January 2026 newsletter
issue 1, volume 23
Only three days left to submit!
Our biennial Novella Prize deadline is almost here. Submit your 10,000- to 20,000-word stories for a chance to win $2,000 and publication in our summer issue. Deadline is February 1, 2026 at 11:59pm PST.
This year’s judges:
Rob Benvie
Liz Harmer
Looking for interviews with them? Click their names to read more about what they’re looking for in a winning novella.
Entry fee (includes a one-year print subscription):
CAD $35 for each entry from Canada
CAD $45 for each entry from elsewhere
CAD $15 for each additional entry, no limit
Jayli Wolf interviews Jenna Timmons-Oikawa, issue #233 poetry contributor
JW: You name unceded Anishinaabe Algonquin territory in your bio. How does being rooted in that place (both land and home) influence how and what you write?
JTO: […] This has become complicated for me in the past few years. I am very proud of my father, who would have fought and given his life for this country and the people in it. I am also ashamed of my country, what it has done to people in my own family, and what it has done and continues to do to the people of this country and this land. I carry these two truths simultaneously, and grapple with them in my writing. How can I be proud to be Canadian when Canada would have liked to erase my mom from existence, and when they couldn’t do that, tried the best they could to erase her history and heritage? They were almost successful in keeping her from finding her way back. Yet, she is rising, as am I, on this journey of discovery to become whole.
I live in the political centre of Canada. There is beautiful architecture and ugly politics everywhere. There are people living in our country without running or safe water. It feels surreal. How is this happening here? The why seems disgustingly obvious.
I live on stolen land, and my mom was stolen. I think this all comes into play when I write, and it is always in my mind.
Tori Gosse interviews Hayden Park, winner of 2025’s Constance Rooke CNF Prize
TG: Are there themes from “The First Law of Adoptee Physics” that you feel you’re still exploring, or are you moving into new creative territory?
HP: The adoption themes aren’t going away. Identity as contradiction, the body wanting to belong, what you owe the people who made you, I think I’ll be working through those questions for the rest of my life. But I’m also trying to find the joy in it, not just the grief. There’s something fierce about being a beloved forgery. The love that built me wasn’t guaranteed by genetics. It was chosen, every day, on purpose. The wound that makes the music possible isn’t only a wound. It’s also the opening that lets the sound escape.
Jenna Timmons-Oikawa interviews Jayli Wolf, issue #233 poetry contributor
JTO: […] The speaker knows winter in a way the geese never will, is there for not only the death but the awakening. With this change, there is a sense of belonging, juxtaposed with a sense of being stuck—a lovely push/pull. How did the poem evolve as you wrote it?
JW: I was drinking my coffee down at the river when I heard the geese returning. The thought of them being unaware of the last season, and never really knowing winter in the way that I do, struck me. The title goose tales originally carried that fairy-tale softness you mention, but as I wrote, the poem showed me how much I wish I could leave for certain seasons too.
The séance image arrived from listening to the meadow on the walk home from the river, standing in the aftermath of winter and knowing what it costs to survive a season like that, even for the bullfrogs.
The geese can leave and return. The speaker stays. The frogs stay. There is belonging in that, an intimacy with cycles of death and awakening, but also a quiet entrapment.
2026 Open Season Awards winners
Congratulations to Cassandra Myers (top left; poetry), Andrea Bishop (top centre; fiction), and Stephanie Harrington (top right; creative nonfiction), winners of our 2026 Open Season Awards!
Many thanks to judges Manahil Bandukwala (bottom left; poetry), H. Felix Chau Bradley (bottom centre; fiction), and Shane Neilson (bottom right; creative nonfiction).
Thank you also to all of our valued staff and volunteers for their work, as well as all who entered for your support of our contest and the magazine.
Name acknowledgement & the Malahat Nation
When The Malahat Review was founded in 1967 at the University of Victoria, the name “Malahat” was taken and used without consultation, permission, or acknowledgment. In response to our desire to make right this wrong, the Malahat Nation has graciously offered the words that follow.
Malahat Nation is part of the W̱SÁNEĆ People, one of five Nations with deep roots along the lands and waters of southern Vancouver Island. Our people speak SENĆOŦEN, hul’q’umi’num’, and Samish—traditional languages that carry our teachings, stories, and responsibilities.* We are a Coast Salish Nation, living and working together as we walk forward in a good way.
latest issue: winter #233
Guest Editor Richard Van Camp
Cover art by Kristi Bridgeman
Art by Jenn Ashton, Crystal Behn, Kristi Bridgeman, Samantha Erron Gibbon, giiwedinongkwe, Hali Heavy Shield, Michael J. Leeb, Autumn Moosehunter, Heather Rampanen, Syndel Thomas Kozar
Poetry by ʕAʔíCKʷALAʔ, Jennifer Adese, Michelle Poirier Brown, Cathi Charles Wherry, Henry Heavyshield, Mika Lafond, Samantha Martin-Bird, Victor Hugo Mendevil, Autumn Moosehunter, Shantell Powell, Athena Serbourne, Raymond Sewell, Syndel Thomas Kozar, Jenna Timmons-Oikawa, Jayli Wolf
Fiction by Brandon Bobb, Jessie Conrad, Francine Cunningham, Annie MacKillican, Mason Mantla, Jason Pearce, Daly Quintal, Kieran Kalls Rice, Stacie VanEvery
Creative nonfiction by Lareina Abbott, Odette Auger, Dayne Brelyn, Joely BigEagle-Kequahtooway, Jaymie Campbell, Marion Erickson, Marshall Hill
Reviews of new books by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, Chris M. Cannon, Andrea Currie, Jennifer David, Kyle Edwards, Sarain Frank Soonias, Dallas Hunt, Patty Krawec, Chyana Marie Sage, and Shannon Webb-Campbell