︎ Jacquelyn Zong-Li Ross is a writer and editor based in Vancouver, the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) nations. Her fiction, poetry, essays, and art criticism have appeared in BOMB, C Mag, The Ex-Puritan, Fence, Mousse, and elsewhere, as well as in the chapbooks Mayonnaise and Drawings on Yellow Paper (with Katie Lyle). By day, she works as an editor at The Capilano Review. By night, she drafts suspended scenarios and propositions. The Longest Way to Eat a Melon, her debut collection of fictions, was published by Sarabande Books in 2025. She is at work on a novel and a long poem about belief.
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Photo by Maegan Hill-Carroll.
Contact: jacquelynzross {at} gmail {dot} com
Agency: K2 Literary
Curriculum Vitae ︎
Instagram ︎
Facebook ︎
Twitter ︎
Photo by Maegan Hill-Carroll.
Contact: jacquelynzross {at} gmail {dot} com
Agency: K2 Literary
Curriculum Vitae ︎
Instagram ︎
Facebook ︎
Twitter ︎
Publications
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Out June 10, 2025
Sarabande Books
Order direct from the publisher (US only) ︎
Order from your nearest independent bookstore (US and Canada) ︎
A cheeky debut of short fictions exploring the pitfalls and minor triumphs of the creative process.
Equal parts melody and malaise, The Longest Way to Eat a Melon charts the activities of a cast of speakers who all grapple in their own ways with what it takes to conjure a self in the midst of discordance. A brain argues with a non-brain about how to remain productive from a place of exhaustion; two supernaturally inclined twins named Han are separated at birth; and an emerging artist overwhelmed by possibility considers how best to transform a melon into a breakthrough work of art. Incorporating elements of fable, surrealism, satire, and art and cultural criticism, these stories have a playful peculiarity to them, an interweaving of self-deprecation and curiosity, of woe and hope, of absurdity and humanity. Reader, you will want to savor every bite.
Read "A Brief History of Feeling" from The Longest Way to Eat a Melon in BOMB ︎
Praise for The Longest Way to Eat a Melon:
“Inventive and charming, these stories offer a fishbowl view of what it is to be plunked into adulthood in these absurd, impossible times.”
—Lucy Corin, author of The Swank Hotel
“I've been a fan of Jacquelyn Zong-Li Ross's writing for years and am so happy to see her debut collection cracking into the world. The stories in The Longest Way to Eat a Melon, like most of my favorite stories, feel as if they've been written from some alternate dimension just to the side of our own—they're strange and smart and funny and true. Read them, and then we can all dream against capitalism together.”
—Danielle Dutton, author of Prairie, Dresses, Art, Other
"The turns in Ross’s smart, tender, darkly hilarious narratives are dazzling. At times we sail right off the road, and the beautiful thing about this book is, we survive it every time. These are fables for the future, full of hope."
—River Halen, author of Dream Rooms
"A richly layered text imbued with wit and charm. Jacquelyn Zong-Li Ross is an artist who breaks the mundanity of everyday life into artifacts. I was brought to the center of a gallery where curated notes of familiarity, the thoughts beneath my thoughts, guided me to reinterpret all that was around me. The Longest Way to Eat a Melon transforms everydayness into a metaphor. The meaning of life and its multitudes dance quietly underneath."
—Sheung-King, author of Batshit Seven
"Despite claiming, somewhere in this impeccable and finely-pitched, completely canny madness, that there is 'no such thing as an original thought,' these pages are brimming-over with them. Think ragers at the end of the world, except instead of that tired old iceberg and decks full of ill-fated violins, we have cranes dropping giant shits; we have noodles and messed up pottery mosaics; we have twins (or brains) imploding at the moment of long-sought, impossible contact; and melon-eating as political theater, a pair of prolific snail neurons, disintegrating images of peaches and rain. Make no mistake—these are fictions (strange, pulsing, sculptural, committed, extrareal) of resistance. Ross is burning with new and dissident questions and never lets up. At its ecstatic core, this is a book about writing and language: 'the most accessible kind of magic.' Get ready to be not just transformed but transduced. The medium is the message and the messages are urgent and already incandescently ahead of us."
