http://therumpus.net/2014/01/the-rumpus-interview-with-mary-miller-2/

Rumpus: You know, it occurs to me that we talk a lot about how we know a story works (which I still don’t understand). How do you know a story doesn’t work? Or, maybe more interesting, how do you know a story won’t work, even with more revision? Miller: This is a great question. And I don’t have an easy answer for it. A story works when there’s momentum, life behind the words. Some stories have this and others don’t, and it’s difficult to say why this is. If all stories “worked,” though, writing wouldn’t be much of a challenge; it wouldn’t be art. There are many stories I’ve wanted to write that I’m simply not able to—sometimes I haven’t found the way in yet, and it doesn’t matter how hard I try. Sometimes the way comes later, when I’m not working or thinking about it at all. When stories don’t work, you try to convince yourself that all of that time and energy wasn’t wasted, that it will make you a better writer, if nothing else. There’s definitely a magical quality to writing that can’t be explained. I can write something I love in two days, or I can work on a story every day for months and it never comes together. I think there simply comes a point at which you’re beating your head against the wall with revision, when you’re making something different but not better. For me, revision usually has more to do with making the language prettier, finding clearer images, using more active verbs. Perhaps adding a line or two of dialogue to try to better capture an emotion. But I’ve found that if the story isn’t there in the beginning, right from the start, I generally can’t beat it into shape no matter how much rewriting I do. // After that, I edited it many, many times. Even though it’s short (around 65,000 words), that’s still a whole lot of words for someone used to writing 3,000 word stories. Making all of those words work together is difficult. It took a lot of cleaning up, a lot of rewriting scenes in order to make them more vivid. I used everything—every oddity I’ve ever seen on the side of the road, every interesting memory I could make relevant. I can’t remember who said it—I think it was Allan Gurganus when he was visiting the Michener Center—but he told us to “spend [our] gold,” meaning, put everything you have into a story. Other “gold” will be waiting for you for your next project. // Rumpus: Let’s take the car accident, since that’s not really a spoiler. A man dies in a car accident early in the book, and the narrator’s family witnesses it. What did you adjust, do you remember? Miller: I knew that I wanted the father to go to these people, to be a kind of hero in the situation—this was an opportunity for him to show his authority, as well as put his beliefs into action. I also knew that I wanted Jess to play an integral role; she’s much more active than her sister or mother, who just stand there waiting for the paramedics to arrive. Like her father, Jess becomes a part of the event. She isn’t content to be a witness, as she is in so much of her life. In early drafts, Jess didn’t put her fingers on the dead man’s neck, feeling for a pulse. But I wanted her to do something, put herself in the scene. It’s a small way for her to feel in control of an uncontrollable situation, much like her life. // This is interesting about mood causing plot, and I think that’s certainly the case for the girls. They’re bored and worried and can feel their parents’ tension, and this leads them to act in ways they wouldn’t otherwise. They’re also in new surroundings where they can imagine that they aren’t really themselves, at least not the selves they know at home. I guess I’m always working through feel—does it feel right? It’s something that’s difficult to explain but I think all writers work this way to some extent, whether we’re aware of it or not. For me, writing has little to do with thinking. I don’t want to control the narrative. I listen to the rhythm of the words and dialogue and try to give the characters the space in which to say and do what they want without intervening too much. // Miller: It’s definitely about the rhythm of the words and how they sound together, writing one sentence and then another and another and cutting something immediately if it doesn’t feel true. I come from a family of musicians and—while I have no musical abilities of my own—I think I inherited a good ear. It’s also obsessiveness. I’ll spend a lot of time working on a single sentence, debating over a dash or a colon, etc. I want things to be perfect. I know nothing will ever be as perfect as I want it, and this is very sad, but sometimes I can get close. // Miller: I try to think as little as possible, at least while working. I look at some of my early stories and can see the machination behind them, like a gear slowly moving. For example, sticking a dead father into the story to explain a character’s sadness and bad decisions, or trying to impress myself with my own cleverness. You don’t need a dead father to explain a character’s sadness. And impressing yourself with wit/cleverness often feels like what it is—authorial intrusion. // Anyhow, this is beside the point. I think training your instinct comes from writing and reading. There’s no big secret. And reading slush helps, as well; I’d recommend everyone edit a literary magazine at some point. It’s time-consuming, but there’s a lot to learn from other writers who are also learning. The patterns (twelve stories about whales in this batch?) are also interesting. // I’ve learned a lot about language from reading slush. You can immediately tell if a writer is in control of the narrative. This writer will avoid using too many words like “possibly,” “probably,” “maybe,” “perhaps,” etc. He/she will avoid using clichés, as well as a lot of metaphors, and won’t take four sentences to say what they could in one (or write a great sentence and follow it up with a bunch of stuff that just weakens it). //