Friend. Follow. Text. Interview.

It's true. Editor Shawn Syms talks Friend. Follow. Text. with the Trevor Corkum. So please do hit that. It just might change your life. Excerpt? Coolness.

What can readers expect from the anthology?

A diverse and eclectic set of stories, each of which reflects upon both the specific and the universal. While I like to think the book has a great flow to it, it is certainly not homogeneous in either form or content. This is a modern, contemporary book reflective of a non-monochromatic world, and as such there is a lot of variety both among the contributors – as just a few examples, there are younger and older storytellers, racialized and non-racialized authors, and writers varied in sexual and gender identities – and across the subjects and themes that they contemplate.

And while the contributors to Friend. Follow. Text. deal with serious and occasionally intense topics  – fertility, sexuality, death, relationship collapse and renewal – their work is leavened with humour as well. In fact, my publisher told me the pieces that made him laugh out loud are the ones that sealed the deal. I hope that readers will be intrigued and moved, and that they may see a bit of themselves in many of the characters in these pages.

I’m extremely proud of the book, and that stems directly from the uniformly high quality of the contributors’ efforts. I can say pretty confidently that I think anyone who picks up this book will find the modest cover price to be money well spent.