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The Divinity Gene: Stories
Q&A with Matthew j. Trafford (not from the flap)
Q: In The Divinity Gene, we seem to be at the crossroads of science and spirituality. Where would you say you fit as a writer, genre-wise?
A: Both science and spirituality attempt to explain the unknown, and imagination is crucial to both and imagination is also the driving engine behind fiction and stories. As a writer, I want my stories to reach as many people as possible anyone who wants to read them and share in my imaginary worlds is most welcome. So genre doesn’t really concern me it’s a classification that happens after the writing is done and published; as such, it’s mostly the domain of readers, booksellers and critics. I don’t think it’s my place to say what genre the collection fits into, and I would hope it doesn’t fit into just one.
I recently gave a reading of Gutted” a story about the dissection of a mermaid and afterwards someone came up to me and said, You’ll probably hate this, but I was thinking that story would be a great world to launch a Dungeons and Dragons campaign.” I don’t hate that at all. I would love for The Divinity Gene to be embraced by the science fiction, fantasy and role-playing crowd. I would love it if scientists read it. And I’m not going to lie: I’d like it if the high-minded literary set appreciated it as well. I want to find readers who love the book that’s my only goal and confining the book to one genre seems antithetical to that. Its whole point, as much as it has one, is to experiment with form and genre almost like a science experiment, in a way.
Q: Why did you opt for supernatural elements in your writing to represent the real world and current issues?
A: Insofar as it was a choice at all which it wasn’t completely, I just write what I write it’s because we’re dealing with fiction here. It’s the realm of the imagination, and anyone who picks up a book of fiction knows what they’re reading isn’t real. In that context, I’ve never been one for mimetic realism or naturalism I read, to a certain extent, to escape the real world. Since we’re dealing with an imaginary world in any short story, why not make up something outlandish and original, give reign to supernatural things we don’t get to experience in our daily lives?
I should also say that a lot of the supernatural elements come from very old stories and myths. Because of that, they have a certain symbolic resonance built in, and readers connect with that, are already familiar with it to some extent. Stories of vampires and werewolves and other creatures have been around for thousands of years and are still hugely popular curiosity about the supernatural is inherent to the human experience, the human imagination. It’s part of asking, What would it be like if things were different?” I think that’s the basic question of all fiction.
Grounding supernatural elements in realistic situations also allows us to see more about our lives lets us see the cracks in the real world” where magic and wonder and awe and the inexplicable can seep in. That’s what I’m interested in writing about.
Recently I wondered if this penchant for supernatural elements was something I had picked up at some point during my training perhaps I was being too influenced by what I like to read? and also wondered whether it was a phase or something integral to my writing self. I then remembered two stories I wrote during my undergrad, before I started seriously studying writing at all. One was about a tiny boy named Little Bobby whose father found him inside a walnut, and the other was about a teenaged necrophiliac vampire hunter in Rivière du Loup (it was for this story I received my first rejection letter, by the way). So clearly this tendency towards the bizarre and supernatural is just something that’s always been with me and is just part of being the writer I am. I’m not going to fight it or try to explain it away to anybody.
Q: In your story The Divinity Gene,” we’re in the year 2029 and it’s written as a Wikipedia entry. Technology is currently moving so quickly and new developments are fast becoming irrelevant, i.e., who’s to say Wikipedia will still be around in 2029? What made you choose a contemporary technological reference for your futuristic work?
A: Of course no one can say for sure, but I’m willing to make you a $5 bet that it will be. What’s interesting to me is not the name or lifespan of the online encyclopedia, but the fact that such a thing exists at all even when we develop new technologies, we often fail to really think outside the box...
188 pages, Paperback
First published February 12, 2011
3 people are currently reading
87 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
August 21, 2025
a strange and off-putting collection of stories that all make you go “hmmmm” after you finish. love how scientific and queer they are too.
