Dreamers and Misfits of Montclair
November 1, 2019 from Exile Editions
Available now from Exile Editions, Amazon, Indigo, or your local independent bookstore.
“Paterson’s writing shines throughout Dreamers and Misfits of Montclair. His language is concrete, poetic, and radiant.” — Literary Review of Canada
“Throughout this collection, the sweet and bitter, the ordinary and odd commingle. Paterson provides us with a lovingly resolute reminder that even in the suburbs, anything – like requited love, courtesy of a gorilla suit – is possible.” — Montreal Review of Books
Tim walks down the main street of town dressed in a gorilla costume. Merry finds diversion in Adam and the Ants lyrics, television show novelizations, and an obsession with her blind neighbour. Alex and John, teenage brothers living under the control of overprotective parents, discover a window to the outside world in a radio show hosted by a psychic.
Welcome to Montclair, a fictional yet familiar suburb of Montreal. At the heart of this short story collection is the struggle for individuality by characters who – out of restlessness, out of nothing – make life on the outskirts of the big city a little bit remarkable for themselves. With a warm, funny, and nuanced voice, and flitting in time between the 1980s, 1990s, and today, Dreamers and Misfits of Montclair explores the little wild spaces of the suburbs, hidden away in overgrown fields behind strip malls, in dark crawlspaces beneath concrete schoolyard staircases, and in the hearts and minds of its inhabitants.
Read “What Have You Done?” from Dreamers and Misfits of Montclair in The Puritan.
A Finely Tuned Apathy Machine (Exile Editions, 2007)
“Compellingly narrated with a slacker’s eye for the bizarre.” – The Globe & Mail
“With this book, Paterson secures his place in the ranks of fellow Montrealers Neil Smith and Barry Webster, of Mark Anthony Jarman and the Americans Denis Johnson and George Saunders: all writers who trade in the zany, the pell-mell, the lunatic and absurd.” – The Malahat Review
“Mark can turn a dark and twisted and hysterical phrase with the best of them and his second collection, like his first, Other People’s Showers, strikes many nerves on the agony and ecstasy of dysfunctionality.” – The Montreal Gazette
Other People’s Showers (Exile Editions, 2003)
“Fiction from just the other side of normal.” – Hour
“Paterson’s unique blend of tenderness, humour and horror is engaging.” – The Montreal Gazette
Short Stories
“To Disappear Around Here” | The Puritan (Runner-up, 2020 Thomas Morton Prize, fiction category)
“My Uncle, My Barbecue Chicken Deliveryman” | CVC8 – Carter V. Cooper Short Fiction Anthology Series, Book 8 (Exile Editions, 2019)
“The Blind Man’s House” | ELQ/Exile: The Literary Quarterly
“The Canadian Accent” | That Dammed Beaver (Exile Editions, 2017)
“A Line Home” | Winner – Fiction Category in the Atwater Library’s 150 Words for 150 Years Writing Contest
“What Have You Done?” | The Puritan
“Plaza Montclair, Early Spring” | carte blanche
“The Dad was Drinking” | carte blanche
“Salut King Kong” | Salut King Kong: New English Writing from Quebec (Véhicule Press, 2014)
“Merry du Terminus” | carte blanche
“Little Brother, Remember the Christmas?” | Rover
“Something Important and Delicate” | carte blanche and CellStories
“Apocalypse, as Viewed From the Family Room” | Joyland
“Spring Training” | Geist
“Body Noises with the Door Open” | carte blanche
“Her Plastic Daisy and the Canadian Water to Grow It” | ELQ/Exile: The Literary Quarterly
“Hot Dogs on Everything” | carte blanche
“The IGA Kissing Bandit” | Lust for Life: Tales of Sex and Love (Véhicule Press, 2006)
“All the Way to the Dump” | Matrix
“Bester McNally’s Fowl Tale” | lostpages
“Creamed Corn Finale” | Lichen
“Red Pants on Monkland” | Pottersfield Portfolio
“Not Your Personal Ashtray” | The Dalhousie Review
“Other People’s Funerals” | ELQ/Exile: The Literary Quarterly
“The Ketchup We Were Born With” | Island Dreams: Montreal Writers of the Fantastic (Véhicule Press, 2003)
“Other People’s Showers” | Career Suicide! Contemporary Literary Humour (DC Books, 2003)
“Hanging Murray” | Espresso Fiction
“Some Hemorrhaging for Jack” | Espresso Fiction
“Gay: A Fairy Tale” | Broken Pencil
“Dirty Montreal” | Pagitica
“Saturday Night” | Telling Stories: New English Fiction from Québec (Véhicule Press, 2002)
“Pit” | Blood + Aphorisms
“Shit Bird” | Fruits of the Branch (Canadian Authors AssociationMontreal, 2001)
“Counting to Prettidase-Nine” | subTerrain
Non-fiction
“What We Talk About When We Talk About 1994” | Souvenir program for Montreal Baseball Project’s gala to mark the 20th anniversary of the 1994 Montreal Expos
“The 1977 Discovery of Gravity in the Tim Hortons Parking Lot” | CBC Canada Writes
“Bay Area Freezers” | CBC Canada Writes
“Looking Back on Gulch Creek Holdup” | Rover
Reviews
“Multiple Universes Now” | Where Did You Sleep Last Night by Lynn Crosbie (House of Anansi Press, 2015) | Rover
“The Pull of Julie Paul” | The Pull of the Moon by Julie Paul (Brindle & Glass, 2014) | Rover
“Sad Songs Say So Much” | Life Is About Losing Everything by Lynn Crosbie (House of Anansi Press, 2012) | Rover
“Corpse Pose” | Suitable Precautions by Laura Boudreau (Biblioasis, 2011) | Rover
“Working Girl” | The Big Dream by Rebecca Rosenblum (Biblioasis, 2011) | Rover
“True Gloom” | Something About the Animal by Cathy Stonehouse (Biblioasis, 2011) | Rover
“Out of Nowhere” | Bats or Swallows by Teri Vlassopoulos (Invisible Publishing, 2010 | Rover
“Delight, then Bite” | Up Up Up by Julie Booker (House of Anansi Press, 2011) Rover
“Fine Young Pyromaniacs” | Krakow Melt by Daniel Allen Cox (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2010) | Rover
“This Isn’t Your Father’s Canadian Notes & Queries” | Canadian Notes & Queries #79, The Short Story Issue | Rover
“Forever Young” | The End of the Ice Age by Terence Young (Biblioasis, 2010) | Rover
“In Praise of Strange Little Books” | The Olive and the Dawn by Ian Orti (Snare Books, 2009) | Rover
“Some of My Best Friends are Twenty-Five” | Holding Still For As Long As Possible by Zoe Whittall (House of Anansi Press, 2009) | Rover
“For Those About to Black Out (We Salute You)” | Selected Blackouts by John Goldbach (Insomniac Press, 2009) | Rover
“Things to Do in Heaven When You’re Dead” | Heaven Is Small by Emily Schultz (House of Anansi Press, 2009) | Rover
“The Story is in the Details” | The Mountain Clinic by Harold Hoefle (Oberon Press, 2008) | Rover
“Fried Cheese and Ass-Grabbing Par Excellence” | Once by Rebecca Rosenblum (Biblioasis, 2008) | Rover
untitled | A Small Dog Barking and Other Stories by Robert Strandquist (Anvil Press, 2005) | Matrix (#75)
untitled | A Short Journey by Car by Liam Durcan (Véhicule Press, 2004) | Matrix (#71)
untitled | An Opening Act of Unspeakable Evil by Jim Munroe (No Media Kings, 2004) | Matrix (#70)
Mark Paterson 