ACCEPTANCE: short story in The Fiddlehead

I am jacked to announce that I will have a NEW SHORT STORY in an upcoming issue of The Fiddlehead, one of Canada's longest running and most august literary journals. My piece, called "Fall Back," is slated to appear in the magazine's Summer Fiction issue, which, I've been told, will also be The Fiddlehead's 300th issue.

While I've published a couple of book reviews in this journal over the years, this will mark the first time I've had my own creative work appear in its pages. I've been a long-time reader of and submitter to The Fiddlehead - off and on probably since the late 1990s - so I can't tell you how tickled pink I am having received this acceptance. This also marks my second short story acceptance so far this year, and it's beginning to feel like I'm finally getting my short fiction mojo back.

Anyway, I'll post more news when I have it, including when the issue hits the news stands.

M.

My Review of Clark Blaise's This Time, That Place: Selected Stories in Canadian Writers Abroad

I'm happy to share with all of you that I'm back in the digital pages of Canadian Writers Abroad magazine, this time reviewing Clark Blaise's most recent short story collection, This Time, That Place. 

Here's an excerpt from the piece:

"Blaise, like many of his fictional doppelgangers, has led an almost preternaturally peripatetic life. He is both an American and a Canadian, with stints in Montreal, Florida, New York, Iowa, and other places during his long life. He has also maintained close ties to India, thanks to his decades-long marriage to fellow author Bharati Mukherjee before her death in 2017. Much of Blaise’s earliest stories, including “Broward Dowdy,” “A North American Education,” and “A Class of New Canadians” are intentionally autobiographical – Blaise was doing auto-fiction before it was trendy – and his overarching theme is clear. A peripatetic life can lead to a fragmented identity, and the quest for a sense of belonging often competes with one’s other desires, and, in some cases, better judgment."

Enjoy!

ACCEPTANCE: Inclusion in forthcoming short story anthology

I'm absolutely thrilled to announce that a short story of mine will be part of the recently announced anthology, Devouring Tomorrow, edited by A.G. Pasquella and Jeff Dupuis, and forthcoming from Dundurn Press in Fall 2025. My piece, called "Unlimited Dream," fits with the book's theme of imagining food of the future in the face of climate change, food insecurity, and other looming menaces. The anthology will also include works by Gary Barwin, Anuja Varghese, Lisa de Nikolits, and many more.

This is especially exciting for me since, according to my literary CV, I haven't published a new short story in just about a decade. (I've been a little busy writing novels and poetry instead.) Anyway, I'm very pleased to have this bit of news to share. Here's the formal announcement that appeared in Publishers Marketplace earlier this week: