Jai Britton: Flash Fiction Editor

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Jai Britton was born in Saskatchewan where she learned to spell long words at an early age. She has studied the art of lying under the tutelage of Canada’s top playwright, Ken Mitchell, and also Joanne Gerber, best new short fiction book award winner.

Jai lives in the beautiful foothills of the Rocky Mountains. She was a semi-finalist for the televised version of the 3-Day Novel Contest (twice!) and a winner of the National Novel Writing Month contest for her first full length work The Atomic Weight of Homelessness. Her second novel, One Headlight, is in the drawer with the first.  She is currently stalling on another novel project ironically called interruption while filling her time writing bad poetry and long letters.

She is a student of early American literature and a lover of Greek mythology. She enjoys short fiction that stings like the business end of a broken beer bottle.

Jai was rewarded with presence of good company when she made Wigleaf Magazine’s shortlist for the Top 50 Short Fiction Writers of 2007.  Other nominees include Robert Bly, Russell Edson, Steve Katz, and ZZ Packer to name a few.

Some recent online work includes:

Gloom Cupboard #86

Word Riot

Toasted Cheese 

A Sample of Jai’s Fiction:

Excerpt from interruption:

My father used to love stories about the unreal, especially Ripley’s Believe It or Not! or old reruns of the Twilight Zone. He would get so immersed my mother would have to remind him to eat his sandwich and put down that picture of the two-headed cow because it wasn’t improving her appetite at all.

My brother, Bill, had found a dying sparrow on the road one winter, wrapped it in his scarf, and brought it home. He kept it hidden outside knowing my mother wouldn’t approve (would freak right out to Mars, is how he put it) and hoped it would survive until my father arrived home from work that evening.

When my father came down the street, Bill flew out to meet him nearly knocking him down in his anticipation to show him the sparrow. Together they went to where Bill had stashed it. Heads together they bent over to look at the dying creature. From the window I saw my father’s boot rise and fall, swiftly crushing the bird. Bill’s mouth hung open and he turned to my father with giant tears in his eyes. My father picked up the dead bird body without a word to Bill and strode to the fence, dumping it over and out of our yard.

Bill stormed into the house and slammed his bedroom door. He didn’t come out for supper. He didn’t come out to watch Cliffhanger! (which was his favourite television show).  He didn’t come out to brush his teeth.

I awoke at about midnight to hear my father whispering in Bill’s room. My father was saying in a gentle voice, “There is nothing unusual about death, Bill. You can’t pretend there is.” A pause. A heavy sigh. “Are you listening? Death is the dumbest person I know. He’s not clever at all. He doesn’t have to be.”