After Realism
24 Stories for the 21st Century
After Realism: 24 Stories for the 21st Century is the first anthology to represent the generation of millennial writers now making their mark. Diverse, sophisticated, and ambitious in scope, the short stories in this ground-breaking book are an essential starting point for anyone interested in daring alternatives to the realist tradition that dominated 20th century English-language fiction. After Realism offers twenty-five distinctive talents who are pushing against the boundaries of the “real” in aesthetically and politically charged ways—forging their styles from influences that range from myth to autofiction, sci-fi to fairy tale, documentary to surrealism. Even those who continue to work in the realist tradition are doing so critically, with an eye to renovation. The selection is accompanied by comprehensive and provocative essay by editor André Forget that explains the themes, tendencies, and concerns of this group. In bearing witness to an extraordinary flowering of contemporary fiction, After Realism will supply a new standard for Canadian writing.
André Forget was born in Toronto and raised in Mount Forest, Ontario. The former editor-in-chief of The Puritan and a contributing editor to Canadian Notes & Queries, his work has appeared in a variety of magazines and newspapers in Canada and the United States.
Casey Plett's 2018 novel Little Fish won a Lambda Literary Award, the Firecracker Award for Fiction, and the Amazon First Novel Award. Her latest work, A Dream of a Woman, has been longlisted for the 2021 Scotiabank Giller Prize and is her first book of short stories since her seminal 2014 collection A Safe Girl to Love. Her essays and reviews have appeared in The New York Times, Maclean's, The Walrus, Plenitude, the Winnipeg Free Press, and other publications. She lives in Windsor, Ontario.
Jessica Johns is a nehiyaw aunty and member of Sucker Creek First Nation in Treaty 8 territory in Northern Alberta and is currently living, working, and learning on the traditional territory of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh peoples. She is the managing editor for Room magazine and a co-organizer of the Indigenous Brilliance reading series in Vancouver. Her stories have appeared in many magazines. Most recently, her short story “Bad Cree” won the 2020 Writers’ Trust Journey Prize and won silver at the 2020 National Magazine Awards.
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