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Planet Earth: Stories
International-award-winning stories of life and love in the midst of planetary decline.
In Planet Earth, Nicholas Ruddock moves nimbly through a range of styles—from conventional to flash-fiction to his unique mastery of the long sentence—in stories exploring themes of love and passion, all with an awareness of our species-specific carelessness burning up the world.
This collection showcases a gifted writer at the top of his game, each story fresh and the time Mario Vargas Llosa sucker-punched Gabriel García Márquez at a theatre in Mexico City inspires a young Marxist couple’s violent act of revenge in Toronto years later; an anxious young man finds solace in the employ of Prince, the musician; a haunting glimpse of Toronto’s polio epidemic at its peak in 1953; a young Canadian student bears witness to the Algerian protests and police violence in 1961 Paris; a pair of naïve young women find themselves involved with a mysterious circus troupe in Nice. These provocative but contemplative stories are paradoxically positive and quick-witted, with a humorous fondness for humans and all our failings.
In Planet Earth, Nicholas Ruddock moves nimbly through a range of styles—from conventional to flash-fiction to his unique mastery of the long sentence—in stories exploring themes of love and passion, all with an awareness of our species-specific carelessness burning up the world.
This collection showcases a gifted writer at the top of his game, each story fresh and the time Mario Vargas Llosa sucker-punched Gabriel García Márquez at a theatre in Mexico City inspires a young Marxist couple’s violent act of revenge in Toronto years later; an anxious young man finds solace in the employ of Prince, the musician; a haunting glimpse of Toronto’s polio epidemic at its peak in 1953; a young Canadian student bears witness to the Algerian protests and police violence in 1961 Paris; a pair of naïve young women find themselves involved with a mysterious circus troupe in Nice. These provocative but contemplative stories are paradoxically positive and quick-witted, with a humorous fondness for humans and all our failings.
184 pages, Paperback
Published November 4, 2025
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January 3, 2026
A pretty standard mix of stories that spoke to me & stories that did not. However, as a champion of the art of conciseness, I did appreciate how I found a number of the two page stories more powerful and effective than the longer tales. An interesting mix.
Displaying 1 of 1 review