39 Book Reviews and A New Workshop!
The A-Z of Publishing (a workshop this Saturday), Three Fabulous New Reviews, PLUS The Brilliance of 2023!
Thank you so much for reading and subscribing to A Turn of Phrase!
The process of transferring my old review site, The Minerva Reader (supporting CanLit since 2017), is nearly complete, with only 2024 remaining, and after which the site will be dedicated to new reviews, book events and breaking news in the publishing world.
Book Event: This Saturday!
I’ve created a brand new 40 page slide show presentation with everything you need to know about getting published, staying published, can novelists make a living from writing, how to get your grammar right, what about ChatGPT and AI, alpha readers, beta readers, how to get in touch with your unique author voice, how to submit to anthologies, where do stories come from, the publishing process, self editing, how to find a publisher, social media, book covers, promoting your book, creating an author website and author brand, how to get the perfect author photo, the importance of blurbs, men vs women in publishing, defining what success means to you and more!
Note: Registration is required so sign up today!
The A-Z of Publishing
Sat. Apr. 19, 2025
1:00 p.m. - 3:00 p.m.
120 mins
Location
Agincourt Program Room
Participants will learn how to traverse the full landscape of writing from story creation to writing to editing to finding a publisher and staying published. We will also look at social media in a time and the necessary relationship between authors and the online experience.
The program would look at the hurdles women face in the world of publishing versus that of men.
Registration is required. Please call the branch at 416-396-8943 or come in-person to register.
If you identify as a person with a disability or as a person who is Deaf, and require accessibility accommodation to participate in this program, please contact Accessibility Services by email, accessibleservices@tpl.ca, or voicemail, 416-393-7099, to make a request. Please contact us at least three weeks in advance.
New Reads
No Ordinary Days by Elizabeth Greene, Ekstatsis Editions
Elizabeth Greene’s No Ordinary Days is no ordinary collection of poetry.
“Here are recipes of a vanished world rich with butter, cream, cheese, sour cream. Lobster Newburg, jambalaya with ham and shrimp, roast duck, veal, lamb’s kidneys, oysters—crab.”
–How I Feed My Friends: One Hundred Sunday Night Dishes A Cookbook by Max White
Much like the heavenly feast above, No Ordinary Days is a rich delight for the senses, a celebration and lament for a vanishing world, while revelling in the extraordinarily magical world around us.
I’d forgotten about Jonathan Cainer, whose words I used to live by.
Greene packs so much into this powerful collection: poetry as protest, poetry as history, poetry as spirituality, magic, tarot and stardust.
“Swim back to surface, to shore,
to this room.
When you’re ready,
open your eyes.
There are other ways.
Always try magic first.”
–The Writer’s Voice
There are no ordinary days. This is no ordinary collection. Read it, savour it, reread it.
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Widow Fantasies by Hollay Ghadery, Gordon Hill Press
Hollay Ghadery’s Widow Fantasies blew me away. Ghadery is one of the most fearless modern day writers. Her work is bold, brave, vulnerable, funny and memorable, and cuts right into the heart of the issues most of us don’t even dare approach. Motherhood, womanhood, marriage, sex and identity; all of these are captured in visceral vignettes of life that are sometimes hard to read. These women have no escape. Trapped in the stench of shit, redeemed by the blue glass of Shalimar, wrapped in a soft coat of mink, “nothing will save your life but this might buy you time.” Caught in the relentless circle of time, “structural integrity” will break your heart, while “limp dick” tells it like it is: “I mean this isn’t supposed to be about my age.” While the stain of menstrual blood leaves an indelible mark of protest against the patriarchy and misogyny in “tennis whites,” Ghadery’s collection is a series of unforgettable portraits that demand to be read.
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The Suicide Tourist by Myna Wallin, Ekstatsis Editions
I delighted in Myna Wallin’s The Suicide Tourist. Alice in the wrong Wonderland, at the mercy of impersonal, careless physicians, unable to escape the turmoil of relentless mood swings and chemical imbalance.
“My brain is an intricate labyrinth, a collision of out-of-sync parts, constantly moving.
“Hello, is anyone there?
I want to say, Yes, I’m here —
But I’m unavailable, unreachable.
– 3 a.m. Tango
And also, humorous, a retort to The Freudian:
“Did you get your diploma
In a box of crackerjacks?”
Fevered dreams, insomnia, surreal psychosis: “We are so often looking in the wrong direction.” –It Was a Beautiful Day in Prospect Park.
The eternal struggle:
“Once the chaotic energy has wrung
me dry, a weird clarity
emerges. Shaking my fist
at a careless God.”
–Mania
Oh, I loved this collection!
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Remember 2023! I do!
These wonderful books were featured on the 2023 edition of The Minerva Reader. I hope you’ll enjoy these books as much as I enjoyed reading and reviewing them.
If You Break It You Buy It by Lynn Tait, Guernica Editions
About the book:
You Break It, You Buy It features poems about disconnection, misconnections: the loss of friendships and identity, our voice, our purpose. At its core, it is a collection of elegies railing against and dealing with toxic relationships, from fair-weather friends, controlling mothers to narcissists. These poems invite the reader into personal experiences, public observations and the price we pay, positive and negative for our interactions with the media, our global and local conflicts, environmental challenges, the pandemic, the Me Too and Black Lives Matter movements. She writes about the dark underside of our lives with a sense of danger, humour and of hope for reconnection in the future with our community and our world.
