Everything from:red letter days

Really getting to like this Sunburst thing…

The 2018 Sunburst longlist is up, and I’m on it again–this time for my short story “Yellowcat”, a sort of literary horror story that found a home with Grain Magazine.  It’s actually not available to read online: Grain is a print-only magazine, and a lovely one, which you should definitely consider buying. Other people on this year’s longlist include so many wonderful fellow travelers, including Kari Maaren, Rati Mehrotra, Sandra Kasturi, Kate Heartfield, Kate Story, Fonda Lee, Lesley Livingston and Terri Favro: all fantastic writers with whom I’m so grateful to share a community and the occasional drink. It’s been ten years since I began writing (!) and every time something goes well for me, a nice review, an award or nomination, I feel humbled by the quality of the work I see around me, joyful to be considered in the same breath, and delighted by the many organizations and individuals dedicated to raising the profile of the work we do. To all of you who read, review, share, post, and talk about stories: thank you! […]

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2017 in Stories

It’s that writerly tradition: the year-end post!  I don’t always make one, but I usually wish I had.  This year I received the gift of an unexpected day off from work and I’m going to make the most of it! 2017 short fiction from me, which I hope you’ll kindly consider when making your award nominations: “Wooden Boxes Lined with the Tongues of Doves”, Beneath Ceaseless Skies: a bleak and difficult start to the year, even more than usual for my work. This story doesn’t make it easy for the reader. “Dinners in Wartime”, Liminal: this one’s also quite bleak, inspired by the suicide of someone I cared about. Trigger warning, friends; I don’t know if this story’s emotional payload will hit you the way it hit me to write, but please take care of yourselves.  “Yellowcat”, Grain Magazine: not actually available to read online so you’ll have to trust me on how fantastic it is! “Le lundi de la matraque (Nightstick Monday)”, Strange Horizons: Immortal screwup Gus Hillyard returns in this story of a violent moment in Canadian history. Gus is always willing to take up someone else’s fight, and not always able to tease out who’s right or […]

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Still riding that win…

Yes, that’s me, accepting my Sunburst Award from chair Rebecca Simkin (who is wonderful even apart from the fact that she has just handed me a medal and a cheque).  I am, once again, so thrilled to be honoured this way.  The other works and writers who have been recognized with this award are beyond amazing! Since I believe in celebrating wins when we get’em, I wore my medal all night at the bar.  (I may or may not have worn it to bed.) This win is a very happy ending for Spells of Blood and Kin.  It’s not totally an ending, of course–it remains in print and on sale in stores–but unless there’s a movie deal or something (hi, producers! You’re all reading this, right?) it will take a back seat to newer works.  Some of those newer works will also be written by me (uh, not right away, but watch this space). I won’t be a debut novelist next time around.  I’ll be a grizzled veteran (not a metaphor…you should see how much grey hair I have now).  I can’t wait. 2017 has treated a lot of us roughly, I have to say, but I’m coming out of […]

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2017 Sunburst Awards

I started writing Spells of Blood and Kin ages ago: 2008, the year I attended the Viable Paradise writing workshop.  Nine years. Nine years ago, I had just lost my father.  I was trying to write something light, something to distract myself from loss and difficulty.  I should have known I didn’t work that way, but it took me a while to understand.  When I did, the book I ended up writing was pretty different. Today, I won the Sunburst Award for that book.  In the jury’s statement, one bit really stood out to me:“Humphrey’s use of a real, contemporary Canadian setting and her refusal to allow her characters any easy victories set this novel apart from a field of strong competitors.”  Italics mine.  I was going to say easy victories aren’t a thing I understand, but I do understand that this is a matter of perspective and privilege.  I also understand that the victories that we treasure are the ones for which we worked, and it’s true that the characters in this book work hard for the comparatively small victories they manage.  This felt true to me when I was writing it, and still today.This particular victory, then, feels incredibly satisfying […]

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Another Post from the Road

In my last post we’d made it as far as Los Angeles, mainly by plane.  The next phase of the tour began with a road trip to San Francisco! Thanks to the generosity of new friends, we had a fun home base in a camper-van near Golden Gate Park and this author & entourage used our time off to explore the city.  Here’s the view from Moraga Steps: We visited the Castro on our day off as it was Pride Weekend.  It was an emotional visit due to the recent tragic crime in Orlando.  We made friends with some lovely folks at a bar near Dolores Park, and I felt like the heart of the community was sore but still so proud, so kind, and so alive. Curtis and I got to sign books at landmark bookstore Borderlands, and then we had a great event at Laurel Bookstore (photo courtesy of my aunt Mia Stageberg):   Next stop: Portland!  On the road there, we began listening to the audiobook of Spells of Blood and Kin.  What a cool experience to hear my characters voiced so well by Vikas Adam (especially Nick and Jonathan–he really nails the stoner-speak!) Powell’s at Cedar […]

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The Road So Far

One week!  One week since Spells of Blood and Kin officially launched.  What’s happened in that week? First: the launch itself!  A power failure at the Yonge & Eglinton Centre meant the Indigo store had to close for the afternoon, but the amazing events team quickly found a solution–the courtyard of the mall.  Check out the amazing setup (and the long signing line!): Curtis Chen and I are tag-teaming a lot of our events as his debut novel, Waypoint Kangaroo, is with the same publisher at the same time–what a great coincidence!  Curtis came to Toronto for this event and the next one–a day later, at the Chiaroscuro Reading Series. Here’s a great picture Kelly Robson took of me at the reading series…right before I classily smacked myself in the face with the microphone: Next up, a double-header of Indigo signings: Chapters Chinook in Calgary, and Indigo Granville in Vancouver.  Both stores were lovely!  Indigo Granville had an especially great location for a signing table: I got to chat with not one but two different readers who were celebrating birthdays and decided to treat themselves to a signed copy of my book.  I hope they both had great days!  (There […]

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Cover reveal!

Spells of Blood and Kin is getting closer and closer, you guys.  You can now preorder it from a whole bunch of different US retailers here, or of course, from Indigo. And take a look at this cover!  It looks even better in person–I am the proud possessor of a mockup (my cover wrapped around a similarly-sized hardcover, since mine won’t be printed for a while yet) and I can’t even describe the rush of seeing it brought to life. Next step for this writer: copyedits!  I have a word list from the copy editors detailing things they’ve corrected, and I need to review the changes.  (Side note: it’s hilarious to me how many swears appear on the list.  Apparently I don’t spell profanity as well as the rest of my vocabulary.  For instance, did you know “douche bag” is two words, not one?!  It never occurred to me to look that up.) One thing I love about this process is the incredible number of talented people who are involved in making this book the best it can be.  I’m grateful to every one and I look forward to thanking them all properly, including those I haven’t yet met… and […]

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On the horizon… look what dawns…

This day, my friends, needs a pin in it: SPELLS OF BLOOD AND KIN has gone up on Amazon (and Goodreads!) It has a preorder link and an ISBN number (which, for anyone reading this who isn’t a book nerd, is like your book’s very own fingerprint or DNA). Go and look!  Look at the beautiful, generous things people have said about this book already!  I am so grateful–and so excited to watch this thing grow. […]

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Daughters of Frankenstein sweepstakes!

Tor.com is holding a sweepstakes–you could win one of three copies of Daughters of Frankenstein by entering here!  Read Brit Mandelo’s generous review also. My story “Eldritch Brown Houses” appears in this anthology–my first, and likely last, engagement with Lovecraft, all mashed up with analog photography, loneliness, and witchcraft.  Enjoy! […]

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It’s starting to sink in…

When I’m working hard on something, one of the things I like to do is imagine what success will look like.  So I’ve constructed a number of scenarios, over the years, for what it would look like to sell my first book.  They became pretty realistic, what with my career in the bookselling business, my posse of working writer friends, and my own recent time in the short-fiction trenches. In fact, my scenarios had become so realistic that when the call finally came, I split in two: one of me, Business Me, recognized that my predictions had been accurate and was satisfied and pleased and totally unsurprised, and the other me, the one who’s been dreaming of this since childhood, was pretty much like this: That’s Sidney Crosby scoring a hat trick, in case you were wondering.  He looks kind of cheerful about it.  But I’ll tell you all about my recent hockey obsession another day, because the important thing about this post is that I have a book deal. It’s currently called KINSHIP but that’s probably going to change; it’s coming out with Thomas Dunne in spring of 2016.  My agent, Connor Goldsmith of Fuse Literary, arranged the deal […]

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