Danuta Gleed Award Shortlist

BULL HEAD has made the shortlist for the Danuta Gleed Literary Award. The Award recognizes the best first English-language collection of short fiction by a Canadian author published in 2012. 

Other nominees include Rebecca Lee, Paul Marlowe, Anton Piatigorsky, and Yasuko Thanh.

For more details on the award and each nominated book, click here.

Booklist: "Impressive Debut Collection"

Recently, Booklist reviewed BULL HEAD and had some great things to say about it: "Muscular, lyrical prose ... The characters, mostly men toughened byhardscrabble living, are drawn with understanding, insight, and brutal honesty....

"This impressive debut collection will appeal to readers of literary fiction like James Dickey's Deliverance, Larry Brown's Joe, and Annie Proulx's Wyoming stories."

The full review can be found here.

CBC Bookie Awards

It was a nice surprise to discover that BULL HEAD is up for a CBC Bookie Award in the category "The Overlookie Bookie Award for Most Underrated Canadian Book."

For more info and to vote on the book or any others, go here.

Reading on Salt Spring Island, April 6

I'm looking forward to reading and discussing BULL HEAD at the "Short, Sharp, Sweet: A Celebration of the Short Story" on Salt Spring Island. The reading takes place on Saturday, April 6, from 7-9pm at the Salt Spring Island Public Library.

Full details of the event can be found here.

Publishers Weekly Review: "Muscular Debut"

Ahead of BULL HEAD's publication in the US, Publishers Weekly gave the book a great review.

"Hard, violent lives are the common denominator, and clouded resolve speaks volumes. And while there is bravado on display, Vigna also prods the underbelly of these emotions, revealing the insecurities of man."

Read the full review here.

"A tense, vitriolic collection..."

Broken Pencil magazine recently reviewed BULL HEAD - here is a brief excerpt.

"Bull Head offers both a lamentation and a condemnation for a type of masculinity that no longer exists, fuelled by blue collar, salt-of-the-earth toughness and emotional stoicism. When forced into a corner, these men turn to violence as a solution to their problems. Whether through a fistfight between friends, shooting and killing a doe, or kicking a pit bull in the ribs, this blunt behaviour gives these characters temporary surges of strength and confidence, allowing them brief respite from their assorted emotional prisons."

Read the full review here.

"Gripping Mountain Gothic Literature"

The wise and generous Bob Ede, over at East Kootenay News Online Weekly (e-know.ca), asked me some insightful questions in a wide-ranging interview that gets to the heart of process in writing BULL HEAD.

The interview sheds light on violence, William Faulkner, Cormac McCarthy and Flannery O'Connor, the harsh beauty of the Elk Valley, curses, the changing role of men, and the importance of basketball in my life.

To read the full interview, go here.