The Journey Prize Stories 19

For almost two decades, The Journey Prize Stories has been taking the pulse of Canada’s literary scene, presenting the best stories published each year by some of our most exciting up-and-coming writers.

Among the stories this year: A holdup marks the beginning of a spectacularly ill-fated romance between a free spirit and a man with the heart and soul of “a criminal born.” When her young imagination is captured by a photo of a Hungarian refugee child, a girl becomes determined to make the orphan a part of her family’s life. In a story set in Venice, amid complications both legal and romantic, a Canadian expat comes to understand the restless path his father’s life has taken. A boy discovers something about fame, mortality, and triple force fields when the kids in his neighbourhood vie for a coveted spot on an arcade game’s high-scores list. In a modern fairytale with a twist, a woman who is always cold is given an unexpected gift. A near-drowning in the Indian Ocean reveals difficult truths to a documentary filmmaker during what is supposed to be a career-advancing trip.Reading the 2007 Journey Prize Stories
By Caroline Adderson, David Bezmozgis, Dionne Brand

Krista Foss
Swimming in Zanzibar (from The Antigonish Review)

Andrew J. Borkowski
Twelve Versions of Lech (from Grain Magazine)

Craig Boyko
OZY (from PRISM international)

Nicholas Ruddock
How Eunice Got Her Baby (from The Fiddlehead)

Pasha Malla
Respite (from The Malahat Review)

Jean Van Loon
Stardust (from Queen’s Quarterly)

Rebecca Rosenblum
Chilly Girl (from Exile)

Patricia Robertson
My Hungarian Sister (from Maisonneuve Magazine)

Alice Petersen
After Summer (from Geist)

Nicole Dixon
High-water Mark (from The New Quarterly)

Grant Buday
The Curve of the Earth (from The Fiddlehead)


About the Authors   
About the Contributing Journals  
List of Previous Contributing Authors  “Amuses, astonishes, enlightens; it is a delicious cacophony of voices and engaging stories.”
— Books in Canada

“Tomorrow’s short lists for the Giller and the Governor General’s prizes invariably start with today’s Journey Prize Stories.”
— Globe and MailCaroline Adderson is the award-winning author of two novels, A History of Forgetting and Sitting Practice, and two collections of short fiction, Bad Imaginings and Pleased to Meet You. She is the 2007 recipient of the Marian Engel Award. She lives in Vancouver.

David Bezmozgis is the award-winning author of Natasha and Other Stories. His writing has appeared in magazines such as Harper’s, The New Yorker, and The Walrus, and has been anthologized in Best American Short Stories, 2005. He lives in Toronto.

Dionne Brand is a multi-award-winning poet, novelist, and essayist, and a professor of English at the University of Guelph. In 2006, her poetry collection Inventory was shortlisted for the Governor General’s Award, her novel What We All Long For won the Toronto Book Award, and Brand herself received the Harbourfront Festival Prize for her contribution to the world of books and writing. She lives in Toronto.