New anthology celebrates best of the short short form

A new book published by Canterbury University Press (CUP), Bonsai: Best small stories from Aotearoa New Zealand, showcases the best new and previously published work from a range of emerging and established authors such as Bill Manhire, Selina Tusitala Marsh and Michelle Leggott.

A comprehensive selection of short short stories, including prose, haibun and flash fiction, the anthology comprises 200 stories of no more than 300 words from 165 writers. It is edited by Michelle Elvy, Frankie McMillan and James Norcliffe.

In the short short form, every word counts and the reader will find the carefully chiselled works in Bonsai provocative, tender and endlessly surprising.

“Short short stories require writers to have the agility of a tightrope walker, moving as they do from one slightly anxious moment to the next. For the onlookers, they offer a moment of suspense, delight and wonder,” Frankie McMillan says.

Morrin Rout, director of the Hagley Writers’ Institute, will launch Bonsai: Best small stories from Aotearoa New Zealand to close WORD Christchurch Festival on Sunday 2 September, 6.30pmat Scorpio Books, Christchurch.

About the editors

Michelle Elvy is an editor at Flash Frontier: An Adventure in Short Fiction whose recent works appear in New Micro: Exceptionally Short Fiction (W.W. Norton, 2018).

Frankie McMillan’s recent book My Mother and the Hungarians, and other small fictions (CUP) was longlisted for the 2017 Ockham New Zealand Book Awards.

James Norcliffe is an award-winning poet and writer. He has published nine collections of poetry and is an editor at Flash Frontier: An Adventure in Short Fiction.

Bonsai: Best small stories from Aotearoa New Zealand, published by Canterbury University Press, August 2018, RRP $39.99, ISBN 978-1-927145-98-2

Bonsai is published with the support of Creative New Zealand.

ends

© Scoop Media