Of late I’ve been focusing on my editorial work, specifically on Clockwork Canada (it’s still going strong!), but now it’s news relating to my writing!
The two stories I had published last year have been longlisted for the 2016 Sunburst Award for Excellence in Canadian Literature of the Fantastic! To say that I was surprised by the news would be a huge understatement. Moments after I saw the longlist I basically breathed in a gin & tonic. The two stories are “Goodbye is a Mouthful of Water” and “Spider Moves the World”. “Goodbye…” was quite possibly the most difficult thing I’ve written and is a story about family, Alzheimer’s, and a drowned village. The other, “Spider Moves the World”, is an odd prose-poem that is basically a love letter to Leena Krohn’s novel Tainaron, my favourite book.
Quill & Quire posted the entire longlist here, including Adult Fiction, YA Fiction, and Short Fiction. My two nominations are in the short fiction category alongside some wonderful writers like Kelly Robson, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Holly Schofield, Charlotte Ashley, and Karen Abrahamson. The Adult (novel) list includes works from Margaret Atwood, Heather O’Neill, Andrew Pyper, Gemma Files, and Lisa Hannett. Really stellar list.
You can find my nominated stories here:
Goodbye is a Mouthful of Water, from The Playground of Lost Toys (Exile Editions).
Spider Moves the World, from Lackington’s issue 6.
The shortlist will be announced July 5th. I would love to be on the shortlist, obviously, but it’s a great group of writers and every one of them would deserve to make it (personally, I’m rooting for Kelly Robson, Charlotte Ashley, and Karen Abrahamson).
Dominik Parisien 