James Stanson lives and writes in Vienna, Austria. He is currently working on his first novel, as well as a second volume of minifiction with Jamie Hershing. He has worked in the boreal forests of the Canadian north, served in a foreign army, and claims to have a rudimentary knowledge of things past – as evidenced by a piece of a paper from an accredited university.
Jamie Hershing also lives and writes in Vienna, Austria. Apart from working on a second volume of minifiction with James Stanson, Hershing dabbles in journalism. He claims to have produced the first European academic study on Latin American minificción – a probable fallacy that he will nevertheless repeat until proven otherwise. He is currently conducting doctoral research on the same topic.
Minifiction Volume One: Marouflage contains 90 carefully crafted stories and fictions that open up 90 new worlds in less than a page each. Each piece explores the limits of conventional story telling, the extremes of parody and the absurdity of fictional advice. It is the short short form like nothing you have read before.
What will e-readers like about your book?
The unexpected twists and turns on each page. The shifts in style and language, in structure and subject matter. The fact that you can read a story or two riding the subway in the morning half asleep, or on your smoke break, or while you wait for those tedious afternoon meetings (and during the meeting too if you can pull it off).
Why did you go indie?
We had an agent who, despite her valiant efforts, was informed by the major publishers that minifiction was unclassifiable and therefore unmarketable, and that maybe minificition was ‘just’ something for the Facebook generation. Well, we hope so!
Who are your favorite authors in your genre?
Aside from the Latin American pioneers of the short short form (Borges, Cortázar, Monterroso) and a dead Greek named Aesop, we would have to include: wikipedia articles, billboards, and the CNN news ticker.
Minifiction Volume One: Marouflage
This sounds fascinating and is on my "to read" list. I wrote poetry before I embarked on my novels and I love intensity and poignancy of short fiction. Austria? I am originally from Switzerland and live there part of the year, so we're practically neighbors. Look forward to reading some of this.
ReplyDeleteChrista Polkinhorn
Love of a Stonemason
Thanks Christa! -- we look forward to hearing what you have to say about it, so please stay in touch. All the best with your own work too dear (sometimes) neighbour ;)
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