My Review:
When I pick up a collection of poetry that sums everything whirling inside my heart and head, my instant reaction is “yes” and “thank you!” And then I marvel at the poet’s ability to combine the perfect image with the perfect expression of that moment.
If You Break It You Buy it by Lynn Tait points her magnifying glass on so many of the crucial trending issues that are quietly tearing us apart. Acerbic, refreshing, and aimed with bull’s eye accuracy, this collection is a must-read, a joy-read. I also love the cover art with the Kintsugi mannequin hand, already broken, repaired with gold and now, suffering further breaks. We break, we mend, we break and then once again, we mend.
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A Fall Afternoon In the Park: Short Stories by Mehri Yalfani, Inanna Publications
About the book:
With its twenty short stories, A Fall Afternoon in the Park invites the reader deep into the interior worlds of Iranian women living in both Iran and Canada.
In “Rainy Day,” a little girl longs for a doll with golden hair; in “Adopted Child,” a successful business professional delays having a baby but then discovers a secret; an educated woman finds herself cleaning the home of a wealthy, illiterate woman to pay the bills in the story “Adam”; and, in the titular story, a family is divided (literally) when the mother loses her job and they must make difficult decisions about their future.
In these varied, compelling snapshots of family, friendship, culture, tradition, discrimination, class issues, and struggle, Mehri Yalfani offers glimpses into the challenges and joys of immigrants’ and refugees’ lived experiences in the Canadian diaspora.
My Review:
I’ve always been a fan of Mehri Yalfani’s beautiful writing and this collection fulfills my every expectation. These stories dig deep into the complex and difficult lives of Iranian women and Yalfani demonstrates unflinching courage in exploring their heartbreak, joy, disappointment, acceptance and quiet liberation. The power of Yalfani’s writing needs to be applauded, how, without indulgence, she conveys the most powerful of emotions.
Excerpt:
Satar said, “But this is a short story—fiction, I mean, literature. It’s not supposed to solve society’s problems.”
Haideh said, “But it can draw attention to society’s problems. I didn’t mean to solve it.”
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Big Wilson by Mark Sampson, Emergency Flash Mob Press
About the book:
Music and literature collide in this long poem about grief, loss, and the family bonds that constrain us as much as they hold us together. The hero of this narrative-in-verse rejects the siren call of the stage for a solitary life of authorship, even as he grapples with death – first his brother’s, then his wife’s, and finally his own. Big Wilson is a tender examination of how place, ambition, and those we choose to love ultimately shape who we become.
My Review:
Big Wilson is to be read and admired. I just loved this long poem. Talk about powerful writing – I can’t get Big Wilson out of my head, in the best possible way. I was swept along on a tidal wave of emotions, awestruck by the imagery, the sense of history, the power of place, the relevance of each human life. In a nutshell, Mark Sampson is a brilliant writer and Big Wilson is a brilliant work.
*I’m SO looking forward to reading Mark’s new work, Lowfield.
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The Lie Maker by Linwood Barclay
About the book:
In this twisty, fast-paced thriller from the New York Times bestselling author of Find You First and Take Your Breath Away, a man desperately tries to track down his father—who was taken into witness protection years ago—before his enemies can get to him.
My review:
This is Linwood Barclay on top of his game! I thoroughly enjoyed it. I always enjoy novels that riff off #authorLife and this novel has a unique spin on that. If you’re looking for a fun read with characters you’ll care about (and others you’ll wish were dead!), and a plot that will keep you guessing till the end – and on the edge of your seat – grab a copy of The Lie Maker.
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Pebble and Dove by Amy Jones, Penguin Random House Canada
About the book:
Named a Best Book of the Year So Far by Audible.ca. In the tradition of Karen Russell’s Swamplandia!, a once-famous but now-abandoned aquarium-in-a-ship in Florida is the captivating backdrop for a novel of family secrets and dysfunction, and the ways in which it can sometimes take an animal to remind us how to be human.
My Review:
Undoubtedly one of my favourite books of 2023. Funny, sad, brilliant and a sheer delight. And of course, Amy Jones is such a gifted writer that the prose itself is a treat. The writing is like a sparkler on a dark night, fizzing and leaping and, when you’re finished the book, you’ll realise that your heart is fizzing and leaping too and for that, I thank you, Amy Jones.
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Broken Fiction by Marlene Kadar, Inanna Publications
About the book:
Broken Fiction is a collection of short autofictional stories and poems that both offer solace and depict anguish at the collision of memory, loss, and grief. This kind of story-making negotiates a recognition and acceptance of hard truths without resorting to easy resolution.
The pieces in this volume are playful and fierce. The narrator’s willingness to give attention to where love works or goes wrong, or to the moments when suffering cannot be veiled by a positive attitude—even as the comic or absurd overwhelms the tragic and humiliating—takes us to places that inhabit both memory and fiction. Photographs break the fiction and pull the reader into the inevitable forces of time and loss and death.
Broken Fiction invites readers to consider a way through—and sometimes around—illness and love, pain and joy, and gives a droplet of hope in nature’s comedy of errors and coincidence.
