Lynn Coady

writes fiction; means well

[lynncoady]

How Many Emails Does It Take To Not Apologize? – Electric Literature

In “Someone is Recording” by Lynn Coady, a man accused of misconduct launches a digital defense

Hi Erica,

I don’t know if you were expecting to hear from me or not after you posted your piece — but here I am. It does feel a bit strange to be getting in touch after all this time and under these particular circumstances. I often thought of dropping you a line in the years after I left Ottawa. I wanted to so many times. But honestly, I assumed you wouldn’t be thrilled to hear from me and it was best to let sleeping dogs lie. Now that I’ve read your essay, I can’t help but think that, despite your very clear irritation with me, you were, in your way, reaching out. If that’s so, I’m glad you did.

Please check out my new story SOMEONE IS RECORDING on Electric Lit

[lynncoady]

Check out this great listen on Audible.com. Winner of the 2013 Scotiabank Giller Prize. Short-listed for the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize. Selected as an Amazon.ca Best Book and for The Globe's Top 10 Books of 2013. With astonishing range and depth, Scotiabank Giller Prize finalist Lynn Coa...

2013′s Giller Prize winning Hellgoing has been released on AUDIOBOOK! Hot tip: If you’re in Canada, you can go to the new Audible Canada site, sign up for a 30-day trial and get it for free. 

[lynncoady]

Scotiabank Giller Prize | Introducing the 2017 Scotiabank Giller Prize Jury

The 2017 jury members are: Canadian writers André Alexis, Anita Rau Badami (Jury Chair) and Lynn Coady, along with British author Richard Beard and American writer and playwright Nathan Englander.

Longlist announcement coming Friday Sept 18th!

[lynncoady]

What the Handmaid’s Tale Can Teach Us about Girl Scouts

With its dystopian theme, the series underscores a lesson: Be Prepared

Little something I wrote for The Walrus back in May, 2017.

[lynncoady]

I chat with Gerard Elson about Hellgoing in the latest issue of the wonderful Australian litmag Kill Your Darlings.

[lynncoady]

Coming in the new year.

[lynncoady]

The Monster At The End - Lynn Coady

There's a lot of anxiety about the supposed 'end' of the book as we know it. But exactly what are we so worried about? In a lecture given at the Canadian Literature Centre at the University of Alberta in Edmonton and in interview with Paul Kennedy, novelist Lynn Coady explores what happens if we separate the idea of 'the book' from the experience they've traditionally provided.

Click above and you can listen to the radio version of the talk I gave last April, “Who Needs Books?” for the Henry Kreisel Memorial Lecture at the University of Alberta. The (perhaps ironic) book version of that talk will appear this coming spring!

[lynncoady]

I’m going to Australia

For the Sydney Writers’ Festival in May 18-24. Exciting, right?

Then in June I’m going to London--THE London--for the London Short Story Festival.

[lynncoady]

omg updates

It's spring, kinda, which means going places, doing things. Here are some:

March 11, Reading, talking and answering Qs with Liz Withey at the Edmonton Public Library, 7 pm

March 13, Concordia! In Montreal! Writers Read

March 17, York University! Toronto! If the strike isn't still going on : (. Canadian Writers in Person

April 13, CLC Kreisel Lecture, "Who Needs Books", at the University of Alberta. Please see bumpf below.

[lynncoady]

Stuff I'm Doing in October

Ottawa International Writers Festival, for the Munro Beattie Lecture on Oct 23 and for Long Story Short with Jon Paul Fiorentino and Mireille Silcoff on Oct 25.

Trent University Oshawa, October 27

Western University, October 28

[lynncoady]

A handful of lovely moments from the Cork International Short Story Festival

A sculpture in the park

John Minihan the festival photographer. He told me he photographed Beckett with this camera.

Tasting the local cuisine

Me in a lane

Cork Women's Prison, closed for a wedding that day so we couldn't go inside. (Wait. A wedding?)

Culture Night at the English Market on Grand Parkade. Mayhem!

Culture Night 2: Music and produce

Bad pic of new friends/short story practitioners Matt Rader (Canada) and Nuala ni Chonchuir (Galway)

[lynncoady]

Now Hannibal arrives on the scene, an aesthete to Dexter’s journeyman. Whereas lab-geek Dexter brought a scientist’s cold precision and rationality to his work, Hannibal’s is so much more horrific for being the playful yet obsessive precision of an artist. Hannibal kills with flair.

This is from a thing I wrote titled: People Who Eat People: Hannibal and TV's New Darkness, published by the good people at Hazlitt Magazine.

[lynncoady]

I'm BC-bound this month!

...and I'll also be in Whistler on May 23 for their Points of Departure reading series.

[lynncoady]

Tch. Turrible wind down at the Halifax waterfront yesterday.

[lynncoady]

I haven't had a chance to read this over very closely but I gather I'm going to Kingston to be crowned Queen of something or other on March 7. 

[lynncoady]

Hollywood may be full of phonies, mediocrities, dictators and good men who have lost their way, but there is something that draws you there that you should not be ashamed of.

Liking this line by Budd Schulberg, from What Makes Sammy Run? circa 1941. Picked up the book after reading this interview with Schulberg, conducted by Kurt Vonnegut, in the Paris Review.

[lynncoady]

the most cape breton thing I think I've ever read

My parents just sent me a photocopy of a very sweet speech given by their neighbour, Senator Mike MacDonald, which he delivered on the Senate floor on November 20th. It made me smile for a lot of reasons, not the least of which was the fact that it may be the most Cape Breton thing I've ever read. Check out the middle paragraph below. In later paragraphs, he goes on to explain in detail the myriad ways in which the MacDonalds and the Coadys are related to one another.