Interview by Jasmine Sealy. Photo by Carly Shaia. Beasa Dukes writes ghost stories. But these stories are far from ephemeral. These stories are about spirits that are born of the earth, that inhabit bodies and influence our every waking...
Prompt #11: Movie Moments There’s something in the way you lock eyes (or don’t, maybe it’s nerves), an August evening warmth, a late bus that perhaps allows for things to feel somehow organic and both scripted. Maybe something in...
Review by Carly Rosalie Vandergriendt
It’s tempting to call Next Year, For Sure, a novel about a millennial couple that happens upon polyamory, a “light” read. Because in many ways, it is a light read. Award-winning short story writer and debut novelist Zoey Leigh Peterson’s prose is deceptively addictive, the kind of writing that can easily keep a reader up until two or three in the morning. (I read it twice; I stayed up late finishing it both times.) Her main characters, nine-years-and-still-going-strong couple Chris and Kathryn, are sensitive and self-aware yuppie Vancouverites who verge on being likeable to a fault. The novel opens with Chris telling Kathryn he has a crush on Emily, a woman he met at the laundromat. Kathryn suggests he take her out on a date, the plot takes off at a brisk pace, alternating between Chris and Kathryn’s point of view as they navigate opening their relationship up to a third person over the course of the year that follows.
Continue reading Loneliness, Polyamory, and Possibility in Zoey Leigh Peterson’s Next Year, For Sure
Prompt #10: Loss Loss is a complicated, sometimes all encompassing, experience that comes with waves of pain, confusion, anger, and denial. Sometimes it’s a temporary loss, and other times it’s something more permanent. Whatever the case, loss is something...
Interview by Michelle Cyca. Photo by Red Works: Nadya Kwandibens
Joi T Arcand is a multidisciplinary artist from Saskatchewan, currently living in Ottawa. A nehiyaw iskwew from the Muskeg Lake Cree Nation, Joi’s body of work includes representations of the Cree language in photography and other mediums, and she has been exhibited across Canada, including at Vancouver’s grunt gallery. She co-created kimiwan, a quarterly publication for and by Indigenous visual artists and writers that published eight issues between 2012 and 2014. Her piece Northern Pawn, Southern Vietnam appeared on the Spring 2017 cover of PRISM international.
Continue reading I Have Been Learning Cree My Whole Life: An Interview with Artist Joi T. Arcand
Prompt #9: Uncorking While sitting around a table with friends, we often open up over food, wine, or simply the feeling of genuine connections. This is the process of uncorking: getting to know others, and opening up ourselves. Over...
Prompt #8: National Day Each day presents numerous opportunities, but some are more guided than others. Today, for example, is “National Sneak Some Zucchini Into Your Neighbour’s Porch Day.” Yes, you read that correctly. Although it may seem ridiculous,...
Contents Jess Taylor – So Much Good Here: Notes on The Jacob Zilber Prize Jacob Zilber Grand Prize Winner Carol Matthews – The Boat, as it Happened Jacob Zilber Prize Runners-Up Adrick Brock – Chez Madame Christine Miscione –...
Today kicks off Pride weekend in Vancouver! Here are some of our favourite groundbreaking LGBTQ+ works of prose, poetry, memoir, and hybrid forms. These stories have changed the way we read, think, and experience our lives. Get them. Devour them. Enjoy...