—Jess Arndt, author of Large Animals
Chapbooks
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Self-published in 2016 by Blank Cheque Press, a small press I ran out of my home/studio between Vancouver and Toronto from 2015-2020 (lately out of print)
Other Selected Writing
~ Art Worker Diary
A creative response to the Winter 2013-14 issue of Fuse Magazine for the 221A Fellowship Library’s Noted* guest interpretation series (forthcoming)
~ On Rochelle Goldberg’s Sun Moon StarsA review of Rachelle Goldberg’s show at the Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver for C Mag
~ More Than Unpaid Work: On Gabrielle L’Hirondelle Hill’s M*****A review of Gabrielle L’Hirondelle Hill’s show at the Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver for Le Chauffage
~ Night Work
Selections from a new long-form project published in Asia Art Archive’s online journal Like a Fever
~ A Woman Suffering
Short story in the new issue of Echolocation Magazine, Toronto
~ baby voices
Poem written to accompany the group exhibition, Inside voices, please at nap projects, Vancouver
~ Five Cricket Songs (after Umico Niwa)
Poems written to accompany Umico Niwa’s exhibition, Neighbourly Pest, at Tilling, Montréal
~ soothsay
Exhibition text for Gabi Dao & geetha thurairajah at Centre Clark, Montréal
~ Elementary Brioche
Short story for Minority Vibration, a special issue of The Puritan, guest-edited by Sheung-King
~ from Fifty Times You Leave Your Lover
Poetic response to Mira Dayal’s artist book, Hair Biography, for the ee!
~ Laurie Kang: Story of the Gut
Catalogue essay to accompany the exhibition Unfixed: Laurie Kang and Chris Curreri at Gordon Smith Gallery, North Vancouver
~ Napping Against Capitalism
Short story for the group exhibition The Pandemic is a Portal at SFU Galleries, Vancouver
~ The Perfect Crime
Fictional accompaniment to Erdem Taşdelen's public billboard project, Vicissitudes, at Mercer Union, Toronto
~ Cute, Good-Looking, Funny, Sweet
Essay on the kind of art that is suspiciously easy to digest for Mousse
~ Lizzie’s Laborufluvs
Short story for the exhibition Disputed Bodies at Trinity Square Video, Toronto
~ Four Poems
Light text accoutrements for Sorry, I’m Busy, an exhibition of Capricorn artists at Support Projects, London, Ontario
~ A Brief History of Feeling
Flash fiction for BOMB Magazine
~ "Wanted: Abject Dreamers for New Study of the Inner Ear $15/hr"
A Kijiji ad for please teach me how to swim, an online project organized by Untitled Art Society, Calgary
~ The Picture Files
Flash fiction for the virtual artist project Anna Hawkins: Fall Fell Felt hosted by Untitled Art Society, Calgary
~ R.O.Y.G.B.I.V.
A poem in Fence
~ Twelve Forecasts
More flash fiction for BOMB Magazine
~ How to Look at an Image, or a Black Hole
Essay accompanying the exhibition Semblance & Shadows Like Anxiety by Liza Eurich and Colin Miner at Stride Gallery, Calgary
~ Obliteration Ritual for Katie Lyle
Fictional portrait for Katie Lyle’s exhibition Why Do I Hear the Ocean in My Ear? at The Loon, Toronto
~ Strange New Health
Fiction for the exhibition Strange New Health by Yi Xin Tong at Katzman Contemporary, Toronto
~ How To Tame A Fly, or: Some Unsolicited Commentary on Jacqueline Kiyomi Gordon’s ‘A Space for Looking is a Space for Listening’
Exhibition review for Charcuterie
~ Ieva Miseviciute: Character Studies of Primeval Life Forms
Artist feature for Mousse
~ Everybody’s Talking about Bone Broth
Essay for Laugh Magazine, RCA London
~ Allison Hrabluik: The Splits
Exhibition review for C Magazine
~ East Georgia’s Shameless Loiterers
Poem for the Somewhat Urgent Series, edited by Steffanie Ling
~ Mystery Dust
An essay on the work of Liz Magor for The Capilano Review’s digital chapbook series ti-TCR
~ I Just Want To Talk About How I Just Want To Dance With You
A series of pamphlets on dance and criticism organized by Alexa Mardon and Brynn McNab at Unit/Pitt Projects, Vancouver
~ Hygiene Tricks & The People At Schick
Review of the exhibition Hypnic Jerk by Kara Hansen for The Bartleby Review
Out June 10, 2025
Sarabande Books
Order direct from the publisher (US only) ︎
Order from your nearest independent bookstore (US and Canada) ︎
A cheeky debut of short fictions exploring the pitfalls and minor triumphs of the creative process.