December 3, 2012
This is difficult to rate...The short stories in The Divinity Gene are quite effective, impactful, even, but I can't say I like the feeling they give me. So I went low, with 3 stars, even though these stories do what great short stories are supposed to do: they hit you in the gut, then leave something squirming inside there. I read short stories only rarely, and I always seem to compare them to that classic "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson. I read that in eighth or ninth grade, and will never forget it. Likewise, I'll be thinking of "Gutted" and "Victim Services" and other passages against my will for years to come.
June 26, 2020
I heard of this book in university. My professor was friends with Matthew J. Trafford and taught one of his stories. He then brought Trafford in for a Q & A/lecture about the story we studied. I honestly forget which one we were taught, because most of the class read the entire book and asked him questions about all of the stories.
Trafford was a really cool guy with interesting things to say about short stories and his own writing process. I remember him saying that he will likely write a novel next, because, even though he likes short stories, he understands that his publisher wants a novel next. Apparently, novels out-sell short story collections.
Anyways, onto the actual stories themselves. They're funny and creative, borrowing tropes from sci-fi, horror and dystopia, but then flipping them on their heads! I think my favorite stories were Camping at Dead Man's Point, The Renegade Angels of Parkdale, iFaust and The Divinity Gene. I also liked Gutted, but not as much as those ones.
The Divinity Gene is the best story in the collection.
Trafford was a really cool guy with interesting things to say about short stories and his own writing process. I remember him saying that he will likely write a novel next, because, even though he likes short stories, he understands that his publisher wants a novel next. Apparently, novels out-sell short story collections.
Anyways, onto the actual stories themselves. They're funny and creative, borrowing tropes from sci-fi, horror and dystopia, but then flipping them on their heads! I think my favorite stories were Camping at Dead Man's Point, The Renegade Angels of Parkdale, iFaust and The Divinity Gene. I also liked Gutted, but not as much as those ones.
The Divinity Gene is the best story in the collection.
January 20, 2024
Fun concepts in many of these stories, and some experimentation that I admired but did not find totally successful. Hope Trafford publishes more work in the future, though—I like the imagination here.
October 22, 2011
October 16, 2011: Airport treat. Thanks D!
October 22, 2011: Honestly, I don't know what to say in reviewing these stories that wouldn't ruin the surprise for the next reader.
I am one of those readers who read not to be taken some place else. I like my world. I read to understand it and myself better. I like to see myself in the stories I read. Characters and their situations have to be real or at least plausible. I need to be able to relate, to empathize, to talk and listen to *people*. I consider myself to be a spiritual person, but decidedly not a religious or god-fearing one. Hence I would not expect to enjoy stories about angels or selling one's soul. Or mermaids. Or walking dead people!
But enjoy Trafford's stories I did. In fact, I was delighted with them. I giggled with such wicked glee at Jim Lundy's odoriferous feet that I was momentarily appalled at myself. Even Matthew was not so unkind as to be rude: "...I didn't want to be too much of a dick. I mean, the guy's feet were flaking off, after all, and he wasn't getting them back." *snerk*
That is not to say that these stories are all hoot and holler. They're not. Some I found disturbing and sad, at least their founding circumstances: having a garage sale of your dying husband's stuff to pay for his meds; deciding whether to, literally, sacrifice your own life and hereafter to save that of an ungrateful, self-absorbed grandchild; having the government offer you a clone of the kid you had lost to tragedy. And yet these stories all piqued my imagination, fascinated me. Jesus! No pun intended (okay it was intended), but a bajillion Jesuses?
In reviewing certain literary novels that have particularly enchanted me with their perfection, I have from time to time said it was like finding a perfect gemstone in the dirt. One that you want to cradle in your palm and watch softly glow. Trafford's stories are like some freakishly weird creature washed up on your beach of perfectly polished stones. You're not sure you want to pick it up in your own hands, but you're fascinated enough that you want to poke at it, tentatively, with a stick to see what it will do.
October 22, 2011: Honestly, I don't know what to say in reviewing these stories that wouldn't ruin the surprise for the next reader.
