Transactions with the Fallen

In this new collection of short stories, author Michael Elcock explores a variety of inner worlds and lived experiences: survival and betrayal in Germany after World War II ... life in the Scottish highlands ... trouble with army ants ...

Michael Elcock's stories enchant, disturb and remind us of the many worlds we inhabit. Touching on intimate moments and interactions, not a lot happens in these intertwined tales, and that is precisely their strength. A young man sits with an older woman one evening and learns about love. A soldier coaxes music out of a battered piano in an attempt to stay alive. Transactions with the Fallen is a study of human relationships told with an exacting eye for detail and the resonant moment.

---Eve Joseph, Griffin Poetry Prize Winner, 2019

There's a lot to be learned from other people's childhoods-and from other people's adulthoods too, if they've been lucky enough to have one. When they're luckier still, there's a lot to be learned from other people's imaginations. In this remarkable book of stories, Michael Elcock offers us the fruits of all three: a rich, multifaceted childhood, a robust, thoughtful adulthood, and a lively, athletic imagination.

---Robert Bringhurst, author, poet, and recipient of the British Columbia Lieutenant Governor's Award for Literary Excellence

Michael Elcock's stories enchant, disturb and remind us of the many worlds we inhabit. Touching on intimate moments and interactions, not a lot happens in these intertwined tales, and that is precisely their strength. A young man sits with an older woman one evening and learns about love. A soldier coaxes music out of a battered piano in an attempt to stay alive. Transactions with the Fallen is a study of human relationships told with an exacting eye for detail and the resonant moment.

---Eve Joseph, Griffin Poetry Prize Winner, 2019

There's a lot to be learned from other people's childhoods-and from other people's adulthoods too, if they've been lucky enough to have one. When they're luckier still, there's a lot to be learned from other people's imaginations. In this remarkable book of stories, Michael Elcock offers us the fruits of all three: a rich, multifaceted childhood, a robust, thoughtful adulthood, and a lively, athletic imagination.

---Robert Bringhurst, author, poet, and recipient of the British Columbia Lieutenant Governor's Award for Literary Excellence

Born in Forres in the north of Scotland, Michael Elcock grew up in Edinburgh and West Africa. He emigrated to Canada at age twenty-one and now lives on Vancouver Island with his family. A memoir about his travels to Belfast, Malta, Hawaii, Prague, Paris, Oman, and Andalusia, entitled A Perfectly Beautiful Place, was published in 2004. His second non-fiction work, Writing on Stone (2006), examined the idea of emigration, exploring questions of memory and identity that come with leaving roots behind and putting down new ones. His first novel, The Gate, a tale of loss and reconciliation set mainly in the last winter of World War II, was published in 2012, and a fictionalised memoir, Eyes of Rain and Ragged Dreams: Coming of Age in Edinburgh, in 2017.

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