ICYMI: Check out my interview in @Macleans Magazine!
Maclean’s Magazine, the largest political commentary national magazine in Canada, interviewed me and my boyfriend Gabe about our post-pandemic travel plans, and it was published online! It’s also going to be in the January 2021 print issue as well (can’t wait to get my hands on a copy!). During this time of closed borders and health concerns, travel has had to be pushed to the back burner. So we’re using this time to save money for a huge around-the-world trip that we hope we’ll be able to do in 2022, and we spoke all about the ins and outs of that feasibility with Maclean’s. Click here to read!
I’m so pleased that my life and the things I have to say always seems to catch the attention of the media. Even though I work in media, I usually write about other people and newsworthy topics. It’s nice to know that my own voice and experiences (along with my life partner, of course) are deemed by many to be newsworthy too.
Enjoy and don’t forget to visit my official Christine Estima dot com! There you’ll find and read all the times the media has profiled and interviewed me! Fanks for the support munchkins!
My latest essay in the @NYTimes: Taking Back My Eyebrows
So . . . this happened.
I sold an essay to The New York Times! They launched a new column in the Style section called Rites Of Passage, and I’m one of the first people to be published in it. I’ve been keeping a lid on this news for a while because, even after I sign a contract, I’m still never sure something will be published until I see it in print. Working with my editors at the Times was incredible, they were so kind and generous. This was a very quick process too, from submitting, to acceptance, to editing, to published. I’m so pleased with how it all turned out. Read it here!
One thing was edited out which I’ll share here: a behind the scenes look at some of things I wanted to say.
Well, I won’t tell you, I’ll show you:
I mean, it’s obvious why that wasn’t included in the final version, but as many of you already know, when it comes to my eyebrows, I GOT STORIES.
Thanks for the support, and if you want more, don’t forget to check out the official Christine Estima dot com, where you can read in full all of my published work!
Check out my latest #shortstory published in @PrismLitMag !
“Discussion Questions for Your Book Club,” my most recent short story, has been published in the new summer issue of Prism International, a literary magazine based out of B.C., and you can find it on the bookshelves nationwide now. I found a copy at Type Books! You can also order your copy online if you don’t live in Canada or near a book seller!
Plotless fiction! Why I never! Type Books, I resent that!
There’s a funny story behind this. So I’ve been a huge fan of Prism for years and have been trying to crack into their pages for over a decade. EASILY over a decade. Over the past year, I noticed that when I submitted a piece to their fiction editor (who recently left the mag….sad face!), he would reply with awfully kind and encouraging rejections. He was like, “I like this a lot. I can’t use it though. Submit to me again!”
So I kept submitting every time I had something new. And his replies were like, “Okay I laughed out loud at this, it’s hella-funny! Still can’t use it, but submit again!”
Personalized rejections are rare in this business, so I didn’t take his encouragement for granted. I kept trying and trying and trying. But, when you submit to magazines online using Submittable, you have to pay a small fee (which is standard across the board), so because I was submitting so much, he was like, “Your next submission is on me, just email it to me, and I’ll plug it into Submittable manually for you.”
Which was super duper kind of him, he didn’t have to do that at all. Anyway, it was that very free submission that turned out to be the winner. He got back to me and was like, “YAAS QUEEN.”
I’m paraphrasing of course.
But you get the idea.
TL;DR – Sure, talent is your most important asset, but you also need drive, ambition, patience, and persistence. If you don’t have those qualities, you won’t last. HUSTLE YOUR ASSES OFF, MY LITTLE CREATIVE MUNCHKINS.
One last thing I’ll say about this story — before I submitted it to Prism, I submitted it to Granta, a huuuuuuge literary magazine based out of the UK. They’re a big deal. They were doing a themed issue on Canada and were looking for Canadian writers and Canadian stories. The issue was edited by Canadian literary superstars Madeleine Thien and Catherine Leroux. Anyway, I got a rejection letter. Which is pretty standard in this industry, I get rejection letters all the time, and they’ve never bothered me. I’ve been lucky with some of the kind rejections I’ve received (like Prism!), but getting a personalized rejection is RARE. Like, it almost never happens. Boilerplate rejections are par for the course. So imagine my surprise when superstar Madeleine Thien added a personalized note at the bottom of the rejection letter!!
Sometimes, for a writer, all it takes is a little bit of encouragement and some nice words from a stranger to put you right again.
And almost directly following this, Prism was like, GURRRRRRL, this is dope. Done. Sold. Sign here.
Again. Paraphrasing.
Anyway, if you’ve read the story, I’d love your thoughts, comments, and feedback.
And as always, don’t forget to check out the official Christine Estima dot com for more of my published stories, essays, interviews, plays, and more!