My Review:
This book is unusual in that it imparts a piece of wisdom you might need on a particular day, as if it somehow recognises that need before you do. And then that troubling thing becomes resolved. Powerful, beautiful, poetic and insightful, this collection will astonish you, delight you and comfort you. An
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Snake Oil and Other Tales by M.H. Callway, Carrick Publishing
About the book:
Snake Oil and Other Tales is the second collection of short stories by author M.H. Callway. These dark tales include strange guardians, mysterious bakeries, faithful dogs and yes, the slithery reptiles that strike fear in even the toughest bro’s heart. Many were finalists for the Crime Writers of Canada Awards for Excellence. They stretch from traditional mysteries to thrillers to speculative fiction and even to horror. What unites them are the characters struggling for justice–or their own warped perception thereof.
My Review:
Not only is M. H. Callway a very fine writer, her work encompasses an admirable range. From the terrifying Snake Oil to the haunting Amdur's Ghost, the stories and novellas in this collection will keep you enthralled from start to finish. The perfect read for Halloween or a stocking stuffer this Holiday Season!
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Mary-Margaret and the Case of the Lapsed Parishioner: A Pint of Trouble Mystery, Best Level Books
About the book:
When Mary-Margaret O’Shea, a woman of a certain age with mildly Machiavellian tendencies, discovers a homicide scene and meets an unimpressive lead investigator, she realizes that she has no choice but to solve the crime herself. With little help from Michael, her police-detective son, she enlists Arthur, her eccentric housekeeper, to help her find the killer.
In Mary-Margaret and The Case of The Lapsed Parishioner, a series of assumptions and misguided steps may lead her to the killer, or they may make her the next victim.
“With her Irish accent and idioms, Mary-Margaret justifies lying and stealing to get what she wants, all the while serving God and her parish as church secretary. Much to the chagrin of the new priest, who regrets calling her out of retirement to assist while her replacement is away on vacation, MM bustles in and takes over despite her supposed broken foot and the crutches she ‘borrowed’ from the hospital. Feigning her disability, MM provides cause to prolong her stay with her Big City Detective son, Michael, who she feels is in need of emotional support.
When a volunteer fails to show up to sort clothes for the upcoming bazaar and her daughter worries something has happened to her, MM goes in search of the missing woman. As her detective son passes the buck to the detective in charge of the case, ‘a horrible man’ according to MM, he leaves her no choice but to investigate on her own.
A spin-off from Desmond P. Ryan’s Mike O’Shea series, police procedurals featuring Mike in his role as a city detective, A Pint of Trouble Mysteries shows another side of his life through the eyes of a protective mother—one who can’t keep her nose out of other people’s business. With the help of her house cleaner, a quirky young man named Arthur, and her wanna-be boyfriend, city morgue attendant, Frank, MM takes on the role of amateur sleuth.
A charming older protagonist who lets nothing stop her from getting to the truth, Mary-Margaret will have you laughing out loud. One of the most entertaining cozy mysteries I’ve read!”
My Review:
What a treat! This book had me smiling from start to finish. I just love Mary-Margaret O’Shea! If you’re looking for a feel-good, fast-paced yarn, this is the book for you! While I can’t wait for Mary-Margaret’s next adventure, make sure you don't miss out on this one!
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Sugar & Vice: A Mystery of Death, Dumplings, and Dragons by Melissa Yi,
About the book:
Do feasts and fiction make you drool?
Do dragons delight you?
Want to catch bad guys and eat happily ever after?
Mix one cup of Louise Penny's food, friendship, and fatality, whisk in a tablespoon of Grey's Anatomy and a dash of dragon myths ...
And take a bite out of Melissa Yi's latest and funniest thriller, SUGAR & VICE.
My review:
Sugar and Vice: A Mystery of Death, Dumplings and Dragons is most deliciously and aptly named! I thoroughly enjoyed this action-packed adventure featuring one of my favourite amateur sleuths, Hope Sze. Come for the dim sum delights, the sassy humour, the mile-a-minute action and the sizzling chemistry – this luscious feast has it all! Add a dash of fascinating historical background and some truly sinister villains and you, dear Reader, like me, won’t be able to tear yourself away!
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A New Season by Terry Fallis, McClelland and Stewart
About the book:
Jack McMaster seemingly has it all. A beautiful house, a loving son of many talents (including cooking, which is great news for Jack, if not for his waistline), even a special bond with his buddies in his ball hockey league. But he’s also learning to live with loss, leaving a gaping hole in his life—a life that will never be the same as before. Jack passes his days knowing he has the support of his family and his friends, but he can’t shake the feeling that his life has gone gray, and that time is slipping by so quickly.
Then, a short and shocking video from an unexpected source gives him the gumption to make a change and maybe even haul himself out of his melancholia. Inspired by his lifelong fascination with 1920s Paris, Jack finally visits the City of Light, following in the footsteps of Hemingway and Fitzgerald, and wandering the Left Bank. Slowly, the colour seeps back into his life, aided by a chance encounter in a café that leads Jack into the art world, and a Paris mystery nearly a century old.
Full of sincerity and warmth, A New Season shows us all that sometimes, making a change in your life can save your life.
My Review:
If you’re looking for a feel-good, heart-warming affirmation that new seasons do exist, then look no further. Penned with Fallis’s trademark self-deprecating humour (and I admit, I do read Fallis into his protagonists), this lively jaunt will put a spring in your step and perhaps inspire the travel bug too!
