We love flash fiction–which is why we love the work of Marilyn Horn-Fahey. We hope you’ll join us next Tuesday at San Jose’s St. James Park, where we’ll be producing two of Marilyn’s short pieces, “April in Paris” and “Snake,” alongside a number of local writers.

Marilyn is an LA native and a graduate of Cal State Long Beach. She now lives in Silicon Valley, where she works as a tech editor and worries about smart machines taking over the world. Her short stories have appeared in Marathon Review, Blotterature and NonBinary Review, among others, and she also presents at San Jose’s Flash Fiction Forum from time to time. When not tied to the computer, she is either sitting in traffic, cleaning up after her children, or looking for her keys.

Upcoming projects:
San Jose’s very own Thinking Ink Press will publish a collection of my short stories later in 2015.

What inspired you to participate in Play On Words?
I knew I wanted to be included in a POW performance as soon as I heard about POW from Lita Kurth. What a brilliant concept. POW is such a gift to writers. We offer you our words, and then you spin your magic and offer them back again — it’s a win-win all around!

Which writers or performers inspire you?
I’m most inspired by the writers I know. When I don’t feel like writing, or when I’m feeling scared about digging deeper into what I’m writing, I think about my writer friends, knowing that they’ve gone through the same thing and yet have kept on writing. So that spurs me on. They’ve also taught me that the writing process itself is important — offering the world your own brand of craziness and weirdness and self-doubt is extremely satisfying, and also it’s very important but I can’t say exactly why. Maybe just so others with the same craziness etc. will know they aren’t alone.

Name a performance that fundamentally affected you.
My daughter took ice skating lessons when she was 10 years old. At the end of the session she had to give a solo performance of all she’d learned. She skated out to the starting point and promptly fell on her butt. I could tell she was mortified but she kept her cool and performed her routine without a hitch. When she got off the ice she cried and was miserable but a few minutes later she found out she won first place. That day has always stayed with me, and sometimes when I’m feeling down I remember her perseverance and grace and willingness to just keep going.

This is made possible through the generosity of The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, in partnership with the San Jose Downtown Association.