Ask The Author: Melissa Yancy

In March came Melissa Yancy’s “Boolean Napoleans.”

1. Do you put the boo in Boolean?

I’d like to think so. I’d like to think I put the lean in Boolean, too.

2. Are you a leaker?

Sadly, yes. At work we have this concept of the “shadow of the leader,” that prompts you to be more conscious of your effect on others. I think the people around me tend to be influenced by my mood. It’s pretty self-important to think that my mood alters the entire enterprise (as it does in the story) but I’m pretty self-important like that.

3. Where did “Boolean Napoleons” come from?

From a haiku. When a beloved co-worker left our office, one of my colleagues decided to make her a book of haiku as a parting gift. Boolean napoleons was the seven-syllable line in one of my haiku.

The story is about a guy in my office (the file clerk) who has . . . an unusual perspective. He has a rich inner life and it’s hard to tell how much he know about what goes on in our office or what’s going on his head. He’s never been a really verbal person, but occasionally he’ll mutter this great zinger that shows he’s been listening to us all along. The other day he wore an Alfred E. Neuman mask to our staff meeting. It was funny but unsettling, since we never really know what he’s thinking. Perhaps he was ready to kill us all? Afterwards, we couldn’t get him to explain why he did that. The foraging, hoarding, etc. in the story are all based on him. And the doodles are all mine. I’ve always thought he and I had a strange kinship through science fiction. On the surface, we are nothing alike and in the “life of the office” occupy different social strata. But we are both likely to be found on New Year’s Day watching The Twilight Zone marathon.

4. What nickname would you like to have in the office?

My boss goes by the Velvet Hammer. Her boss is The Queen. I’d like to be the Ultimate Grand Supreme.

5. What would Jesus do?

It depends on which Jesus shows up that day. He’s unpredictable that way.

6. What is your sanctuary?

Writing, I suppose. For example, I had to go to a cultural transformation “retreat” and the only way I could get through it was to think of a story about a guy who has a wicked case of hemorrhoids during a cultural transformation retreat. Thinking of real life as fiction as I’m experiencing it is pretty soothing to me. “Boolean Napoleons” is basically a collage of trash—my steno pages filled with anxious doodles, my frustrations about how to run a proper data query, my fear of our department head. I’ve written a couple of other stories like this that are just an homage to my day-to-day. As weird as this story is, it’s not very creative. It’s just my office, pretty plainly, but through the eyes of Alfred E. Neuman guy.