Discuss “Nocturnal Creatures”, by Saïd Sayrafiezadeh

[We meet every Sunday when there's a new New Yorker.]

Greetings, Fictioneers!

On Sunday, May 4, 2025 at 4 pm CDT/5 pm EDT, on Zoom, we will discuss this week’s New Yorker Fiction story from the issue dated May 5, 2025: “Nocturnal Creatures”, by Saïd Sayrafiezadeh. We read Sayrafiezadeh’s last New Yorker fiction, “Minimum Payment Due”, last November.

1. Read ““Nocturnal Creatures”” at this link. Try a private or incognito window if blocked by the New Yorker's paywall or through the Libby app via your local public library “card”.
2. Want to listen to it? The author reads the story on this link (34:25 with intro) or from the link on the story page (32:35 at 1x speed).
3. The author interview, “Saïd Sayrafiezadeh on Cockroaches and Commitment” is available at this link.

“Saïd Sayrafiezadeh (Persian: سعید صیرفی‌زاده; /sɑːˈiːd ˌsɛərəfiˈzɑːdeɪ/; born 1968) is an American memoirist, playwright and fiction writer living in New York City. He won a 2010 Whiting Award for his memoir, When Skateboards Will Be Free. He is the author of two story collections, American Estrangement (2021) and Brief Encounters With the Enemy, which was short-listed for the 2014 PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for debut fiction. He serves on the board of directors for the New York Foundation for the Arts.
...
“Sayrafiezadeh was born in Brooklyn, New York, to an Iranian father, Mahmoud Sayrafiezadeh, and an American Jewish mother, Martha Harris, both of whom were members of the Socialist Workers Party. He was raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. His maternal uncle was the novelist Mark Harris. He lives in New York City.
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“Sayrafiezadeh has published essays and short stories in a number of outlets, including The New Yorker, The Paris Review, The New York Times, Granta, and McSweeney's.
“His plays include New York is Bleeding, Autobiography of a Terrorist, All Fall Away, and Long Dream in Summer. They have been produced or read at South Coast Repertory, New York Theatre Workshop, The Humana Festival of New American Plays, and at The Sundance Theatre Lab.
“Sayrafiezadeh has also published a memoir about his childhood in the Socialist Workers Party.
“He has published two short story collections, Brief Encounters with the Enemy in 2013 and American Estrangement in 2021. The latter includes "Audition", a story based on his experiences with drug addiction and as an aspiring actor.”

- from Wikipedia’s Saïd_Sayrafiezadeh page, links and footnote indicators excised ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saïd_Sayrafiezadeh](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sa%C3%AFd_Sayrafiezadeh))