Manuscript Collection - Derek McCormack Papers

Derek McCormack (1969- ) is a Canadian novelist and short story writer whose work is characterized by its extreme brevity and dark humour. Born and raised in Peterborough, Ontario, he currently resides in Toronto. McCormack’s first book, Dark Rides was published by Gutter Press, a small Canadian press founded by Sam Hiyate as part of a mid-1990s boom in alternative publishing in Toronto. This book was edited by Ken Sparling who left his ‘aggressively minimalist’ imprint on it. At the beginning of his career, McCormack was frequently described as being part of a new generation of Canadian writers, most notably in a 1996 Globe and Mail feature about him and other writers like Evan Solomon, Russell Smith and Andrew Pyper. He received a nomination for Wild Mouse for the 1999 City of Toronto Book Award, and The Haunted Hillbilly has appeared on the Globe and Mail and Village Voice lists of the best books of the year for 2004.