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Tucked Away by Phyllis Rudin, Inanna Publications
About the book:
It seems like a dream gig when Daphne gets the job offer—live in Montreal’s Underground City for a full year and blog about the experience. The flip side of the city has all the creature comforts. The year will fly by. Except there’s a catch. To collect her whopping bonus for sticking it out till day 365, Daphne must agree never to set so much as a toe outside the territory of the Underground City, submitting to an ankle monitor to keep her honest. Even if the conditions are hardcore, she doesn’t have much choice. Out of work, and sole provider for a grandmother whose bank account is on life support, Daphne signs on the dotted line. And that’s when her life goes into freefall.
Inspired by Daphne, her grandmother comes up with an underground plan of her own, sheltering a family of illegal refugees in her basement. Daphne’s initial fury at her grandmother’s risky move does an about-face once she meets Chantal, a young runaway holed up in the Underground City, fleeing a threat she refuses to disclose. When Chantal shows up on Daphne’s doorstep desperate for protection, Daphne must decide if she’s prepared to lay her underground future on the line to rescue a group of virtual strangers from discovery and ruin.
My Review:
This book is an absolute must-read. I was immediately intrigued by the plot and once I started reading, I just couldn’t put the book down. The novel covers so much, cleverly weaving together social issues, relationships, and friendships. I thoroughly enjoyed the writing. The prose is vivid, observant, insightful, funny, and wise. The pacing of the book is spot on and you get swept along. Pick up a copy for the story, for the writing or for the sheer enjoyment of a good book. There are so many reasons to pick up a copy of this delightful book, so order your copy today!
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[Squelch Procedures] by MLA Chernoff, Gordon Hill Press
About the book:
In [SQUELCH PROCEDURES], MLA Chernoff contemplates the ways that trauma, poverty, and strict gender norms rupture the concept of childhood. The tension of multiple meanings in the word "squelch" acts as a guide to Chernoff's unique voice, which uses language to swaddle intrusive thoughts and mimic defense mechanisms such as avoidance, depersonalization, and derealization. [SQUELCH PROCEDURES] is an ambitious attempt to show how healing and regression are often indistinguishable, while the past is always predisposed to happen more than once: first as tragedy
My Review:
This is the shortest review I’ve ever written: this work is sheer genius. Whatever you do, don’t miss out on reading [Squelch Procedures]. It’s a wildly original, completely absorbing, fabulous collection.
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Standing in the Shadows by Peter Robinson.
About the book:
The 28th twisting installment in the DCI Alan Banks mystery series that Stephen King calls "the best now on the market."
In November 1980, Nick Hartley returns home from a university lecture to find his house crawling with police. His ex-girlfriend, Alice Poole, has been found murdered, and her new boyfriend Mark Woodcroft is missing. Nick is the prime suspect. The case quickly goes cold, but Nick cannot let it go. He embarks on a career in investigative journalism, determined to find Alice's murderer--but his obsession leads him down a dangerous path.
Decades later, in November 2019, an archaeologist unearths a skeleton that turns out to be far more contemporary than the Roman remains she is seeking. Detective Superintendent Alan Banks and his team are called in to investigate, but there is little to be gleaned from the remains themselves. Left with few clues, Banks and his team must rely on their wits to hunt down a killer.
As the two cases unfurl, the investigations twist and turn to an explosive conclusion.
My Review:
Knowing that Peter Robinson is no longer with us made for bittersweet reading. It’s always such a treat to hang out with an old familiar friend like Alan Banks and this book was no exception. Peter Robinson was such a masterful storyteller – and such an incredibly lovely human being. I had the great pleasure of reading with him at an event and it is one of my fondest memories. To Peter Robinson, thank you for all the wonderful reads.
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The Last Chair Lift by John Irving
About the book:
One of the world’s greatest novelists returns with his first novel in seven years—a ghost story and a love story, spanning eight decades of sexual politics.
The Last Chairlift breaks new artistic ground for Irving, who has been called “among the very best storytellers at work today” (The Philadelphia Inquirer); “the American Balzac” (The Nation); “a pop star of literature, beloved by all generations” (Süddeutsche Zeitung, Munich); and “the voice of social justice and compassion in contemporary American literature” (The Globe and Mail). With The Last Chairlift, readers will once again be in John Irving’s thrall.
My Review:
There’s so much to unpack about The Last Chairlift by John Irving. I’m a speedy reader and at first, I was alarmed by the size of the book. Shortly into it, I found couldn’t speed read because every single word brought a level of pleasure. In addition to the characters, the familial relationships and the issues of gender and sex (through the decades) were extremely entertaining, as well as the delightful insights about writers and the writing process.
But (and I don’t usually add a but on The Minerva Reader but I’m going to make an exception), the second half the book just sort of fell apart, for me, anyway.
The first half was sheer brilliance but at the midpoint, I felt as if I was reading an entirely new book, with abrupt (repeititious) insertions of the plot that came before.
I was also conflicted by Irving’s fascination and fondness for all things ‘small’ and ‘pretty’. And I was troubled by the protagonist’s mother, Ray. There’s no doubt that she was intended to be a controversial figure but I found her distasteful. It was if we were urged to accept that Ray was just Ray, and therefore the high bastion of mothering, regardless of what she did but I couldn’t. I also found Adam to be unformed and unconvincing. And the resolution of the love affairs seemed too pat and forced.
