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Emma's Hands
The O. Henry Awards are regarded as America's most prestigious awards for short fiction. Mary Swan's story `The Deep', first published in The Malahat Review , was included in the 2001 O. Henry anthology, which featured such illustrious names as Alice Munro, Dan Chaon and Louise Erdrich. `The Deep'subsequently walked away with first prize. In September, 2002, the Porcupine's Quill published The Deep in novella format. The book was shortlisted for the Canada/Carribean Region of the Commonwealth Writers Prize, `Best First Book' category. Now, the Porcupine's Quill is pleased to bring you Emma's Hands . These stories range in their settings from an Israeli kibbutz to Ontario lakeside cottages to the beach at Ostend. Most of the stories are quietly cadenced and elegiac in tone and the prose is marked, as Alice Munro says, by `the urgency of feeling and the calm beauty of the telling.'
176 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2003
12 people want to read
About the author
Mary Swan
16Ìýbooks13ÌýfollowersMary Swan is a Canadian novelist and short story writer. She is also a trained librarian with a keen eye for history. Her novel The Boys in the Trees, a shortlisted nominee for the 2008 Scotiabank Giller Prize, was inspired by a newspaper clipping concerning a death within a family.
Swan was the winner of the 2001 O. Henry Award for short fiction for her short story "The Deep", which was published in The Malahat Review. That story later became the title story of her debut short story collection The Deep and Other Stories in 2002.
A graduate of York University and the University of Guelph, she currently resides in Guelph, Ontario with her family.
Swan was the winner of the 2001 O. Henry Award for short fiction for her short story "The Deep", which was published in The Malahat Review. That story later became the title story of her debut short story collection The Deep and Other Stories in 2002.
A graduate of York University and the University of Guelph, she currently resides in Guelph, Ontario with her family.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
June 27, 2012
“…the yearning for something else entirely. And she thought that it was such a waste, the way you started to figure things out so late. The way the knowing wasn’t anything you could pass on anyway� (18).
“The things she reads often astound her. Past Contrary-to-Fact Conditions. Present Unreal Conditions. The significance of the subjunctive mood� (42).
“…meaning must therefore be determined by context� (43).
“But sometimes at night he makes soft blowing noises in his sleep and she nudges him with an elbow, hard, harder, until he stops. And sometimes it frightens her, how she hits him when he is sleeping, as hard as she can� (45).
“Using a small silver sharpener with a grey smudge in one corner, all that was left of the price tag� (49).
“I saw him then as a child, lost in the scent of pine needles. When all the presents have been unwrapped with laughter and a flurry of crackling paper and it slowly begins to be clear that one perfect, mysterious, longed-for gift is not there� (56).
“I read that the peach probably came from China, like fireworks and pasta…� (59).
“In those days some of us bought ridiculous hats� (93).
“The things she reads often astound her. Past Contrary-to-Fact Conditions. Present Unreal Conditions. The significance of the subjunctive mood� (42).
“…meaning must therefore be determined by context� (43).
“But sometimes at night he makes soft blowing noises in his sleep and she nudges him with an elbow, hard, harder, until he stops. And sometimes it frightens her, how she hits him when he is sleeping, as hard as she can� (45).
“Using a small silver sharpener with a grey smudge in one corner, all that was left of the price tag� (49).
“I saw him then as a child, lost in the scent of pine needles. When all the presents have been unwrapped with laughter and a flurry of crackling paper and it slowly begins to be clear that one perfect, mysterious, longed-for gift is not there� (56).
“I read that the peach probably came from China, like fireworks and pasta…� (59).
“In those days some of us bought ridiculous hats� (93).
Displaying 1 of 1 review
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