The Writer’s Gauntlet with Sadie Kaye is a regular column at The Hooghly Review. This article is being reprinted with The Review’s permission.
Zero AI trickery was used to conjure me. Every pixel is hand-drawn and coloured by a human artist who is currently tied up. In my basement.
SK: If a detective looked at your browser tabs right now, would they arrest you, call an exorcist, or buy you a weighted blanket?
NC: The sheer amount of caffeine investments I make is enough for me to be arrested for possession of class-A stimulants.
When you’re stuck on a scene, grappling for a metaphorical weapon, do you precision-strike like a sniper, or spray and pray like Trump?
I think I’ve passively absorbed enough anime to believe in my precision-strike abilities. As long as I shout loud enough, it should land.
What’s a word you’ve used in a draft that you definitely don’t know how to pronounce?
Cinnamon and synonym—in that exact order. Try saying them fast, three times in a row without sounding like a lame duck in a reflecting pool.
Would you rather your protagonists sue you for emotional distress and gross negligence or be sentenced to life in a Happy Ending colony?
Seeing as I am the protagonist, I feel obligated to choose life in a Happy Ending colony.
Would you rather delete your favourite 5,000-word chapter or replace every instance of ‘said’ with ‘ejaculated’?
I do live readings. Dropping nineteen ‘ejaculateds’ is more than enough to get the crowd going. Ha.
Are your characters named after ancient deities and celestial bodies, or did you just glance at a spice rack and decide ‘Cumin’ sounded heroic?
My surname is stolen from a can of condensed soup. I trust that answers your question.
If you could magically delete one trope from existence, which one are you throwing under the bus with zero regrets?
Enemies to Lovers. I don’t know what kind of trauma-bonding the internet is romanticizing, but It Ends with Us can’t be what we’ve come to with relationship goals, can it??
Do your protagonists guide you toward the light, or sit on your shoulder whispering, ‘Kill the mentor, kill the mentor’?
The protagonists of my other books have been on a boba tea kick lately and their reviews are incredibly mixed. Once I sniff out the loyalists from the betrayers, I’ll know exactly whose character arc needs a sudden, violent plot twist.
If your WIP characters were ghosts, would they help you find your keys or rearrange your furniture to match the mess in your head?
They are actively rearranging my furniture. I swear I am one stubbed toe away from burning the whole apartment building to the ground.
What font do you write in and why is it superior to everyone else’s?
Times New Roman. It’s clean, classic, and carries cold, calculated authority.
Oxford Comma: Life-saving necessity or pretentious clutter?
My characters are entrenched in drama. I don’t need to stress them out with unnecessary punctuation.
Plotter or Pantser?
It changes like the upstate New York weather: in winter I have to plan out the layers so I don’t f*cking freeze. In summer, anything goes, including pants. I go commando.
What’s your writing ritual and why is it a cursed superstition?
My characters live rent-free inside my head, which makes them roomies. The curse kicks in when they start throwing parties and I’m the only one who can hear them and complain about it.
One word that makes you go feral every time you see it misused?
I have a high-functioning autocorrect built in my brain. My eyes just automatically swap out typos. I don’t know whose God I appeased to get this upgrade, but I have been blessed.
What non-existent job do you wish existed?
Rollerskate drive thru services. Let’s bring back the golden days of getting a burger delivered by someone doing a backward glide.
Would you rather find a typo in the first sentence of your freshly published novel or the last?
The end. I’d happily give readers a stray ‘u’ in colour as a parting gift.
Would you rather your status on Submittable remain forever ‘received’ or ‘in-progress’?
Received — ‘in-progress’ feels like a lost USPS package tracking number. Maybe it’s being passed through a million cities, maybe it’s sitting in a damp sorting facility. No thanks. Once I have the order confirmation, that’s good enough for me.
What cartoon character best represents your ride or die? (Alternatively explain why ‘ride or die’ makes you go feral)
Noodle from Gorillaz. She’s a badass. End of.
Which creature adds more joy to your world: butterflies or geckos?
Butterflies are just moths wearing too much makeup, and California is overrun by Lizard People, so I’ll stay on the side of my Gecko friends.
If you could teleport, but only to places you’ve tripped and fallen, where are you tripping?
