Holding Fast for Nineteen Years

I looked up the etymology of tenacity this morning, and discovered that it comes from the Latin tenax which means ‘holding fast’ (the original meaning of fast being ‘to hold firmly’). I like this. I like the idea of holding one’s dreams and intentions and desires firmly in one’s heart. Because that’s what I’ve been doing, […]

Firelight Interview Series: Julie Paul

This month’s Firelight Interview is with author Julie Paul. Her second collection of short stories, The Pull of the Moon, was chosen by the Globe and Mail as one of the best 100 books of 2014. “This is writing of emotional veracity with an edge, of humour alongside gravity, of darkness tempered with blithe optimism,” wrote Rover […]

Character Study

These days, I’ve been working on my new novel, narrated by a young woman called Melonie Barnett (unless, of course, I decide to change her name). The story grew out of three linked short stories – Empty Nest, which you can read in the latest issue of The New Quarterly; Rhubarb, which will be in Oberon Press‘s 15: […]

Read Places Like These

It’s not Thursday (tomorrow on the site: a Firelight Interview with poet Laurie D. Graham), but I wanted to let you all know that my story, Places Like These, which I blogged about last week, is up today on Little Fiction. Enjoy! [youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFYdi5UbD3A[/youtube]

Places Like These

Last fall, I wrote a story. It was early morning, and I had the itch, and it was one of those great days when the thing just poured out of me. The draft I ended up with hardly needed any work. A few changes, a bit of shifting around, tweaks here and there, and I […]