Interview with ​Kristen Reece

Meet NUNUM's Contributor: Kristen Reece

4/4/2026

NUNUM

Blending Flash Fiction & Art

Interview with Kristen Reece

What was the first book you remember picking up and reading by yourself?

The first books I remember reading were vintage Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, and Black Beauty. They were stored in my grandmother's sideboard, the clear coat on the cover was yellowed and cracking with age.

What writer(s) or which book(s) influenced your decision to become a writer?

I hadn't planned to be one; I stumbled into it later in life. While always having a deep love for literature, my writing didn't begin as a nod to specific authors. I write by ear with an instinct for compression and rhythm. I only later recognized that what I was doing aligned with flash, prose poetry , and hybrid forms.

Is there a writing craft book that you would recommend to new writers?

I don't work from craft books myself, and I tend to learn from reading widely than from manuals. I encourage writers to read what unsettles them, what shocks them, where they feel emotional resonance and attempt to reverse the engineering in a new individualized way.

Is there a writer who has influenced your current writing style?

No single writer has directly influenced my current style, though I've always been fascinated by Lorca's concept on duende—the idea that the piece carries its force through risk and feeling rather than polish. Writing comes from the world around me. From the small daily interactions, early habits like reading the back of the cereal box as a kid. I think writing is a deep pattern of recognition for some. All the words and books and experiences provide an internal book of self.

Why write flash fiction?

I initially started with poetry, and stumbled onto flash, and felt a sense of relief, understanding why my poems were such a hybrid already. There was an internal click, the dawning 'ah', that I had just been looking for more words. Flash is fascinating; I tend to be a maximalist writer, where others gravitate to pared down minimalism. Regardless of style, the most important thing to learn is compression. Does it fall apart in the back half, or is it sustainable for the reader the whole way?

What advice would you give someone who is just starting to send their work out to journals?

Never give up, It's a grind, It's not glamorous. If a journal didn't want your piece it wasn't the right place for it. Stack your law of averages, submit and submit widely. Research what that particular journal tends to publish but also consider that perhaps they are looking for something new. Expect rejection, and often. Don't take it as a measure of your work; often it's a measure of taste, the journal theme for the issue, or possibly even a very tired first reader. Track your submissions carefully, it is easy to get overwhelmed if submitting widely.

What do you allow on the page that you allow nowhere else?

Everything. Absolutely everything. Shame, remorse, self-indictment, grief, strangeness, and joy. Nothing is off limits. Writing for me is just another way of processing my feelings. I am often shocked by what emerges in a flow state. Usually I process a piece for a good week after I write it.

Who are you writing for?

The mothers, the ones that feel different, people that struggle to articulate how they feel. I'm interested in interior lives people don't always have language for.

Where did this story come from?

I was watching a miniaturist series on TV and saw a taxidermized lizard later online wearing a dress. I wrote the first line and the rest flowed out. I don't preplan the stories or I can feel the stumbles in them. If its not there naturally, I can't write it.

Kristen Reece is a Canadian writer from Alberta and works in the oilfield. She has work appearing, or in Sky Island Journal, BULL, Miracle Monocle-the University of Louisville and others. She spends her free time scheming how to stay home long enough to get a cat.