Wait, what? 🫨

Why *is the Canadian government using British spelling though? Most of the time, to Canadian readers, it just looks unfamiliar. www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...

We are currently OPEN until Jan. 31, 2026 for Issue 34 journal submissions! www.thetemzreview.com/submissions....

Announcing the National Book Critics Circle 2025 Longlist for Fiction

You heard it here first: Jacob Elordi tells @beccamford.bsky.social he'd rather kiss on the beach than talk about AI vanityfair.com/hollywood/story/frankenstein-jacob-elordi-euphoria-interview

Seems like people are condemned to relearn this every day: LLM AIs will always have output errors (“hallucinations“). That’s just the nature of the beast. www.computerworld.com/article/4059...

NDP says Ontario report on intimate partner violence partly AI-generated, includes non-existent sources www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/artic...

"I fell in love with the idea that the mysterious thing you look for your whole life will eventually eat you alive." - Laurie Anderson explaining her attraction to Moby-Dick

Ah, age-based social media bans. The abstinence education of digital literacy.

Do we really have guaranteed rights and freedoms in this country if rouge premiers can suspend them at will, multiple times a month even, with, apparently, zero repercussions? www.thestar.com/news/canada/...

“…six years after leading body camera maker Axon Enterprise, Inc. said police use of facial recognition technology posed serious ethical concerns, the pilot project — switched on last week— is raising alarms far beyond Edmonton, the continent’s northernmost city of more than 1 million people.”

Do what you can to end suffering.

I can't stop thinking about the purported drug smugglers being murdered by the US military. The punishment for drug offenses isn't the death penalty. This is just bloodlust and men in suits playing with lives they don't care about. It's truly grotesque and gravely compromises this country.

Encouragingly similar to Mike Keller’s closing reflections encouraging deep reading, deep thinking, and deep respect in libraries, archives, and museums even as they engage critically with AI #ff2025

I voted, did you?! The work of good lit mags is so underrated.

I actually think it’s the perfect choice. It’s a bone bleached by sun, the 500 year old styrofoam still intact on polluted soil, a noxious fume billowing into sky, corporate minimalist interior, a splotch on an x-ray, the afterlives of the present.

that "Their brains worked less, but they 𝘧𝘦𝘭𝘵 just as engaged—a kind of metacognitive mirage.” jumped out at me. and just feels like such a capturing of current times. reminds me of watching a movie or TV show while second-screening — you 𝘧𝘦𝘦𝘭 just as engaged, but are probably missing a similar 47%

Grateful to Phillip Dwight Morgan and @thegrindto.bsky.social for giving me space to write about AS THE EARTH DREAMS, edited by Terese Pierre; TO PLACE A RABBIT by Madhur Anand; and THE BOOK OF RECORDS by Madeleine Thien. Check out Phill & Jody Chan's recs too!: www.thegrindmag.ca/our-favourit...

’Tis the season to give the gift of Brick! Send the finest in contemporary writing—essays, fiction, interviews, and poetry—for your loved ones to enjoy year-round. Save $5 on all one- and two-year gift subscriptions with code THEGIFTOFBRICK. brickmag.com/subscribe/

Subscribe your loved ones to literary magazines for the holidays

This is actually quite brilliant, up to and including the final sentence 🔥

The Canada-Alberta deal pushes a pipeline AND - Allows Alberta to delay cutting methane emissions - Suspends clean energy regulations in Alberta - Loosens restrictions on tax breaks for clean tech to encourage more oil drilling - Allows oil tankers on the west coast thenarwhal.ca/carney-alber...

More than six weeks after the Gaza ceasefire came into force, journalists are still prevented by the Israeli military from entering the Gaza Strip.

"A novel of remembering, of the times in our lives we carry around like a precious and hefty rock in our back pocket. A novel about learning to be—for ourselves—who we want to be." @junctionreads.bsky.social reviews celebrated writer Shani Mootoo's Starry Starry Night. tinyurl.com/mru8vept

The one thing I really miss about the 'older world' is browsing library stacks, and card catalogues. However much I appreciate databases and retrieving what I want in moments, the serendipity of 'the book next to the one I wanted' and 'the article in the same issue' cannot be replicated. #Libraries

Is it really Nov. 20? How is time passing like this!

“LLMs aren’t going away” statements are wishes, not predictions, that they’re trying to make happen. Treat them as advocacy for a specific future, not observations of inevitability

Folks in Ontario, please email your MPPs and urge them to vote no on Bills 60 & 33. We need to our government to invest in repairing and funding our schools and support strong tenant protections and real solutions to the housing crisis: win.newmode.net/ontarionewde...

Yes!! I want to put down my phone and get more subscription s.

Palestinian families call for help as Israel's two-year military assault has left hundreds of thousands vulnerable.

$1 billion data centre to maybe create 100 jobs. That's likely an overstatement. It is truly not worth draining the living word for this vampiric tech and people are starting to realize it. www.wisn.com/article/meta...

Save the date—Dec. 8—& celebrate the latest issue of @brickliterary.bsky.social with us: simpli.events/e/brick116

"B.C. forests were four times more likely to be logged inside recommended deferral zones than outside over the past four years." Wow.

I'm doing 2 workshop webinars for 1 price for the Writers Guild of Alberta on Writing Very Short Narratives and Book Publicity (that you can live with) Open to all! Recording available after. writersguild.ca/tickets-avai...

I would rather listen to a cat walking across a piano than any song made by generative AI

If you're a renter in Ontario, tell the FRPO to back off and withdraw support from Bill 60 (and email MPPs too, even if you already have!). share.nwmd.social/s/Si47Vbnp

Available for one more week.

One of the most beautiful things about the Irish is their respect for the arts. You find live music at most bars, I went to a literary pub crawl & saw monuments & museums dedicated to writers, poets, musicians, etc. They understand the value of supporting artists & I wish Canada did, too.

"...Canadian progressives for decades have — like the Democratic establishment in the U.S. — looked at the success of right-wing populists...and figured if voters were considering going that far right, then the solution was to moderate themselves to appear less left." Stop chasing the middle.

A webinar on writing Very Short Narratives was just the creative boost I needed last month. open.substack.com/pub/lizdsjoh...

Wow. So grateful for the words—and sounds!—of these alchemists. One week left to watch the lectures. Don’t miss your chance!

Read The World After Rain.

LET'S GO BLUE JAYS

Just a thought: How about we stop shaming the poor for buying things that may not be essential, and start shaming the rich for making a profit off things that are essential?

Bill 60 is outrageous in a province already inundated with mass homelessness. It further limits justice for tenants at the LTB, expedites evictions, and further incentivizes Landlord's Own Use evictions by slashing compensation to tenants. Unconscionable! news.ontario.ca/en/release/1...

Musician, writer and artist Leanne Betasamosake Simpson has a new album out this week. She talked to us about the need to "find awe and inspiration in every piece of the natural world ... regardless of how much harm they carry from extraction, neglect and exploitation." thenarwhal.ca/moose-questi...

repost this if an editor has ever saved you from yourself

NEW: David Piccini, the minister whose office picks Skills Development Fund recipients, was in Paris this weekend at the wedding of a lobbyist whose clients received millions from that fund. From me and @charliepinkerton.bsky.social. www.thetrillium.ca/news/politic...

this week during prime day sales take a moment and think about what you need, how quickly you need it, and where you might be able to get it in your community! It’s surprisingly easy to boycott the crummiest company on earth and there’s no shortage of great reasons to try start trying