31 Days of Stories 2021, Day 15: “How to Live Longer” by M.G. Vassanji
Two time Scotiabank Giller Prize winner Vassanji’s story is about missed opportunities and unfulfilled dreams.
31 Days of Stories 2021, Day 14: “Tits for Cigs” by Téa Mutonji
Mutonji’s story is an empathetic look at burgeoning female sexuality and the roles women are expected to perform in our capitalist system.
31 Days of Stories 2021, Day 13: “Firebugs” by Craig Davidson
The language of the story is tightly calibrated and walks a tightrope between lyricism and incipient violence.
31 Days of Stories 2021, Day 12: “Arsonists” by Chris Benjamin
A story about a granddaughter on the day she euthanizes her grandmother is also a veiled critique of the residential school system.
31 Days of Stories 2021, Day 7: “Fan Mail” by Peter Robinson
In this short, ironic work of feminist noir, the femme fatale turns the tables on the hapless men and their murderous scheme.
31 Days of Stories 2021, Day 4: “The Ice Queen” by Madeline Sonik
Three female figures, and their carefully interwoven relationships, provide the backbone for this creepily fractured fairy tale.
31 Days of Stories 2021, Day 2: “Adoro Te Devote” by Kristyn Dunnion
Dunnion’s story, about a gay teenager navigating the shoals of religious and sexual attraction, finds its momentum in the juxtaposition of the sacred and profane.
No future, or, the submerged punk ethos of Susan Sanford Blades’s Fake It So Real
In these tales of mothers, daughters, fathers, and lovers, punk is more attitudinal than aural or political.
Novelist Kim Echlin ventures into dark territory in Speak, Silence, a Bosnia-set novel about rape as a war crime
“For 2,000 years or more, women in literature have been represented as the spoils of war,” says Echlin about one impression she wanted to correct by writing this novel.
Brief Encounters: “Four Stations in His Circle” by Austin Clarke
Clarke’s story – nominally a comic work – is a piercing examination of the way Canadian capitalism disfavours those who are not white.