Margaret Chen rarely grants interviews. The acclaimed novelist, whose sparse prose has earned comparisons to everyone from Hemingway to Yoko Ogawa, has spent the better part of two decades avoiding the literary spotlight while producing some of the most celebrated fiction of our time.

We meet in her modest home in the Pacific Northwest, surrounded by floor-to-ceiling bookshelves and the quiet hum of a rainy afternoon. At 67, Chen moves with deliberate grace, her silver hair pulled back in a simple bun. She offers tea before we begin, a ritual she says helps her transition from the solitary world of writing to the collaborative one of conversation.

"Writing is an act of compression," she tells me, settling into an armchair that has clearly seen decades of use. "Every word must earn its place on the page. The same should be true of speaking, though I find conversation far more difficult than writing."

Her latest novel, 'The Weight of Water,' has been shortlisted for every major literary prize. Like her previous works, it tells a deceptively simple story—a woman returns to her childhood home after her mother's death—that unfolds into a meditation on memory, loss, and the stories families tell themselves.

When I ask about her famous revision process, which reportedly involves cutting each draft by half, she smiles. "It's not about removing words. It's about finding the essential truth of each scene. Often that truth is smaller, quieter than we initially imagine."

Chen's path to writing was unconventional. She worked as a marine biologist for fifteen years before publishing her first novel at 42. "I spent years studying how organisms adapt to extreme environments," she reflects. "Writing fiction isn't so different. You're exploring how humans adapt—or fail to—under pressure."

The conversation turns to the current state of literature, and Chen grows thoughtful. "I worry we've lost patience for the slow reveal," she admits. "Good fiction requires us to sit with uncertainty, to let meaning accumulate gradually. That's increasingly difficult in an age of instant gratification."

Despite her reservations, Chen remains hopeful. She's currently working on her seventh novel, though she declines to share details. "The book will speak for itself when it's ready. Until then, it belongs to me alone."