NEW HOPE INTERNATIONAL REVIEW ON-LINE

I had never come across the Canadian magazine FRONT & CENTRE before, but I'm glad that I did. This sixth issue is very plain and utilitarian in appearance, and the editor, Matthew Firth, devotes his editorial to telling us why. And none of the authors' names meant anything to me. So far, not so good. But the emphasis has therefore been put on the fiction — six stories in this issue, and all worth reading. Good after all!

Todd Besant's I REALLY LIKED IT AND YOU LIKED IT TOO turns from a sample shot of semi-criminalised low life, into the sort of story that has a sting in the tail of its last line and leaves you feeling actually sympathetic towards the main character, who now may well not be anything like as bad as you thought.

DON'T by Andrea Samuelson is a surreal look at the goings-on in a stationer's shop — the staff politics right out of THE OFFICE on a bad day. But then there are the customers, and one in particular with a very vital message.

PUNCTURE by Alan Ram is a mixed-up narrative about mixed-up and lost people trying to get somewhere. Like travelling on Britain's motorway network, PUNCTURE often takes a long time to get absolutely anywhere, and you don't know who you might meet on the way, or what they'll want. But it will be like a slap in the face.

Rick Taylor's BOX 4335 is less than a page long, but has all the more impact for that, as an assignation goes wrong — or is the way it should be?

THE HAPPENING by Laura Hird is a black comedy of the morning after the night before with all the goings-on that no-one can remember. Until they do start to remember, and the memories fall back into place and it was even worse than you imagined you could possibly remember. This one would make a good short film or radio play.

CZECHS by Harold Hoefle is not just a pun on those who collect welfare cheques (as the characters in the story do), but on the relationships of Anton and Jan, Czech immigrants to Canada, and Harold, who is slumming it in the same rooming house. As the men's circumstances change and improve, their adaptability also means that they move apart, mentally as well as in physical distance.

The issue is rounded off with a few pages of reviews of small-press books by authors that (again) I've never heard of. All my loss, clearly, as FRONT & CENTRE is a lively small magazine, that can publish vivid and vigorous fiction. Well worth a look.