I'm Meg Wallitzer and I have nothing up my sleeve.

I know you can't see me or my sleeve, but trust me.

This week on Selected Shorts, I bring you stories that indulge a little sleight of hand.

An author can fool the ear as easily as a magician can trick the eye.

Stick around, I'll show you how.

You're listening to Selected Shorts, where our greatest actors transport us through

the magic of fiction, one short story at a time.

The Magic of Fiction.

You know, I've said that phrase a lot over the past couple of years.

I doodfully record it at the top of each and every show, but we don't talk about what

that means exactly.

When someone mentions magic in the real world, we usually think of wands and capes and

scantily clad assistants sawed in half.

Those big theatrical shows aren't what you think about when you sit down to read, say,

Jane Austen.

Still, as a writer, it's hard to imagine doing what I do without a little sleight of hand.

Every storyteller understands the shape of their story, the characters, the conflict,

the consequences, but only the really good storytellers understand how the contours of their

stories measure up against their listeners' expectations.

Great storytellers know what it is we think is going to happen and shake up our expectations

along the way.

Either they fool us about how they arrive at an inevitable conclusion or make that conclusion

...