Guernica Editions

The Midwife of Torment & Other Stories is a collection of sudden fiction that compresses its narrative to deliver a variety of stories that alternate the flavour of a philosophical reflection with the whimsical enchantment of a fable with a twist. These stories also often dwell on the strange--and the horror--found in our mundane lives. Stories that, on occasion, also leap as far as speculative fiction or swirl in a lyrical exploration of prose narratives. Divided into six sections, Midwife explores human and non-human voices through narrative weighing at less than one thousand words, and the vast majority weighing at less than five hundred. Included are a series of black and white lithograph-like original drawings commissioned specifically for this manuscript from the Portuguese visual artist, João Ventura.

You walk out. You walk out as if you had no plans to return. I say no, don't go. I say it in the only way I know: a sigh and a lowering of the eyes.--From "The Wait"

Reviews

• Calling Us Into Seeing
  CWA - October 2, 2017

Links

• paulo da costa featured on Canadian Writers Abroad
• paulo da costa: Focus on Victoria
• paulo's Open Book Interview