthology Critical Hits: Writers Playing Video Games, edited by Carmen Maria Machado and J. Robert Lennon. He’s received fellowships and residencies from the Constance Saltonstall Foundation for the Arts, Hugo House, and the Mineral School. He earned his MFA in fiction from Syracuse University. He also used to work as a stand-up comedian and was featured at 10,000 Laughs, Second City’s Break Out Comedy Festival, 208 Comedy Festival, Out of Bounds Comedy Festival, and Intersections Festival. @maxdelsohn

Where were you born and raised? How did it influence your writing and your thinking about the world?
I grew up in Thousand Oaks, California. It's a suburb an hour-ish north of Los Angeles. I was the oldest of three sisters; we were all girls then. You couldn't even say we were Valley Girls because Thousand Oaks is actually farther north than that. Growing up in Thousand Oaks, conventional femininity was rewarded, especially at the all-girls Catholic school I attended for grades 7-12. I was one of the few Jewish kids at the school and that combined with my inherent masculinity limited my prospects socially. I wasn't pretty at all but I was funny and relatively observant for my age, so I was able to charm my way into friendships even though I had a frizzy triangle of hair and insisted on wearing the uniform pants every day (never the skirt, except for when they forced us to, on Mass Days). I won Winter Formal Princess during my senior year but I'm still not sure if it was meant to be a joke or not. All this to say, growing up in Thousand Oaks prompted me to become an entertainer, and I think that does show up in my writing quite a bit--every sentence has to be seductive, beautiful, musical, something. It's the best way I know how to hold your attention.

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 as a kid. My dad writes nonfiction books about sports, so it was important to him to read to all three of us at night when we were little. We were never wanting for books in our house. It's hard for me to remember specifics from when I was really, really young but I know he read the first Harry Potter book to me, and maybe the second one, then at some point I started reading them myself. I used to brag about how many times I had read each Harry Potter book. There were some YA books beyond Harry Potter that made a big impression, too: The Book Thief, the Maximum Ride series, basically anything by Meg Cabot, Looking for Alaska, Hoot, The Perks of Being a Wallflower.

Describe your typical writing day.
Ideally I write in the mornings with a cup of coffee. I'm not an outliner. I wish I was--I've tried to outline both stories and novels before and it somehow always ruins it before it's begun. Stories have to remain almost totally mysterious to me until the very end, but I've been surprised that I've needed to take a similarly ignorant approach to novels. It's scary to write without a blueprint, but I can't figure out how to do it any other way. That said, I don't write every day, or at least not in a concentrated, at-the-desk type way--I often write down scraps of scenes or ideas in a notebook or my planner--and I do find for the novel I've needed to spend a lot of time consciously thinking about the book and, like, its broader themes and political implications, abstract stuff like that. With stories, I try not to think about them except for when I am sitting down and working on them. I think it helps me keep the prose alive and urgent, especially sensitive.

Tell us about the creative process behind your most well-known work or your current writing project.
My debut story collection, CRAWL (out from Graywolf Press 10.21.2025!), began with the titular story, which is also the first story in the book. I wrote it because I had just moved away from Seattle after ten years and I really missed it. The other earliest stories I wrote for the collection came from this place of just wanting to put myself back in Seattle somehow, at the bars and other public spaces I really loved. I decided to keep writing about Seattle, because I felt like I also wanted to explore the disappointment and frustration I felt after I came out as trans, about halfway through my time there; all the ways the city and its dominant culture tries to brand itself as this gay utopia but in reality is more often this neoliberal nightmare that's terrible for its most marginalized residents. I felt like I kept encountering all these barriers to authentic connection, real community, having fun when I went out on the weekends, but also just being treated with basic dignity as a transsexual. The stories are ordered in such a way to reflect this arc of disillusionment.

Do you keep a journal or notebook? If so, what’s in it?
I have a planner that I use religiously and carry with me everywhere, even around the house. I have to make lists constantly because I am shit at focusing/getting things done. I also have a notebook which is just for writing ideas or doodling--purely creative stuff, nothing about my schedule. Sometimes I'll write notes for the novel down in my planner in a pinch, but I prefer to keep those mindsets separate. I do occasionally write chunks of novels and stories longhand in the notebook then transfer them over later, but usually I do most of my writing on my laptop.

How do you research and what role does research play in your writing? I have gotten really into researching with the novel I'm working on now. I like to research associatively and keep it as joyful as possible. It's always an exercise in honoring my own interest and desire. Sometimes that means getting a bunch of random books from the library, sometimes it's an Internet rabbit hole. A lot of films, especially older films. If I'm going to write about something in a fictional context, I need to appreciate the conversation I am entering into--like for the novel I'm working on, it mostly takes place at an orgy, so I've been having a lot of fun reading all these different texts about the history of the orgy, reading literature and watching movies that depict orgies, etc.

Which writer, living or dead, would you most like to have dinner with? Wow, I have to only pick one?! First thought, best thought: Kafka. Maybe a common answer, but I just wish I could talk to him about writing, how he thought about it. I read his diaries and his stories over and over, just trying to figure out how his brain worked.

Do you draw inspiration from music, art, or other disciplines?
I find a lot of different kinds of art inspiring: movies, TV, sculpture, paintings, music. The last story in the collection is directly inspired by David Lynch's FIRE WALK WITH ME. Music is a big one too. CRAWL is suffused with music throughout, in part because I do think of a great story collection a little bit like a record. The songs together don't tell one continuous story, lyrically or musically, but they still work together as a whole. I also think that writing short stories is the closest I can get to making music, which I wish I could do so badly. I want my stories to work like music. I really agonize over making each sentence sing.

AI and technology are 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? I don't feel worried about AI. It's hard to imagine AI eclipsing literary fiction, at least. Like, yeah, it might be a problem for Marvel movies. But I just can't imagine people running to AI literary fiction for basically any reason.

Tell us about some books you've recently enjoyed and your favorite books and writers of all time.
If I had to identify one book that is the most important to my formation as a writer, it would be Birds of America by Lorrie Moore. When I forget why I even like writing or books in the first place, that is where I go. Right now I'm reading Bibliophobia by Sarah Chihaya and loving it. The prose is just perfect. It's thrilling to read every sentence when the prose is this excellent.

The Importance of Arts, Culture & The Creative Process
I am obsessed with learning about the creative processes of other artists. So much of what we do as artists is mysterious--and its important to honor and protect the mysterious parts of creation!--but I get easily discouraged and overwhelmed sometimes when I think about the prospect of filling up a blank page with actual literature. Like, who do I think I am, trying to turn this blank page into LITERATURE? There's enormous comfort and encouragement that comes from hearing other artists struggle through the act of creation. I think my favorite literary fiction successfully depicts consciousness itself--that's part of what I come to literature for, a new way of thinking about, perceiving the world--so it makes sense to me that hearing about a writer's process of creating that fiction would be just as interesting.

Interviewed by Mia Funk