The story is part of a longer series of fantastical travelogues which began during traveling in Europe, and they’re based on both my own literal and emotional journeys. I was interested in exploring new ways to tell short stories, particularly fantastical tales, and I found that the “travel guide” form provided a great metaphor for the kinds of inner travels we take throughout our lives. And so these travel stories, for all their fantasy, are actually a kind of autobiography!

Around the time of 9/11, I was working my first full-time job in an information services company similar (physically, not metaphysically!) to the one I’ve depicted in the story. The political turmoil of that time was a rude awakening at a formative age; it really got me thinking about diversion points and the ways the world could (and should) be different. So the speculative conceit and the weird ambience of the story were born back then, but it took years of stewing.

I have a logical mind, almost robotically so. I like data. I like statistics. Here are some numbers courtesy of the FBI: In the United States, approximately eight out of ten violent crimes are committed by men. Eight out of ten burglaries. Eight out of ten robberies. Eight out of ten arsons. Eight out of ten physical assaults. Nine out of ten murders. Ninety-seven out of one hundred rapes. Ninety-seven out of one hundred —and those, of course, are only the rapes that are reported.

It’s rare for me to sit down and write a story from start to finish without pausing to catch a breath, but that’s how this story went. No surprises, no unexpected twists (for me, though several for the reader, I expect). This story was propelled by rage from start to finish. Like one of those moments when you are angry—so angry that every thought leads to some another thought that makes you even angrier. And I really enjoyed channeling all that anger into a character who was so cool and so much in control.

Fairy tales (the darker and more troubling, the better, I’m afraid) are always creeping in from the edges when I write. I owe a great deal to the folks who write (or write on) fairy tales and fairy tale retellings: Angela Carter, absolutely, and also Ludmilla Petrushevskaya, Helen Oyeyemi, Kate Bernheimer. I so dearly admire writing that keeps some sort of lightness or whimsy about it—in fairy tales, these are fabulist settings, mind-bending setups, the turns of phrase.