And then there was the ghost story. It was fascinating until I got to the screenplays which just bogged me down.
I did read the book, every single word. Was it worth it? Yes, it was but it’s a pity about the second half.
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So That We Might Finger the Words by Sue Chenette, Aeolus House.
About the book:
So That We Might Finger the Words: The Biography of Eleanor Jones Bussey is part elegy, part biography, part history. Eleanor, who lived from 1917 to 2014, was Jonesy when she played her flute in the U of Minnesota band and worked with her pals on The Daily, Eleanor Bussey when she moved with her husband to his job in a small northern Wisconsin town. These are poems about her life, but the book speaks more broadly for the women of her generation, positioned, as she was, in the middle class (women of privilege, we would say now), but also within the constraints of still-patriarchal society — women who, finding themselves in a particular time and place, lived their lives purposefully within those givens. The poems witness, too, the ending of her long-lived life, and what comes after in the grieving, the acceptance of loss that interrupts and reconfigures time, the everyday made strange by a mother’s absence.
My Review:
One of the most peaceful, peace-creating works I’ve read. These poems float like a song on a summer breeze, carrying with them so many lovely images. Reading these words made me feel floaty and dreamy. Time slowed, the rush of life slowed and, if happiness is indeed a colour, then this collection is that rose-coloured loveliness too. A wonderful homage to a life lived to the fullest. Here’s to Jonesy, who, with these words, continues to inspire.
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A book I loved:
Power by Sky MacKay Curtis, Inanna Publications
Wry, forthright Home and Garden reporter Robin MacFarland has somehow gotten herself—along with her best friend and investigative journalist colleague Cindy—assigned by their newspaper editor to examine the deep rooted causes of homelessness in Toronto, Ontario. Their investigation quickly reveals that environmental racism not only created hydroelectric power, it harmed the environment and displaced a large population of Indigenous people. When the Premier of Ontario dies at Robin’s family cottage in Muskoka, Robin sets about proving that he was murdered against a tide of objection from Huntsville’s police force. Though she’s only supposed to be along for the ride, Robin MacFarland is honest to a fault, committed to justice and, though she’s always willing to laugh at herself, also always willing to look for the hard truth no matter where it’s hiding. Robin needs to figure out exactly how his death was disguised to look like an accident, what his part was in a dirty web surrounding the creation of more electric power, who knocked him off, and finally, how all this will impact her family.
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The Merry Widow Murders by Melodie Campbell, Cormorant Books
About the book: t’s the latter half of the Roaring Twenties and Lady Lucy Revelstoke, the unconventional widow of a young British lord, is once more crossing the Atlantic on a state-of-the-art ocean liner. Rubbing elbows with the era’s elite, Lucy has come a long way from her roots as the daughter of a Canadian mobster. But when a dead man turns up in her stateroom on the first night of the voyage, Lucy wonders if her past has come back to haunt her. Who is this dead man? Is someone from her past trying to send her a message? Lucy doesn’t wait to find out. With her chivalrous friend Lord Tony, and Elf, her pickpocket-turned-maid, she endeavors to throw the body overboard. It does not go as planned. When the body is discovered by authorities on the ship, Lucy must do everything in her power to find the murderer before they look too deeply into her past.
My Review: I’ve been watching Agatha Christie reruns lately, for the comfort of the scenery, the reassuring bonhomie of the characters, dead bodies not withstanding! To call them cozies, not to insult the genre, doesn’t do justice to the intricacy of the plots and the characterizations. Maybe that’s because I (perhaps mistakenly) consider a cozy book to be limited to a woman in a quaint cottage, with a cat, solving a crime while baking muffins. I’ve never been a fan of the rabid categorizations that dominate our writing world – to my mind, a good murder story is a good murder story. So I’m not sure if The Merry Widow Murders is a cozy or not but it doesn’t matter because what it is, is a fun-filled, delightfully written, richly textured, funny read. I loved being aboard The Victoriana with Lucy Revelstoke and Elf and reader, you will too! Just like a good Agatha Christie, this novel offers all the elements of crime, deception, intrigue and greed, along with a breathtakingly lovely setting.
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These Days Are Numbered: Diary of a High-Rise Lockdown by Rebecca Rosenblum, Dundurn
About this book: The novelist Rebecca Rosenblum lives in St James Town, Toronto — the most densely populated square kilometre in all of Canada. When the Covid-19 pandemic and ensuing lockdowns arrive, she’s cut off from colleagues, friends, family, and not allowed to go near neighbours. As the world constricts, Rebecca keeps a weird and worried diary online — a love letter both to the outside world that she misses so desperately, and the little world inside St James Town that she can see from home.
As Rebecca watches and wonders from inside her box in the sky, her entries mix an account of a tough time in a tough place, joyful goofiness, and moments of unexpected compassion.
My Review: I admit I was initially concerned that I may not want to revisit the days of Covid, even although I was one of the few who quite liked part of that time. I enjoyed being off the crazy grid of normal life for a while. I enjoyed the quiet walks late at night, finding new parks and getting reaquainted with my (very bad) knitting. I liked the (initial) camaraderie, as we all came together as a nation and faced a global nightmare. But so much of it was so hard too and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go back to it. I picked up These Days Are Numbered, knowing that while I’m a true fan of Rebecca Rosenblum’s work, I wasn’t sure if the book was going to unsettle and disturb me. I admit too, that I didn’t follow the initial posts on Facebook because in general, I find social media to be a rabbit hole that isn’t good for my psyche. I tend to post my comings and goings in case they interest people (and I try to focus on the positive wherever I can, I pop a thing on my wall and off I go). Which meant I was a newcomer to the posts and, in picking up the book, I wasn’t sure what to expect.
