Fast Fictions by Kevin Spenst

A recent acquisition, worth blogging about, is a slender little booklet entitled Fast Fictions by Vancouver writer Kevin Spenst. Kevin has been writing a short-short story a day for, oh, about 1000+ days. Recently he wrote his 1000th story and celebrated with a clever tour (50 venues in the same day) reading from a the aforementioned booklet which contains 25 of the best stories (in Kevin's opinion). Martian Press devotees may recognize Kevin from his inclusion in the first and only Martian Press Review, or from his short films as part of the Narcoleptic Videographer collective in Vancouver. Anyway, the book is a great little collection of "freak show short-short stories of the sad, bizarre & beautiful" (to quote its cover). You should e-mail kevinspensty@hotmail.com to arrange purchase of your own copy for a mere $7.

The latest from McSweeney's is also short-short stories, One Hundred and Forty-Five Stories in a Small Box, which is essentially three short-short story collections: Hard to Admit and Harder to Escape by Sarah Manguso, How the Water Feels to the Fishes by Dave Eggers, and Minor Robberies by Deb Olin Unferth.

Short-short stories are running rampant! They must be stopped. I recommend purchasing them all as the best method to contain this madness.