Impossibilia

I just finished reading PS Showcase #5: Impossibilia, a collection of short stories by Douglas Smith. I've had the great pleasure of meeting Douglas at a few Conventions now, and the even greater pleasure of hearing him read. He is excellent live, which is good, because it takes an excellent reader to bring out the quality behind excellent writing.

Impossibilia is a wonderful book, with three of Douglas's short stories: "Bouquet of Flowers in a Vase, by Van Gogh," about art, death and psychic time travel, "Spirit Dance," about northern Ontario, native spirits and shapeshifting and ""Going Down to Lucky Town," about what happens when you can see good luck... and bad luck.

Each one is an example of how a master at the art tells a story -- and I'm saying this out of sheer envy. I write a decent short story, but Douglas has fine tuned the art of writing short prose to the point where he says very well in 10,000 words what other writers would take 100,000 to say.

Impossibilia is an amazing little collection and if you like the short story form I recommend it.

Douglas is rumoured to be working on a novel. I can't wait to see it when it comes out.