Fish Anthology 2004 – Spoonface and Other Stories
ISBN: 0-9542586-2-2
Fish Anthology 2004 It’s fantastic to discover that so many people write short stories. There were over 2,000 entries to the Fish Short Story Prize this year. We notice that every year the standard goes up, and it is increasingly difficult to shortlist. Frequently, the difference is the ending. So many stories just fail to make the cut because the author has not dedicated the same care to the ending as they have to the rest of the story. Sometimes I think that there are more people writing short stories than reading them. There is a reluctance, in most publishing houses, to publish anthologies of short stories because of the lack of demand. A campaign is underway to revitalise short story reading. The British Arts Council is working hard to promote the short story, but more needs to be done in schools so that children feel reading short stories is something they do. Fish Publishing is dedicated to the short story and endeavours to make the anthology intriguing to young and old. We have increased the first prize for the 2004/5 Fish Short Story Prize to €10,000, and all the published authors next year will be financially rewarded. We hope the larger prize will give the winner a boost, and will attract attention to the prize and help to raise awareness of the short story form. We have introduced a Very Short Story Prize, and the best six from that competition appear in this book. Many who entered hadn’t written much before. Well done to those authors – 250 words is an exacting discipline. There were almost 1,500 entries, and there were many that could have made it into this book. Many of the stories that impressed had a twist in the last sentence, or had an unusual structure. All could create a character and a situation in a sentence. The opening sentence, vital in a short story, is crucial in a very short one. Of course, so is the last, and each one in between. In that sense they are as spare as poems. We were fascinated by them, and look forward to more next year. Look out too for the Fish Unpublished Novel Prize and in the bookshops for the subsequent publication of the winning novel. See www.fishpublishing.com for details. As for the stories in this book, they speak for themselves. Read them. If you want to read more from a particular author, get in touch with Fish and we will let the author know. Freda Churches won the Fish Short Story Prize of €2,500 with ‘Spoonface’, an utterly moving story of a mother and her invalided son. Freda was also one of the six winners of the Very Short Prize with ‘Juice Baby’. She is one of Scotland’s most promising new writers. Second prize of a week at Anam Cara Writers’ and Artists’ Retreat plus €250 went to Philip MacCann from Belfast for his story ‘Shadow Lives’, an atmospheric urban tale of love, hope, and desperation. The third prize of €250 went to Stephanie Dickinson from New York for ‘Fire Maidens, ‘57’, about two teenage girls escaping their lives on a Nevada Desert reservation into a nuclear test site. There are twelve other short stories in this book and each is worthy, interesting and individual – from the surrealism of ‘At the Water Cooler’ by Polly Clark, the inevitability in ‘Unbreakable’ by Tim Foley, the insights into old age in ‘Shirley Poppy’ by Val Lee, to the banality of evil in ‘Rain’ by Barry Troy. ‘Countdown to Ecstasy’, by Adrian Wistreich, one of the six very short gems, went straight to my heart. Brilliant. To all who entered the competitions, thank you. The shortlisted writers are listed at the back of this book, as are details of the Fish Prizes. We appreciated enormously the many calls and messages offering help and good wishes after the Fish offices were burnt to the ground on Valentine’s Night. Thank you.
Contents
Spoonface – Freda Churches Shadow Lives – Philip MacCann Fire Maidens ’57 – Stephanie Dickinson Countdown to Ecstasy – Adrian Wistreich Rain – Barry Troy At the Water Cooler – Polly Clark Juice Baby – Freda Churches The Silence of St. Pierre – Margaret Irish Unbreakable – Tim Foley The Visit – Karen Stevens Shirley Poppy – Val G. Lee Fat Abbey – Beth Williamson Dressed in Irony – Michael Levitt Breathing – Leone Ross The Charles River – Rohan Kar The Strawberry Man – 1973 – Thecla Condon Garden Game – Ruth M. Harris Man in a Wardrobe – Paul Blaney The Admiral – Ray Dolphin Aubergine – Selma Dabbagh The Logger – Susi Klare