Equal parts melody and malaise, The Longest Way to Eat a Melon charts the activities of a cast of speakers who all grapple in their own ways with what it takes to conjure a self in the midst of discordance. A brain argues with a non-brain about how to remain productive from a place of exhaustion; two supernaturally inclined twins named Han are separated at birth; and an emerging artist overwhelmed by possibility considers how best to transform a melon into a breakthrough work of art. Incorporating elements of fable, surrealism, satire, and art and cultural criticism, these stories have a playful peculiarity to them, an interweaving of self-deprecation and curiosity, of woe and hope, of absurdity and humanity. Reader, you will want to savor every bite.
Read "A Brief History of Feeling" from The Longest Way to Eat a Melon in BOMB ︎
Praise for The Longest Way to Eat a Melon:
“Inventive and charming, these stories offer a fishbowl view of what it is to be plunked into adulthood in these absurd, impossible times.”
—Lucy Corin, author of The Swank Hotel
“I've been a fan of Jacquelyn Zong-Li Ross's writing for years and am so happy to see her debut collection cracking into the world. The stories in The Longest Way to Eat a Melon, like most of my favorite stories, feel as if they've been written from some alternate dimension just to the side of our own—they're strange and smart and funny and true. Read them, and then we can all dream against capitalism together.”
—Danielle Dutton, author of Prairie, Dresses, Art, Other
"The turns in Ross’s smart, tender, darkly hilarious narratives are dazzling. At times we sail right off the road, and the beautiful thing about this book is, we survive it every time. These are fables for the future, full of hope."
—River Halen, author of Dream Rooms
"A richly layered text imbued with wit and charm. Jacquelyn Zong-Li Ross is an artist who breaks the mundanity of everyday life into artifacts. I was brought to the center of a gallery where curated notes of familiarity, the thoughts beneath my thoughts, guided me to reinterpret all that was around me. The Longest Way to Eat a Melon transforms everydayness into a metaphor. The meaning of life and its multitudes dance quietly underneath."
—Sheung-King, author of Batshit Seven
"Despite claiming, somewhere in this impeccable and finely-pitched, completely canny madness, that there is 'no such thing as an original thought,' these pages are brimming-over with them. Think ragers at the end of the world, except instead of that tired old iceberg and decks full of ill-fated violins, we have cranes dropping giant shits; we have noodles and messed up pottery mosaics; we have twins (or brains) imploding at the moment of long-sought, impossible contact; and melon-eating as political theater, a pair of prolific snail neurons, disintegrating images of peaches and rain. Make no mistake—these are fictions (strange, pulsing, sculptural, committed, extrareal) of resistance. Ross is burning with new and dissident questions and never lets up. At its ecstatic core, this is a book about writing and language: 'the most accessible kind of magic.' Get ready to be not just transformed but transduced. The medium is the message and the messages are urgent and already incandescently ahead of us."