I am one of those readers who read not to be taken some place else. I like my world. I read to understand it and myself better. I like to see myself in the stories I read. Characters and their situations have to be real or at least plausible. I need to be able to relate, to empathize, to talk and listen to *people*. I consider myself to be a spiritual person, but decidedly not a religious or god-fearing one. Hence I would not expect to enjoy stories about angels or selling one's soul. Or mermaids. Or walking dead people!
But enjoy Trafford's stories I did. In fact, I was delighted with them. I giggled with such wicked glee at Jim Lundy's odoriferous feet that I was momentarily appalled at myself. Even Matthew was not so unkind as to be rude: "...I didn't want to be too much of a dick. I mean, the guy's feet were flaking off, after all, and he wasn't getting them back." *snerk*
That is not to say that these stories are all hoot and holler. They're not. Some I found disturbing and sad, at least their founding circumstances: having a garage sale of your dying husband's stuff to pay for his meds; deciding whether to, literally, sacrifice your own life and hereafter to save that of an ungrateful, self-absorbed grandchild; having the government offer you a clone of the kid you had lost to tragedy. And yet these stories all piqued my imagination, fascinated me. Jesus! No pun intended (okay it was intended), but a bajillion Jesuses?
In reviewing certain literary novels that have particularly enchanted me with their perfection, I have from time to time said it was like finding a perfect gemstone in the dirt. One that you want to cradle in your palm and watch softly glow. Trafford's stories are like some freakishly weird creature washed up on your beach of perfectly polished stones. You're not sure you want to pick it up in your own hands, but you're fascinated enough that you want to poke at it, tentatively, with a stick to see what it will do.
March 9, 2013
The Divinity Gene is a very interesting book of short stories that include both real world situations and supernatural phenomena. The stories encompass degrees of greed, judgement, and spirituality; they also deal with different kinds of people and how they react in certain situations and interact with others. Some of the stories, such as "Gutted" (a father and son find a mermaid, and despite his son's protests, the father dissects her and tries to gain publicity from the find), are gruesome, most likely on purpose to get a point across about human behavior. Other stories in the book, such as "Grimpils" (flocks of teenagers travel to Paris without warning in search of an author, and their parents frantically try to find them and find out their motivations), are rather confusing and terrifying because they have no surface meaning. I quickly understood or came up with a meaning for some of the stories, but others left me in a rut of trying to figure out what was going on. Overall, The Divinity Gene was extremely thought provoking. It was a refreshing and unique form of writing that I had not expected it to be when I picked it up in the store.
March 21, 2012
The Divinity Gene by Matthew J. Trafford is a book of short stories. The book was chosen the read for the Opinionless Virtual Bookclub and Matthew joined us for the discussion.
This was my first book of short stories and I thoroughly enjoyed reading the collection. The stories were not related but had a loose thread running through them - love and loss with a few angels or other divine beings (or not) running through them.
What really impressed me about this collection was Matthew's writing style. Many of the stories were written in a completely different point of view and style. He used a technique in a couple stories in which he listed several, well more than several, descriptive terms one right after the other. For example, in "Finding Helen" he listed probably all of the literary spiders ever written about. Interestingly, I knew most of the spiders, and the list fit well into the story.
See the rest of the review: http://readerandrider.blogspot.com/20...
This was my first book of short stories and I thoroughly enjoyed reading the collection. The stories were not related but had a loose thread running through them - love and loss with a few angels or other divine beings (or not) running through them.
What really impressed me about this collection was Matthew's writing style. Many of the stories were written in a completely different point of view and style. He used a technique in a couple stories in which he listed several, well more than several, descriptive terms one right after the other. For example, in "Finding Helen" he listed probably all of the literary spiders ever written about. Interestingly, I knew most of the spiders, and the list fit well into the story.
See the rest of the review: http://readerandrider.blogspot.com/20...
January 24, 2012
Many writers spend their entire careers honing and refining their craft so they can effortlessly draw from the mundane occurrences that appear as part of our everyday lives in the hope of twisting and turning them into something more magical. Not so much in the case of Matthew J. Trafford. Instead he chooses to go about things the opposite way, infusing his short stories with flourishes of the supernatural and then having the characters he’s created accept these circumstances as being so overly normal that they border on the banal.