But, in short, the book is an absolute delight! Sure, it’s set during the time of Covid and it’s about that, but it’s so much more than that. Rosenblum is an absolute master of tapping into human emotions, and relationships and her observations into human nature, while so very insightful, are also so extremely kind and lovely.
And of course there is Mark Sampson who is, in this book, completely hilarious.
This book is about life, love, relationships, friendships, family, communities, and society in general. It’s a treat read, beautifully written and you shouldn’t miss it.
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The Big Dream by Rebecca Rosenblum, Biblioasis
About the book: At Dream Inc., a lifestyle magazine publisher, people are struggling not only to do their jobs—or even to keep them—but to fall in love and stay that way, to have friends, to be good parents and good children, to eat lunch and answer the phone and be happy. Which can be pretty interesting . . . even on company time. In The Big Dream, acclaimed short story writer Rebecca Rosenblum offers a suite of linked stories exploring the working world in all its dark and humorous complexity, creating an In Our Time for our time. Rebecca Rosenblum's debut collection Once drew comparison to Alice Munro's Dance of the Happy Shades " ( Quill & Quire ). She works in publishing in Toronto, Ontario.
My Review: Another sheer delight by Rebecca Rosenblum. It was published in 2011 and I’m not sure how I missed reading it then. It’s so funny, so tragic and oh, so very, very, very real. The stories are cuttingly sharp, whiplash funny and yet, again, so very kind and compassionate. I revelled in the attention to detail; the food, the clothing, the office cubicles, the contents of each drawer, the terrible toothache of an exploding abscess. And the story titles! “Bursting into Tears Every Twenty Minutes.”, “Cheese-Eaters”, “This Weather I’m Under”. If you’ve read the book, read it again. And if you haven’t, then read it now.
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Love is a Place But You Cannot Live There by Jade Wallace, Guernica Editions
About the book: Each section of Love Is A Place But You Cannot Live There is a psychogeographic investigation. Two casual ghost hunters on a road trip hear the death rattle of their relationship. Residents of a city’s fringe measure their physical and social isolation. A mother and her adult child have diametrically opposed reactions to their vacation spot. Lovers on a romantic coastal getaway discover how estranged they are from one another. Curious figures begin to embody their environments. Forthright and anecdotal, these poems recount the signals people transmit and receive, and the reciprocal ways we make, and are made by, the places we inhabit.
My Review: I’ve always loved the dreamy David Lynch-like quality of Jade Wallace’s work and this collection, starting with the absolutely fabulous title, lives up to my every expectation. Each poem offers a poignant, heartbreaking glimpse into a quiet moment of acute observation. I often feel, when reading Wallace’s work, that I’m alone in a room, with a carousel of old Kodachrome slides and each click is a read that transports me instantly into another time, another place. I’m taken to a world that my heart instantly recognizes and feels with every sense. Beautiful work.
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Dying Times by Darlene Madott, Exile Editions
About the book: Dying Times is the story of a successful though conflicted lady litigator, told with a dark undercurrent of humor that underpins this striking meditation on dying, and discovering a meaningful approach to living. Death is all around the lady litigator. It is her loving, wise mother who, by dying, triggers open hatred within the family. It is her greedy, irascible but brilliant senior partner at a big downtown law firm who, while determined to control everything, even his own death, discovers generosity. It is the last client the senior partner and lady litigator will share, a man in a wheelchair who is appalling in his need to wreak ruin on his wife in a monumentally lucrative divorce case. Far from sombre, the novel is told with a wry wit and a transcendent tenderness that is fresh and surprising. It is a presentation of raw reality, with characters navigating the emotions of love on the verge of abuse and hatred, loyalty on the verge of betrayal, and visceral energy on the verge of exhaustion. Dying Times frames an important We die as individually as we have lived.
My Review: I didn’t expect a book about dying to be so funny. But it is funny, and it’s sharp, tight and beautifully written. I’m beginning to think that being a lawyer is an advantage to being a writer – look at Shari Lapena, Helen Fields and so many others. There must be something about writing briefs that trains the precision of prose, stating the facts while bringing so much life to the characters and situation. Again, it might be odd that a book about dying is so full of life and be such a celebration of life but it is that. Sibling rivalry, marriage breakdowns, mothers and daughters, cut throat careers – you’ll get all of these in Dying Times, along with rum cake and a lot of laughs.
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Remedies for Chiron by m. patchwork monoceros, Radiant Press
About the book: In the astrological tradition, Chiron represents our deepest wound, and our lifelong efforts to heal it. Remedies for Chiron is a collection of poems that journey through the days of a young, queer, Black, and newly disabled poet trying to find a place to root and exist in the entirety of those intersections. Moving between cycles of grief and self-discovery, Remedies tells the story of a prismatic existence while also offering a balm for the hurts we all experience and the humility that comes with healing.
My Review: I completely loved this book. Its power taps into the very heart of so many of the daily struggles of pain, money, social inequality, sexuality, ageing and so much more and it does so in a way that makes you feels as if you’re the recipient of some magical balm, privy to of a secret society of understanding. I feel I can’t do justice to the work so I urge you to read it.
