Small Change

A collection of linked stories that navigate the difficult realm of friendship, charting its beginnings and endings, its intimacies and betrayals, its joys and humiliations.

These twenty superbly crafted linked stories navigate the difficult realm of friendship, charting its beginnings and ends, its intimacies and betrayals, its joys and humiliations. A mother learns something of the nature of love from watching her young daughter as she falls in and out of favour with a neighbourhood girl. An intricate story of two women reveals a friendship held together by the steely bonds of passivity. A chance sighting in a library prompts a woman to recall the “unconsummated courtship” she was drawn into by a male colleague. With trenchant insight, uncommon honesty, and dark humour, Elizabeth Hay probes the precarious bonds that exist between friends. The result is an emotionally raw and provocative collection of stories that will resonate with readers long after the final page.

Elizabeth Hay is the author of five books, including Small Change and A Student of Weather. Her books have been shortlisted for a number of awards, including Canada's two most prestigious, The Governor General's Award and the Giller Prize. She recently won the Marian Engle Award for a woman writer in mid-career. She lives in Ottawa.