First Things First: Selected Stories

First Things First gathers 18 of the best of Diane Schoemperlen?s earliest and uncollected stories, with several being published in book form for the first time. Playfully inventive, comic, moving and profound, this collection will reinforce Schoemperlen?s importance as one of the leading short story writers of her generation.

AUTHOR

Diane Schoemperlen

Diane Schoemperlen has published several critically acclaimed collections of short fiction and three novels, In the Language of Love (1994), Our Lady of the Lost and Found (2001), and At A Loss For Words (2008). Her 1990 collection, The Man of My Dreams, was shortlisted for both the Governor-General?s Award and the Trillium. Her collection Forms of Devotion: Stories and Pictures won the 1998 Governor-General?s Award for English Fiction, and her 2014 collection, By the Book: Stories and Pictures was compared to the works of Lydia Davis, David Markson and Padgett Powell by The New York Times Sunday Book Review. In 2008, she received the Marian Engel Award from the Writers? Trust of Canada. In 2012, she was Writer-in-Residence at Queen?s University. She lives in Kingston, Ontario.

Reviews

Praise for First Things First

“The pleasures of such a collection — spanning three decades — are that it provides a bounty of good reading while charting the growth of one of our most interesting and iconoclastic writers.”—Toronto Star

“A generous selection of early and uncollected stories to provide a cross-section of Schoemperlen’s output in the genre. This single-volume collection showcases the author’s skill and versatility.”—Quill & Quire

“Since 1974, Diane Schoemperlen has been producing fine, often-quirky and sardonic short stories about young Canadian women grappling with self-identity and elusive love … The stories are presented in the order in which Schoemperlen wrote them. The stories get better, more assured and more insightful, over the years. The final four are exceptional, highlighting the author’s strengths and giving three-dimensional pictures of authentic characters and their worlds.”—Dave Williamson, Winnipeg Review

Praise for Diane Schoemperlen

“There is no mistaking a Schoemperlen story—devoted to form, faithful to the mysteries of the everyday.”—The Globe & Mail

“Schoemperlen takes off from the modest launchpad of these seemingly simple concepts, soaring away in wholly unexpected directions. And we follow, thrilled by her quicksilver prose, warm humor, sexiness, precision, and tenderness.”—Booklist

“Schoemperlen’s inventive language and narrative structures encourage readers to be free ‘from the prison of everyday thinking.’”—The New York Times Book Review

“Lovely, clever [and] imaginative.”—The Wall Street Journal