Fighting Fish
By Short Story Issue 90
FRED, THEIR BETTA FISH, IS DEAD. Christopher tips scummy water into the wilted tomato on the fire escape and gazes at the red body in his hand. He thinks about tossing Fred into the alley for the neighbor’s tabby before Damien wakes up from his nap, but decides against it. Ruth always strolls up the…
Read MoreRunning the Whale’s Back
By Short Story Issue 72
The following excerpt is from the novel A Blessed Snarl, forthcoming from Breakwater Books in 2012. THE WEATHERMAN’S HAND sweeps from Labrador down Newfoundland’s fanged north coast to Saint John’s, his finger squiggling from there down to Renews: the sea white against green land. He’s talking about winds rifling in from the north. The…
Read MoreA Map of the Watershed
By Short Story Issue 81
THE SPELLS CAME late that summer and left him bewildered, muttering. He had known this was coming, had felt the tremors in his mind and seen familiar objects—his can of shoe polish and his TV remote—transformed in his hand into strange artifacts. The TV remote he found in his desk, facedown beside the calculator. The…
Read More