Crack open a copy of The Divinity Gene and you’ll come face to face with a mermaid with extremely bad luck, an undead fellow who likes to go camping, angels who descend from Heaven to open up night clubs all over the world, and dozens of clones of Jesus Christ that are all strangely un-preacher like.
READ MORE:
http://www.opinionless.com/book-revie...
Crack open a copy of The Divinity Gene and you’ll come face to face with a mermaid with extremely bad luck, an undead fellow who likes to go camping, angels who descend from Heaven to open up night clubs all over the world, and dozens of clones of Jesus Christ that are all strangely un-preacher like.
READ MORE:
http://www.opinionless.com/book-revie...
October 13, 2012
There was so much terrain covered in this book. Mermaids. Jesus clones. Dead people who aren't dead. Trafford covers a broad spectrum of voices and subjects, ranging from spiritual to scientific to the everyday moments that make up the bulk of our lives. And that's where short story collections can shine more than novels - in the breadth of their creative scope. I enjoyed The Divinity Gene and I'm looking forward to what Trafford comes out with next.
August 31, 2014
I don't remember any more where the recommendation for this collection came from. It might actually have been goodreads; it might have been through the short story course I took last year, (a writing course, but one which had a lot of fabulous recommended reading lists for all styles). Anyway, wherever it came from, I am very happy to have discovered it. I really liked this collection. Quite a lot. Adding it to my growing list of "read these to see how it can be done".
January 16, 2015
This astonishing collection of short stories by Matthew Trafford was wildly imaginative, entirely unexpected, and had me engaged the whole time. There was great interplay between the lighter and darker sides of humanity. Having met Matthew at The Banff Centre, I was expecting to be impressed. His writing did not disappoint. You should read this book. It was so unique, it rather defies categorization.
January 16, 2015
This astonishing collection of short stories by Matthew Trafford was wildly imaginative, entirely unexpected, and had me engaged the whole time. There was great interplay between the lighter and darker sides of humanity. Having met Matthew at The Banff Centre, I was expecting to be impressed. His writing did not disappoint. You should read this book. It was so unique, it rather defies categorization.
March 5, 2016
4.5 stars. You know when you're reading a short fiction collection and get to the middle and there are a couple of duds that are stuck in there, and you end up kind making a low growl and skipping over them? Not in "Divinity Gene". Every story was a solid one, there was variety in the genres across the collection showing Trafford's range, and prose that was eloquent --and even poetic-- without being ostentatious. Excellent collection. Read it.
February 26, 2012
3.5 actually. Trouble with short stories for me tho is I get too hooked! There were some GREAT characters in here that I would have liked to get to know better and i am aching to find out what happened next! Full review here:
http://literaryhoarders.wordpress.com...
http://literaryhoarders.wordpress.com...
March 10, 2013
A short-fiction lover's wet dream. I recommend "Thoracic Exam" for the reader who believes themselves to be normal; "Forgetting Helen" will dash all those dreams you had of living in a library; "The Divinity Gene" is a work of art written with skill equal to the likes of Yann Martel and A.S. Byatt.
March 13, 2011
I loved this book of short stories! The ten stories that Matthew J. Trafford has written in this volume as diverse in style and voice. They are brilliant, moving and impressive.
I can't wait for his novel to be released.
I can't wait for his novel to be released.
February 5, 2013
This was a whacky and fun read through a crazily varied selection of short stories. From cloned Jesus and undead campers, to mermaids, and a story about young men flocking to Europe to seek out a mysterious author -- Trafford will keep you on your toes!
Want to read
January 24, 2012The review in Rain Taxi made this short story collection sound excellent.
February 17, 2012
Review coming...
November 16, 2012
loved it, will reread.
May 23, 2014
his is one of my favourite collections. Thoroughly imaginative, profound and touching. Funny too!
June 11, 2015
This book is rich and deep. Hilarious and horrifying. Brilliantly structured and beautifully written. I highly recommend this collection.
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews