Ari Asho has made the 2023 CBC Short Story Prize longlist for Compliments to Change the Way You Feel About Me.

The winner of the 2023 CBC Short Story Prize will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, have their work published on CBC Books and win a two-week writing residency at Artscape Gibraltar Point. Four finalists will each receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and have their work published on CBC Books.

The shortlist will be announced on April 12 and the winner will be announced on April 18.

If you're interested in the CBC Literary Prizes, the 2023 CBC Poetry Prize is open for submissions until May 31.

Ari Asho is a prose writer living in Montreal. They draw inspiration from many sources, most recently environmental history, natural sciences and folktales. Their work under another name has been published in the Veg Literary Magazine. They are currently working on a collection of short stories and a novella.

"Longing for love, but fear."

"Lately I've been thinking a lot about the role of words and language in shaping our experience of the world and our relationships with each other, and I wanted to explore those themes in this story. I also wanted to deal with this fear of surrendering to greater natural forces. Compliments illustrates how that fear of vulnerability can play out when it is reflected between two imperfect people."

There was a girl you lived with for many years without liking her much. She was studying to be a doctor; in medical school, like you. You and I would meet for coffee, or to walk along the path by the lake, and you would tell me about her: how she was unabashedly bright; how her proximity made you feel unintelligent, unambitious by comparison.

I took her side, on occasion. I did this because she was someone I knew, though as kind of a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend. But I knew her; I felt she was misunderstood. I felt as if we were, in some unseen way, intertwined.

The winner of the 2023 CBC Short Story Prize will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, have their work published on CBC Books and attend a two-week writing residency at Artscape Gibraltar Point. Four finalists will each receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and have their work published on CBC Books.

The 2023 CBC Poetry Prize is currently open until May 31, 2023 at 11:59 p.m. ET. The 2024 CBC Short Story Prize will open in September and the 2024 CBC Nonfiction Prize will open in January 2024.