“remember the times when rules about your aesthetic, affection,
and after-school hours dared to dull your luminescence
remember, with life-learned knowledge
you would still find your way through
the cracks of those boxes
you have been a witch all along.”
To: mel
Fr: your indesctructible self
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Sunset and Jericho: A Wakeland Novel by Sam Wiebe (Harbour Publishing)
About the book: The fourth thrilling installment of the Wakeland detective series, exploring the depths of Vancouver’s criminal underworld.
The mayor’s brother is missing. A transit cop lies beaten and blinded, her service weapon stolen. A new series of graffiti tags are appearing, linked to an underground group calling themselves The Death of Kings. Class warfare has broken out on the streets of Vancouver, and PI Dave Wakeland finds himself on the front lines―but unsure which side he’s on.
Reeling from a bad breakup, and increasingly alienated from the city he calls home, Wakeland nevertheless agrees to look for the missing gun. The investigation takes him from flophouses to city hall, and from a clinic in the West Vancouver hills to a mega-mansion in the exclusive British Properties neighborhood―along the way, crossing every ethical line the PI has drawn for himself. Even then, Wakeland may not be able to pull it off…
My Review: My only regret (and it’s an easily fixable one), is that I hadn’t had the sheer pleasure of reading Sam Wiebe’s Wakeland’s series before this novel. I interviewed Sam Weibe alongside Dietrich Kalteis at TIFA MOTIVE 2023 and, after reading Sunset and Jericho, I can’t wait to go back and start at the beginning.
Sunset and Jericho slides down as smoothly as honeyed bourbon, tugging at the ache at the edge of your heart and setting fire to the reader’s willingness to follow protagonist Dave Wakeland into every seedy alleyway, every broken promise and shattered dream. But Dave’s on the side of the good guys and he’ll put his life on the line, and he takes the reader with him. Highly recommended. Thank you MOTIVE 2023 for introducing me to this series.
*The Last Exile is next on my list to read!
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Unearthing: A Story of Tangled Love and Family Secrets by Kyo Maclear (Knopf Canada)
About the book: An unforgettable memoir about a family secret revealed by a DNA test, the lessons learned in its aftermath, and the indelible power of love—for readers of Dani Shapiro’s Inheritance and Katherine May’s Wintering.
What gets planted, and what gets buried? What role does storytelling play in unearthing the past and making sense of a life? Can the humble act of tending a garden provide common ground for an inquisitive daughter and her complicated mother? As it seeks to answer these questions, Unearthing bursts with the very love it seeks to understand.
My Review: This magical book was like no other I’ve read. It’s a memoir, yes, but it’s also a mystery of biology and genealogy, the mystery of a mother’s secret life. As children, we feel like we own our parents' lives, the lives they had before us and even the ones they live after we’ve grown and left the family nest. But this memoir so beautifully demonstrates that we never fully become detached from the vines of familial connectivity. In the same way that foliage reaches out, connects and survives, even is submerged by concrete paving or pruned or devastated by flood, fire or drought. The seeds will find a way to breach the prisons of exile, desired or forced. And our parents; their affairs, misadventures, desires, loyalties and conflicts. The careful give and take to keep the child safe – but, can the child be kept safe? The child, reading the unclear signals of the parent, carries their own curiosities and demons. Unconditional love is a term bandied about like tumbleweed on the set of a wild west movie set. But this book, Unearthing, scrapes away the compost, the dried old leaves and finds the tenderest shoots of unconditional love, not only for our families but for ourselves. And, apart from that, it’s just so exquisitely written, with perfect flow, pacing and plot.
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Dusk in the Frog Pond by Rummana Chowdhury (Inanna Publications)
About the book: In Dusk in the Frog Pond, Rummana Chowdhury presents new narratives about the lived realities of Muslim women as they navigate life, be it in Bangladesh, on the shores of Lake Ontario in Toronto or along the riotous waves of the Atlantic in New York. These eight powerful stories follow a series of intrepid Bangladeshi women as they confront the issues of migration, displacement, nostalgia, cultural assimilation, marriage and—above all— identity and loneliness. Despite the challenges facing them, these compelling characters seek out happiness, whether in arranged marriages, romantic relationships or in shaping their individual destinies. Each tale is a depiction of the tensions, active as well as simmering, between culture, tradition and history and the modern world. The collection is a compendium of both joy and sorrow. It is an eternity coming alive through the fire of hope burning and dying within all of us.
My Review: From the luscious to the sublime to the coldest, grayest despair. These stories catapult us from sensual, ripe love and abundance to the devastation and grief. From plump, ardent flesh to withered husks, these stories take the reader from one extreme to another. Love and food are characters, emblematic of emotions and relationships. This is a collection of exquisite contrasts, happiness and desolation – and the enduring courage to accept and bear the latter with the greatest of dignity and profundity. There is heart wrenching sorrow, the kind from which one never heals, lessons to be learned, repented and perhaps, repeated.
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The Opportunist by Elyse Friedman (Mira)
About the book: A deliciously sly, compulsively readable tale about greed, power and the world’s most devious family. Smart, entertaining and brimming with shocking twists and turns, The Opportunist is both a thrill ride of a story and a razor-sharp view of who wields power in the world.