My front porch steps
Cursor status: blinking and judgmental or solid and reassuring?
I have trust issues with solid and reassuring. It feels like it’s hiding something from me. Blinking and judging is more honest.
What’s the last thing you researched that has probably put you on a government watchlist?
Pineapple pizza
Drafting fuel: coffee, tea, liquor, Haribo or the tears of your antagonists?
Coffee—but keep that burnt, syrup-drenched shit away from me. It needs to be jet fuel disguised as a drink.
Are you a ruthless assassin or a sentimental hoarder on a kill your darlings scale?
A cold-blooded assassin. I don’t write novels. I write 100,000-word obituaries for characters who thought they had a future.
Stinky Books: old library vanilla or fresh-off-the-press chemicals?
Did you go through my cologne?
How do you write: sitting like a human or perched like a gargoyle?
When I write, I sag like a loose sack of bones. If you don’t see me for a couple of hours, it’s best that you knock on the bathroom door to make sure I haven’t fallen in.
Describe your latest WIP using three emojis and no context.
One word you’ve banned from your vocab because you’ve overused it?
Smiled. My characters smile too much. I could saw them in half and they’d be smiling at me. Some sort of coping mechanism?
‘Chaos Desk’ or ‘Aesthetic Nook’?
I think my desk is an Aesthetic Nook. Everyone else seems to disagree and probably lacks the puzzle-solving skills to navigate my organizational genius.
Would you prefer a 1-star review that says ‘This changed my life for the worse’ or a 3-star review that says ‘It was fine’?
I can get behind a dedicated hater, so long as they do their research. At least they read it.
Are you an Ellipsis… (trailing off into mystery) or an Exclamation Point! (perpetually caffeinated and/or yelling)?
I’m a full stop. Period. Right up until the 10:00 pm crash turns me into a fading ellipsis trailing off to…
Would you rather commit bookish blasphemy by dog-earring the pages of a rare first edition or reading the ending of every book before you start chapter one?
I rarely foresee the ending of my own stories. Reading the last page is harmless if you don’t know how you got there.
In a post-apocalyptic world, is your primary contribution navigating by the stars or knowing which snacks stay edible the longest?
If it’s between an expired Twinkie and starving to death, I’ll take the cardboard-flavoured cakes.
Who is your ultimate nemesis: the person who types ‘K’ as a full response or the person who leaves 1 second left on the microwave?
Plot twist: they are both me. I am my own worst enemy.
If you had to turn into an animal for an hour every day, are you a Majestic Hawk (great view, very cold) or a Fat Housecat (great nap, very judged)?
I don’t need a bird’s-eye view of anyone, but a quality nap? That sounds purrfect.
Is ‘breakfast for dinner’ a symbol of freedom or a sign that society has failed?
I’m a cereal killer who pledges allegiance to the brightly coloured ads of delicious cereal companies.
Writer’s bio
I’m pretty sure you’ve seen me huffing ink off the page of a paperback at 3:00 AM on a delayed L-train. My name is Nick Campbell and I’m the author of Call Me Crazy. You don’t have to call me that, though. Nick’s fine.
When I’m not being violently puppet-mastered through a keyboard by a sleep-deprived Gen Z artist, I spend my time buying over-priced fancy-f*ck coffee and wondering why she gave me flawless cheekbones but a cheerio mouth.
Call Me Crazy by Nick Campbell. Independently published 2021. ISBN 9798710471821 ASIN B09CRQP15K
Connect on Instagram:
@picknickcamp (Character/Author)
@skye_wonderlust (Creator/Artist)
Sadie Kaye is a writer & performer from Sai Kung, Hong Kong. Her humour, fiction, rants & reviews have appeared in the South China Morning Post, Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, The Hooghly Review, Buzz & many anthologies. Her humour column for RTHK Radio 3, Sharp Pains, received nominations for Best Comedy from the New York Festivals Radio Awards and Moment of Comedy Gold from the International Women’s Podcast Awards in 2022 & 2023. She won the Comedy Women in Print Prize for Flash Fiction in 2024. She’s a producer for Contro Vento Films. Her most recent film, To Love A Narcissist, was released in North America on 19 May 2026 and will soon be available worldwide.
She can be found at https://sadiekaye.tv
Her life motto is you’re only young once, but you can be immature forever.
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