Jonathan Ball and Chadwick Ginther
Please join us for December’s Book Chat, which will feature local authors Jonathan Ball and Chadwick Ginther. Come and listen as they read from and discuss their new anthology Shared World.
To be a part of this event, please email for the Zoom instructions.
About the authors:
Jonathan Ball is the author or editor of multiple books, including works of fiction, poetry, and nonfiction. He writes comics and screenplays as well, and offers writing courses and mentorship in private programs and through universities in Winnipeg. Jonathan is owner and publisher of Stranger Fiction Inc. and Martian Embassy Media.
Chadwick Ginther is the Prix Aurora Award nominated author of Graveyard Mind and the Thunder Road Trilogy. His short fiction has appeared in many magazines and anthologies, his story “All Cats Go to Valhalla” won the 2021 Prix Aurora Award for Best Short Story. He lives and writes in Winnipeg, Canada, spinning sagas set in the wild spaces of Canada’s western wilderness where surely monsters must exist.
About Shared World:
Four literary authors have co-created a shared horror-fantasy world and are inviting the readers of their two new books to add more stories.
Authors Jonathan Ball, GMB Chomichuk, James Gillespie and Chadwick Ginther have separately worked in multiple genres and won many awards for their work, including over 10 Manitoba Book Awards.
Now, they have co-authored an anthology of short sword-and-sorcery stories called Shared World, which launches at McNally Robinson on November 29, alongside a new collection of stories by Chadwick Ginther, Khyber, which are all set in the same shared world.
Shared World includes an introduction by bestselling horror author Silvia Moreno-Garcia and an afterward by YA fantasy author S. M. Beiko, who was also the editor of the first Shared World stories. Both books also feature illustrations by GMB Chomichuk.
The images and the fictional fantasy world itself are both heavily influenced by horror elements. The stories and the world blend the styles of Robert E Howard’s Conan the Barbarian, Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythos, and character-based literature.
The publication of Shared World and Khyber will coincide with the launch of a website, SharedWorld.ca, where readers can learn more about the fantasy world as it develops over time, about future books set in the Shared World, and contribute their own stories.
“Readers don’t have to just read about this world,” says Jonathan Ball. “They can also change the world by writing their own stories to add new elements. We wanted to not only tell stories but also have a foundation to teach creative writing and do some community building.”
Future anthologies set in the Shared World will collect reader-contributed stories alongside stories by already established horror-fantasy authors.
“A number of authors have already reached out to me to say they are extremely excited about this project and want to know how they can contribute their stories,” reports Chomichuk. “But the most important thing is that YOU can also contribute. First time authors and international bestsellers can all join the fun of writing stories set in our Shared World.”
