Following in the tradition of Edgar Allan Poe and Oscar Wilde, St. John's author Mike Heffernan has created an anthology of uniquely east-coast fiction: twisted, macabre, eery and compelling. The fourteen stories include work by such award-winning writers as Michael Crummey, Ramona Dearing, Jo-Anne Soper-Cook and many others. The foreword has been written by another award-winning Newfoundland writer - Kathleen Winter.

Hard Ol' Spot is full of visceral imagery. Readers will be confronted by immigrant strangers in lonesome towns, and a suburb where rape is a girl's first romance. These are stories of lost dreams, oceans that can swallow a man whole, and tales where personal sorrow is whipped by the wind until it becomes bitter and bloody.

For anyone who likes their literature written with a ragged quill pen, a messy inkpot, and a sinister edge, Hard Ol' Spot brings us the dark beauty of Atlantic-Canadian fiction.

Mike Heffernan was born and raised in St. John's, Newfoundland. He is the author of the national bestseller Rig: An Oral History of the Ocean Ranger Disaster, which was adapted to the stage by Rising Tide Theatre and the Arts and Culture Center, and The Other Side of Midnight: Taxicab Stories. His work has appeared in Riddle Fence, This Magazine, Our Times and been performed on CBC Radio. Let It All Fall: Underground Music and the Culture of Rebellion in Newfoundland, 1977-95 is his latest book.

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