Overview
Motion Sickness is a flash novel consisting of 55 chapters of exactly 500 words each and accompanied by a wood-cut like, scratchboard illustration that follows one young woman's humorous and poignant misadventures in the worlds of employment, friendship, dating, birth control and abortion. The illustrations are dark and somewhat whimsical as is the text. Penelope, the twenty-year-old narrator is a guitarist who writes some lyrics, has a good colour sense and a social conscience. She has kicked a drug habit and is now mainly drinking and sometimes jamming in after-hours clubs as well as writing letters of protest. She finds herself increasingly attracted to Theo, a slightly older bass player who turns out to be married and who shares a similarly poetic take on the world, but who, unlike her, sticks with people and jobs. A drugged threesome involves the very sexy but potentially violent Stan who becomes a frightening stalker. But Theo remains a stable anchor and it slowly becomes clear to both of them, as well as to Theo’s wife, and Stan, that their developing relationship is not to be ignored. A smart, engaging novel about a young woman finding her way in the world.
Ursula Pflug
Ursula Pflug is author of the novels Green Music, The Alphabet Stones and Motion Sickness; the story collections After the Fires and Harvesting the Moon; and the novellas Mountain and Down From. Her award-winning short fiction has appeared internationally in prestigious genre and literary publications for decades. Pflug has won small press awards in the U.S. from Dark Regions and Rose Secrest, and, in Canada, has been a finalist for the Aurora Award, the 3-Day Novel Contest, the Descant Novella Award, the ReLit Award, the KM Hunter Award, the Sunburst Award, and others. She is a Pushcart nominee. She lives in Norwood, Ontario./p
SK Dyment
SK Dyment is a writer and visual artist with a love of political cartooning. SK likes take to the stage at open mic events to perform poetry, short prose and stand-up work and they have written several plays which were produced at Buddies In Bad Times Theatre. Their illustrations were most recently published in Ursula Pflug’s flash fiction novel, Motion Sickness, which was longlisted for the ReLit Award. Their humour and cartooning work has appeared in a number of magazines including, Peace Magazine, This Magazine, Open Road Magazine, Healthsharing, Herizons, Kinesis, The Activist Magazine, Kick It Over Magazine, and Fireweed. Steel Animals is their debut novel.
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