—Jess Arndt, author of Large Animals
Chapbooks
Self-published in 2016 by Blank Cheque Press, a small press I ran out of my home/studio between Vancouver and Toronto from 2015-2020 (lately out of print)
Other Selected Writing
2025
~ Art Worker Diary
A creative response to the Winter 2013-14 issue of Fuse Magazine for the 221A Fellowship Library’s Noted* guest interpretation series (forthcoming)
2024
~ On Rochelle Goldberg’s Sun Moon StarsA review of Rachelle Goldberg’s show at the Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver for C Mag
~ More Than Unpaid Work: On Gabrielle L’Hirondelle Hill’s M*****A review of Gabrielle L’Hirondelle Hill’s show at the Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver for Le Chauffage
2023
~ Night Work
Selections from a new long-form project published in Asia Art Archive’s online journal Like a Fever
~ A Woman Suffering
Short story in the new issue of Echolocation Magazine, Toronto
~ baby voices
Poem written to accompany the group exhibition, Inside voices, please at nap projects, Vancouver
2022
~ Five Cricket Songs (after Umico Niwa)
Poems written to accompany Umico Niwa’s exhibition, Neighbourly Pest, at Tilling, Montréal
~ soothsay
Exhibition text for Gabi Dao & geetha thurairajah at Centre Clark, Montréal
2021
~ Elementary Brioche
Short story for Minority Vibration, a special issue of The Puritan, guest-edited by Sheung-King
~ from Fifty Times You Leave Your Lover
Poetic response to Mira Dayal’s artist book, Hair Biography, for the ee!
~ Laurie Kang: Story of the Gut
Catalogue essay to accompany the exhibition Unfixed: Laurie Kang and Chris Curreri at Gordon Smith Gallery, North Vancouver
2020
~ Napping Against Capitalism
Short story for the group exhibition The Pandemic is a Portal at SFU Galleries, Vancouver
~ The Perfect Crime
Fictional accompaniment to Erdem Taşdelen's public billboard project, Vicissitudes, at Mercer Union, Toronto
2019
~ Cute, Good-Looking, Funny, Sweet
Essay on the kind of art that is suspiciously easy to digest for Mousse
~ Lizzie’s Laborufluvs
Short story for the exhibition Disputed Bodies at Trinity Square Video, Toronto
~ Four Poems
Light text accoutrements for Sorry, I’m Busy, an exhibition of Capricorn artists at Support Projects, London, Ontario
2018
~ A Brief History of Feeling
Flash fiction for BOMB Magazine
~ "Wanted: Abject Dreamers for New Study of the Inner Ear $15/hr"
A Kijiji ad for please teach me how to swim, an online project organized by Untitled Art Society, Calgary
~ The Picture Files
Flash fiction for the virtual artist project Anna Hawkins: Fall Fell Felt hosted by Untitled Art Society, Calgary
~ R.O.Y.G.B.I.V.
A poem in Fence
2017
~ Twelve Forecasts
More flash fiction for BOMB Magazine
~ How to Look at an Image, or a Black Hole
Essay accompanying the exhibition Semblance & Shadows Like Anxiety by Liza Eurich and Colin Miner at Stride Gallery, Calgary
~ Obliteration Ritual for Katie Lyle
Fictional portrait for Katie Lyle’s exhibition Why Do I Hear the Ocean in My Ear? at The Loon, Toronto
2016
~ Strange New Health
Fiction for the exhibition Strange New Health by Yi Xin Tong at Katzman Contemporary, Toronto
~ How To Tame A Fly, or: Some Unsolicited Commentary on Jacqueline Kiyomi Gordon’s ‘A Space for Looking is a Space for Listening’
Exhibition review for Charcuterie
~ Ieva Miseviciute: Character Studies of Primeval Life Forms
Artist feature for Mousse
~ Everybody’s Talking about Bone Broth
Essay for Laugh Magazine, RCA London
~ Allison Hrabluik: The Splits
Exhibition review for C Magazine
~ East Georgia’s Shameless Loiterers
Poem for the Somewhat Urgent Series, edited by Steffanie Ling
~ Mystery Dust
An essay on the work of Liz Magor for The Capilano Review’s digital chapbook series ti-TCR
~ I Just Want To Talk About How I Just Want To Dance With You
A series of pamphlets on dance and criticism organized by Alexa Mardon and Brynn McNab at Unit/Pitt Projects, Vancouver
~ Hygiene Tricks & The People At Schick
Review of the exhibition Hypnic Jerk by Kara Hansen for The Bartleby Review