Check me out on @CBC’s show Podcast Playlist!
Last year I performed at GRTTWaK, reading an entry from my 1996 diary which was hilarious and cringeworthy at the same time. It was a great experience where I ended up being included on GRTTWaK’s curated podcast. Well, the CBC show Podcast Playlist got wind of my performance and included it in this week’s edition, “As Seen On TV!”
If you want to give’r a listen, click here and fast forward to time index 48:00!
And if you want to watch this performance in full, including me trying to stifle a giggle as the audience laughs, you can watch it below!
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Last week I mentioned that I’d be reading at the Toronto launch of Room Magazine’s 40th Anniversary Anthology. Well it went great! A lot of people in the Canadian literary community showed up and I got to talk books, creativity, and the business with some incredibly talented and accomplished peers!
I’m so pleased that they included me in the anthology. There are more good things like this to come, things are happening and it’s all very exciting. I love being a writer, espesh a respected member of the Can. Lit. community!
As always, don’t forget to visit the official Christine Estima dot com to check out all of my published works, and all of the media attention I’ve garnered!
Come Watch Me Read at @RoomMagazine’s 40th Anniversary Celebration!
If you’re a longtime reader of this blog (which has officially been around for 12 years this month….), you might remember a decade ago when I sold a short story to Room Magazine. I posted about it here….my gosh that blog post hasn’t aged well. Also TMI, ESTIMA. Yeeesh.
Back then, Room was called Room Of One’s Own, but it’s always been an outlet for Canadian women to have feminist literature and art published. This was a big success for me at the time because I was still a novice, emerging writer with only a few successes under my belt. Also, I was still finding my style, voice, and form (which, for a writer, can take years).
In any case, recently Room contacted me to let me know they were putting together their 40th Anniversary Anthology and they wanted to include my short story!
Me: So you want to re-publish the same story a decade later?
Them: Yes.
Me: And you want to pay me a second time for the same story?
Them: Yes.
Me: What do you need me to do?
Them: Could you talk about it on social media?
Me: HOLD MY BEER.
In addition to this great honour, later this week they are having the Toronto launch party for the 40th Anniversary Anthology and they asked me to be one of the readers! Huzzah! Finally, a captive audience.
The event is the evening of April 22 at the Artscape Youngplace in the west end of Toronto, so if you’re about and free that evening, I’d love to see some familiar, friendly faces in the room. Get it? THE ROOM.
……(I’ll get my coat).
All the details for the even are here on the Facebook Event Listing so come out on Saturday and watch me be a huge ham in front of Can.Lit scenesters.
Also don’t forget to check the official Christine Estima dot com to read my published works and to check out all the great things I have coming up!
Check out my @VICE interview with #TIFF16 film director Alice Lowe
The Toronto International Film Festival was amazing this year, I saw so many films (as documented by this round-up I wrote for VICE last week), and the fest is always such an electric time to be on the streets of Toronto. Everything is alive.
Speaking of life, the film PREVENGE is about a pregnant woman whose fetus tells her to kill people. So OF COURSE I had to interview the director/writer/performer Alice Lowe. Check out what she had to tell me about women in the film industry and pregnancy stigmas over here on VICE.
Fun fact: I had first seen Alice Lowe in an episode of Sherlock (season 3 episode “Sign of Three“) and the whole time we were talking, her voice was just reminding me of one of her lines from Sherlock, “A GHOST, MR HOLMES!” and then a drunk Watson saying to her, “He’s clueing for looks.”
I am a gigantic nerd.
Check out the official Christine Estima dot com for more of my VICE essays and articles, and much more.
Everyday Struggles of the Hairy Woman: my latest essay published in @ViceCanada
Sometimes I really hate talking about this stuff, but writing is cathartic, and what is the point of being a writer if you don’t talk about the things that mortify you to an audience of millions, right? Oh boy.
My latest essay in VICE is about what it’s like having Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome and having to deal with the resulting hirsutism. Women aren’t allowed to have hair, if you didn’t already know, and the world won’t let us fucking forget it. The way we are shamed for having something that naturally grows on our bodies is outrageous, but if you’re like me, you’ve internalized that shame. It has definitely affected my self-worth and self-confidence, but most days no one actually knows that I deal with hirsutism because I am so vigilant about it now. Years of bullying will do that to you.
Anyway, it’s not all doom and gloom. There’s some humour in this piece too. Hope it makes you laugh! Click to read!
And don’t forget to check out the official Christine Estima dot com where you can read all of my published VICE essays, and more!
