Subscribe to Matthew to support their work and read subscriber-only content.
The name I answer to is Matt Hughes. I write science fiction, fantasy and suspense fiction. To keep the genres separate, I now use my full name, Matthew Hughes, for sff, and the shorter form for the crime stuff. I also write media tie-ins as Hugh Matthews. I've won the Crime Writers of Canada's Arthur Ellis Award, and have been shortlisted for the Aurora, Nebula, Philip K. Dick, Endeavour (twice), A.E. Van Vogt, and Derringer Awards. I was born sixty-nine years ago in Liverpool, England, but my family moved to Canada when I was five. I've made my living as a writer all of my adult life, first as a journalist, then as a staff speechwriter to the Canadian Ministers of Justice and Environment, and -- from 1979 until a few years back- as a freelance corporate and political speechwriter in British Columbia.
Free
Fiction
Published May 5, 2019 · 4,507 words (17 minutes) · 3 likes · 218 views
“Timmy, Come Home” was written ten years ago at the invitation of Gordon Van Gelder for an anthology he was putting together called Is Anybody Out There? All the stories were themed around the Fermi Paradox, which asks the question, “If there are alien civilizations out there, why haven’t we been contacted by them?”
Free
Free
Fiction
Published Mar 6, 2019 · 11,941 words (44 minutes) · 3 likes · 214 views
A little philosophical diversion featuring my corpulent master criminal of Old Earth in its penultimate age.
Free
Free
Fiction
Published Feb 7, 2019 · 1,338 words (5 minutes) · 196 views
I was a successful speechwriter because I knew how to paint word pictures, and because I could write in the voice of the person who was going to give the speech. As I wrote, I could hear the speaker's voice in my head. Back in 2003, I decided to write a story in the inimitable voice of one of the 20th century's great speech-makers. I sold it to the late and undeniably great Gardner Dozois, who was then editing Asimov's SF Magazine.
Free
Free
Fiction
Published Jan 5, 2019 · 5,741 words (21 minutes) · 1 like · 224 views
An origin story for Pacific City, a fictional Oregon metropolis that grew up to be the haunt of various superheroes. Find out more here: https://welcometopacificcity.wordpress.com/
Free
Free
Fiction
Published Dec 5, 2018 · 10,618 words (39 minutes) · 2 likes · 188 views
Guth Bandar is an explorer of the human collective unconscious, which the Institute of Historical Inquiry has comprehensively mapped over aeons of Old Earth's ancient civilization. But The Commons, as the Institute's scholars call the noosphere, may still have a few surprises left.
Free
Free
Fiction
Published Nov 2, 2018 · 560 words (3 minutes) · 2 likes · 192 views
A little dark fantasy flash.
Free
Free
Fiction
Published Oct 3, 2018 · 8,862 words (33 minutes) · 3 likes · 608 views
Free
Free
Fiction
Published Sep 12, 2018 · 10,687 words (39 minutes) · 2 likes · 389 views
Free
Free
Free
Fiction
Published Aug 5, 2018 · 3,941 words (15 minutes) · 3 likes · 564 views
Free