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November 21, 2023
Excerpt from Nights Too Short to Dance by the Late French Canadian Literary Icon Marie-Claire Blais
Marie-Claire Blais was known for her fiery writing, her passionate representation of the French Canadian experience, and her fearless literary voice. Over 70 years, she became an icon of Quebec, Canadian, ...
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November 19, 2024
A City Teenager Sells Weed with a Side of Egg Rolls to Keep His Family Afloat in Johnny Delivers
Award-winning author and avid world traveler Wayne Ng has found success on the literary scene with his previous works of fiction, using elements from the lived-in experiences of Chinese-Canadian immigrants ...
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December 01, 2020
"All of the Pieces are Aware of and Concerned With the Unknowable": Paige Cooper on Taking Up the Best Canadian Stories Mantle
Every year, one editor is tasked with finding the very best short stories from Canadian writers. It's a daunting challenge, given the wealth of great short fiction in Canada, but one that has turned out ...
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September 14, 2020
Short is Beautiful
Don’t get me wrong, I like to lose myself in a big, fat novel. My first and still-favourite author is Charles Dickens. Not long ago I managed to get through Donna Tartt’s The Goldfinch and a couple ...
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April 01, 2025
Green to Grey: An Environmental Anthology is an Eclectic Collection of Fiction and a Call to Action
There have been some excellent anthologies featured on Open Book, and many of those have had wide-ranging themes and focuses, from terrifying campfire tales by acclaimed Indigenous authors to erotic yarns ...
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September 11, 2019
"I Like it When Characters Disobey the Narrative Around Them" Seyward Goodhand on Breaking Rules & Surprising Herself
Seyward Goodhand has been creating fresh, eerie, fascinating short fiction for years (racking up nominations for honours like the Journey Prize, CBC Short Story Prize, and a National Magazine Award in ...
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January 24, 2019
"You Can Live Whole Other Lives" H.B. Hogan on Discovering the Most Important Books in Her Life
H. B. Hogan's debut collection of stories, This Keeps Happening (Invisible Publishing), is sit-up-and-take-notice short fiction. Assured, wonderfully strange, deftly funny, and totally fresh in both ...
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April 13, 2023
Read an Excerpt from Steven Heighton's Final Story Collection, Instructions for the Drowning
The CanLit community came together in mourning last year when the news broke that beloved and acclaimed Kingston-based writer Steven Heighton had passed away at the age of 60. Known for his powerful multi-genre ...
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February 14, 2019
"I am a Fighter" Nilofar Shidmehr on Writing Iranian Women's Stories in Her Powerful Collection Divided Loyalties
Nilofar Shidmehr is known for her powerful poetry collections, but her newest book sees her working in a different genre: short fiction. Her voice is just as arresting in the short stories of Divided ...
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November 01, 2022
"[He Was] Lacking None of the Graces Except a Core of Essential Decency" Read an Excerpt from This Time, That Place by Clark Blaise
Clark Blaise has been described as "the greatest living Canadian writer most Canadians have never heard of." Now 82, with more than 20 books of fiction and nonfiction to his name and a staggering c.v. ...