My latest short story, published in The Antigonish Review! @antigonishrevie
Head to the magazine section of your local book store and grab the new issue of literary magazine The Antigonish Review (issue 185). Turn to page 67 to read my new short story, “The Meat Disappears from the Bones.” I’m super excited about this because I’ve been trying to crack into TAR for a decade. They’re a super prestigious literary magazine from St. Francis Xavier University, and they’ve published the likes of Carol Shields, Rohinton Mistry, and Marshall McLuhan!
See. The medium IS the message.
Or in my case, the tedium is the message.
#SadTrombone
Anyway, normally I would post a scan of the first page of my story to pique your interest, but this time I thought I’d post the last page. See above! Hope you enjoy! Fanks for the support, munchkins!
And as always, visit the official Christine Estima dot com for all of my published works, performances, and press!
Check out my story in @subTerrain Magazine, on the shelves now!
Grab a copy of the current issue of subTerrain Magazine and turn to page 4 for my Creative Non-Fiction story, entitled “Rue Berri.” It’s a piece about my time in Montreal last year when I found the apartment my grandparents lived in during the 1940s. Above is a scan of the first page to whet your appetite. Included in the issue is also some of my original photography! See my hastily painted fingersnails there? SCHEXY.
Some of you have asked me where to find all these literary magazines in which I’m published. In Chapters/Indigo, you can find them in the Literature/Arts/Music section of the magazine racks. At indie book shops like Type Books or Drawn n’ Quarterly, just ask the clerks for help but those shops always have a large lit mag selection, so here’s a scan of the issue in which I appear so you can find it easily!
Working with the editors at subTerrain was a dream, they were so kind and helpful. I’m so honoured to be included in the pages of this amazingly beautiful issue, I’ve been trying to break into them since, I think, 2001 or 2002-ish, when I entered a crappy, crappy story into their Lush Triumphant contest. 15 years later – success! See? That’s how long it takes writers to improve. It’s a slow process indeed.
Happy reading!
And, as always, don’t forget to check out the official Christine Estima dot com for all of my published works, and more!
Check out my new story in the latest issue of @EVENTMags!
I’m really excited to share that my non-fiction story, ‘Spray It, Don’t Say It,’ has been published in the latest issue of Event Literary Magazine, that for decades has published the best short prose and poetry in the country. I have been trying to crack into Event for 10 years (they are notoriously selective!), so I was delighted when they snatched this up with such kind words for my voice and style. The piece is about my time as a waif on the streets of Europe
And here’s my EVENT bio. Awww yeeeeeeah, dis mah shit. This is only a slice of my publications, my full list of publications can be found here
You can pick up Event at any bookshop in the country. As always, don’t forget to check out the official ChristineEstima dot com for more of my writing, performances, and recent news!
Check out my column in @MetroNewsCanada
Pick up a copy of the weekend edition of Metro News and turn to the centrefold for my latest column. I talk about the language we employ when talking about race and ethnicity.
It was really great to work with the team at Metro, the whole process was very fast-paced and positive. It was such a challenge to put everything I wanted to say into a mere 400 words, I’m used to writing 1500-word essays, so I welcomed the challenge to be brief and succinct. BUT I’M SO LOQUACIOUS!
Also, funny sidenote: that photograph of me there… That was taken yesterday with my iPad as I sat in a café on Spadina. OH THE GLAMOUR.
Fanks for reading, my munchkins, and don’t forget to check out ChristineEstima.com for more on my writing career.
#Polska14: I’m being sent on a Polish adventure!
Some of you might remember in 2012 when I was invited by Eurail.com to blog & tweet my way across Europe using the rail network (read up on that month-long journey in my Eurail 2012 category!), or in 2011 when I was invited by VIA Rail to vlog and blog my way across Canada on the cross-Canada sleeper train The Canadian. There was even that weekend trip to Montreal for Labour Day 2011, courtesy of Ford Canada, who lent me a brand new Ford Fusion 2.5 for the roadtrip!
Now I’m very pleased to announce that the Ministry of Economy of the Republic of Poland and Ajencja M Promotion have invited me on a press/media trip (known in the travel industry as a FAM trip) to Warsaw, Lodz, and Poznan! The week-long trip will have a special focus on Polish history, environment and economy, which will culminate in my participation in the POLEKO 2014 conference in Poznan, which is the International Trade Fair of Environmental Protection. This trip was open solely to Canadian writers as the trip is part of the Polish Economy Promotion Program in Canada, and they want me to blog and tweet all about it!
I’m extra excited about this because I haven’t been to Poland since 2006 when I backpacked across Warsaw and Krakow (with a special trip to Auschwitz-Birkenau) and I really fell for the Polish landscape and people, so another visit has been long overdue!
The trip begins October 12th, so make sure to check this space, and also follow along with my adventures using the #Polska14 hashtag on Twitter.
So if you spot me mad-dashing through a few airport terminals over the next little while, you know why.
The Spadina Monologues 