10 Canadian Short Stories to Read in 2025
Stay up to date with the latest literary voices and styles this spring season by reading 10 Canadian short stories published in 2025 (so far). Discover fresh perspectives, compelling voices, and innovative styles that have been discovered and published across our rich literary magazine landscape.
“The Reader” by Kayal Vizhi in Issue 114 of BRICK
“The girl is a reader, first and foremost. She lives in an apartment in a city that is not the city of her childhood. She waits tables and attends classes on English Literature. Daniel Gluck, the elderly interlocutor in Ali Smith’s Autumn, urges his young neighbour Elisabeth Demand to always be reading something…. Even when we’re not physically reading. How else will we read the world?”
“It is my 27th week at the Restaurant for Homesick Aliens, though it isn’t much of a restaurant, and I wouldn’t call myself homesick. But I guess I am an alien, this not being earth. There are no cooks or waiters, just row after row of vacuum-packed food and food equivalents organized by planet. Choose from over 300 pan-galactic menu items, then head over to the Insta-Gourmet (Iggy for short).”
“Roses for Bodies” by Luanne Gauvreau in Issue 302 of The Fiddlehead
“Early morning and Max had finished his first errand. He had two bars of the finest shaving soap in all of Florence in his jacket pocket. Smooth and rich, but not so soft that it disappeared in a frothy mess in your shaving cup; foam that kept its integrity with the soap. The way the foam of a good cappuccino remains a part of the coffee, he thought. Italians are good at foam. He had bought a bar of this soap early in his stay here and it had been a daily pleasure. This scent, in the morning, will come to mean Florence in his memory.”
“Lady with the Big Head Chronicle” by Angélique Lalonde published in Issue 125 of GEIST
“The lady with the big head wants me to keep writing about her even though I thought I had understood her story and typed it all up, then put that story in a book and shared it with other people. All along she knew I would keep going but didn’t let me in on her knowing. She relishes in showing me I am wrong about so many things because she is a somewhat ghost who appears and disappears to me, wearing veils that morph between the faces of my ancestors, descendants and kinfolk, the world that awes me, and all of the things I fear.”
“The Only Twin” by Joel Fishbane in Volume 12, Issue 2 of The Humber Literary Review
“We can’t all be like Lana Turner, discovered at a drugstore. But David Boreanaz was spotted while walking his dog and this, at least, gives me a reason to hope. It helps that my dog tends to attract attention. He’s a Borzoi, better suited for the Russian wilderness than the streets of Manhattan. Shaggy white with brown streaks. People often ask me about him and, someday, one of them might give me their card.”
“Kangalang” by Yasmin Rodrigues in Issue 229 of The Malahat Review
“Wash clothes shit on Saturday morning! Why? Why was she still living in this miserable backwater at Georgetown, British Guiana? In 1952, 1952, when everybody, everybody was getting ready for life, getting ready to study, to marry, and now, getting ready for elections, getting ready for freedom, getting ready to push the British out of British Guiana.”
“Southwesterly Winds” by Helen Knott in Issue 173 of The New Quarterly
“For a split second, Elizabeth saw the younger, livelier version of her mom that had existed two decades before. Back then, she had danced in that very same kitchen with her dad, her long straight jet-black hair swaying as she moved her head to the music that streamed in from the radio. She wore a dress that fanned out every time her dad twirled her. Sometimes in Elizabeth’s memory the dress was grey with a white floral print and other times it was blue with pink flowers, but she was in a dress, nonetheless.”
“Baked As You Like It” by Justina Bombard in Issue 45.4 of Prairie Fire
“Elaine paused, piping bag poised above the smooth red surface of the pie. She was very much aware her hair would be a gingham of powdered sugar when she took off her hairnet. “Be with you in just a minute.” She set the bag down, wiped her hands, stood at the counter. “Back again?””
“Cinderella Lives in North Montreal” by Joshua Goudie in Riddle Fence
“My fairy godmother drinks too much. She shows up most days with warm, sour breath, then falls asleep on the couch watching Maury Povich. Some days she’ll bring me a strawberry mille-feuille all squat inside a wax paper bag. I eat at the kitchen table, cleaning the crumbs with the tip of my finger, leaving behind sugar-sticky prints that are invisible until you tilt your head just right. On TV, people celebrate like guests at a surprise party. You are not the father! Everyone is screaming and jumping out of their seats. When I hear snoring, I switch the channel to play Mario Kart.”
“Someone Else’s Year” by Sabina Willmott in Yolk
The resolutions started because I didn’t want to be myself that year. I had done it forty times already and it was getting old. So was I.
The first was to drink more water. I usually avoided it. There was already so much of it inside me, rising wet from between my legs and under my arms when I ran. I went to the sink and put a mug under the tap. Unrinsed remnants of cold coffee sulked in its porcelain barrel; it didn’t matter. All things coalesce in the clutch of the stomach. The faucet spit up something that slid down my throat like oil. I was an engine. I was a firetruck.
