carte blanche is just that.
It is open-ended and open-minded.
It is a blank page that gets filled up, scribbled on, and passed around.
It is where writers can sound off, send up, amuse, follow their muse, versify, dramatize, sketch, snap, think big, get famous, polish, perish and, above all, publish.

carte blanche is a volunteer, not-for-profit project published by the Quebec Writers’ Federation, with support from the Canada Council for the Arts and individual sponsors.

In December 2011, carte blanche merged with the live storytelling series, This Really Happened. Tally Abecassis joins us as the event’s founder and curator. TRH takes place twice a year in Montreal with participants telling true stories in front of an audience without notes. Selected stories will appear on our website. Stay tuned!

The 3Macs carte blanche Prize is awarded once a year in recognition of an outstanding submission by a Quebec writer, artist, or translator. The prize is sponsored by Mark Gallop, of MacDougall, MacDougall & MacTier Inc.

Past winners of the 3Macs carte blanche Prize:

2011 – Like This Together by Gillian Sze
2010 – Something Important and Delicate by Mark Paterson

Past winners of the carte blanche Quebec prize:

2009 – Changing Winter Tires, by Julie Mahfood
2008 – Wyoming is Haunted, by J.R. Carpenter

carte blanche Issue prizes:

Issue 6 – Mother Tongue, by Joni Dufour
Issue 5 – Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, by Tracy Evans
Issue 4 – Something Good, by Sue Sorisky
Issue 3 – Hot Dogs on Everything, by Mark Paterson
Issue 2 – Taking the Bus from Regina to Saskatoon, by Elise Moser
Issue 1 – Tateh and the Angel of Death, by Gina Roitman

Other accolades

The nonfiction story “Sounds of Silence,” by Nanette Rayman Rivera was chosen by Dzanc Books for their Best of the Web 2010 anthology.

Masthead

• Maria Schamis Turner, editor

Editorial board

• Joni Dufour, fiction
• Patrick McDonagh, poetry
• Greg Santos, poetry
• Maria Schamis Turner, creative nonfiction
• Salgood Sam, graphic fiction
• Nicola Danby, translation
• Rohan Quinby, photography
• Cristal Duhaime, audio
• Tally Abecassis & Maria Schamis Turner, curators of This Really Happened
• Vanessa Muri, managing editor

Contributing editors: Alexandra Pasian, Angela J Murphy, Leonard Epp, and Leila Marshy

Editorial intern, Fall 2011, Lyra Hilliard

Valuable editorial assistance is also provided by our previous co-managing editor, Erin O’Connell. Many thanks to Rhonda Mullins, translation editor, Neale McDevitt, fiction editor, and Matthew Forsythe, graphic fiction editor, for their hard work on previous editions of carte blanche, .

Founding members of the site are: Sandy Wolofsky, Jennifer Zakutney, Barbara Rudnicka, Claire Helman, Mary Lynn Deachman, Elise Moser, Rhonda Mullins, and Maria Schamis Turner.

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts which last year invested $20.1 million in writing and publishing throughout Canada.

Nous remercions de son soutien le Conseil des Arts du Canada, qui a investi 20,1 millions de dollars l’an dernier dans les lettres et l’édition à travers le Canada.

carte blanche is a proud member of the Council of Literary Magazines and Presses.