My Review: If you enjoyed Netflix’s “The Last Thing He Told Me” and Shari Lapena’s gripping, chilling and ultimately creepy Everyone Here is Lying, pick up The Opportunist. The scenery and setting is an escape in itself and the characters are richly vile and vilely rich.
The plot twists keep you guessing, even if you think (as I did!) that you’ve figured it all out.
I fell into this novel, fully embracing Alana Shropshire. As the bodies pile up (in a most satisfying way), you’ll be treated to a sting in the tail – masterful storytelling.
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Old Babes in the Woods: Stories by Margaret Atwood (Doubleday)
About the book: A dazzling collection of short stories from the internationally acclaimed, award-winning author of The Handmaid's Tale and The Testaments, stories that look deeply into the heart of family relationships, marriage, loss and memory, and what it means to spend a life together. Returning to short fiction for the first time since her 2014 collection Stone Mattress, Atwood showcases both her creativity and her humanity in these remarkable tales which by turns delight, illuminate, and quietly devastate.
My Review: I’ve always relied on Margaret Atwood to provide not only a rivetingly unusual set of stories, with unexpected twists of magical realism but also, with her almost psychotherapeutic insights into the hidden workings of human emotions. The journey of life, and perhaps most importantly and vibrantly, a sociological commentary of the times and peoples past and present. In Old Babes in the Woods, the cutting edge of Atwood’s polished sword eviscerates the carefully prescribed Miss Manners codes of conduct – no longer Miss anything, no longer concerned with manners. Atwood cleverly demonstrates the inner dialogue versus the external prerequisites. Her observations are hilarious as she documents the disparity between past and present. And too, there is heartbreak and grief, grief so deep it cannot be fully expressed.
This collection is as wildly original, vibrant and brimming with meaning as any of Atwood’s earlier, more dramatic works. Powerfully memorable.
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Rebellion Box by Hollay Ghadery (Radiant Press)
About the book: This explosive debut collection pushes against the limitations of gender roles, race, bodies, and minds, and explores our insignificance and impotence in the universe. The concept of otherness afforded by a marginalized and neurodivergent perspective is brilliantly represented in this book.
My Review: I can’t adequately describe the impact of these poems. This is the kind of poetry where you want to ask the poet, “have you been reading my mind!” or just yell YES on the subway without caring what anyone thinks, and then wave the book around, telling the world to read it.
These poems reach into your very marrow, eviscerate you and then wrap you in a weighted blanket of warmth and understanding.
I completely loved the explosive power of the language. Reading these poems was a adrenaline rush - and, even with rereading, the vivacity holds fast. I carry this collection with me and reading it never fails to thrill me, delight me and take my breath away.
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Circle Tour by Eva Tihanyi (Inanna Publications)
About the book: Circle Tour, Eva Tihanyi’s ninth poetry collection, seeks and celebrates beauty in the face of despondency. Its three sections—Outer Circle, Inner Circle, Centre—draw us in as we move from the “outside” world of politics, culture, and art to the “inside” world of relationships with family, friends, and lovers, to the “core” world of the self.
My Review:
“What did you try to save?
What wreckage did you win?”
“Would it be enough if you stopped leaning into the future
as if it were an adversary wind?”
A powerful, globally feminist collection of poetry. Unflinchingly direct and ultimately inspiring. Dedicated to Inanna Publisher and Editor-in-Chief, Luciana Ricciutelli.
“Where you are,
there will be dancing.
In the wake of your departure,
A terrible knowing: gone
Means gone.
Dearhearts, keep writing”
There is so much beauty in isolation, the individual as solitary origami. Observations of how stories choose us.
“I create magic; therefore I am.”
A lyrical journey of love, loss and longing, a journal of poetic observations, wise insights and the call to courage. An exploration of grief under a microscope as only Tihanyi can, undiluted by clichés, stripped of social artifice and stitched together with steel threads of hope and bravery.
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The Ghosts That Haunt Me: Memories of a Homicide Detective by Steve Ryan (Dundurn)
About the book: After years working in homicide, retired Toronto detective Steve Ryan reflects on six cases he will never forget.
Retired detective Steve Ryan worked in Toronto’s homicide squad for over a decade. For Ryan, the stories of Toronto’s most infamous crimes were more than just a headline read over morning coffee ― they were his everyday life.
After investigating over one hundred homicides, Ryan can never forget the tragedies and the victims, even after his retirement from the police force. In The Ghosts That Haunt Me , he reflects on six of the many cases that greatly impacted him ― seven people whose lives were senselessly taken ― and that he still thinks about nearly every day. While the stories are hard to tell for Ryan, they were harder to live through. Yet somewhere between the crimes and the heartache is a glimmer of hope that good eventually does prevail and that healing can come after grief.
My Review: Kudos to Steve Ryan for paying respectful homage to the victims in this book, lighting a candle to lives cut terribly short. The Ghosts That Haunt Me wasn’t an easy read but it’s an important one, delving into the psychology of evil and the toll it takes on those who hunt down the perpetrators. This book is haunting indeed but I truly believe that these ghosts will lie more peacefully for having their stories told. I applaud Ryan’s writing. The prose is careful, direct and highly evocative of the situations. From the gruelling weather to weariness of working endless hours around the clock, Ryan takes the reader with him every step of the way. As a Toronto resident, Ryan shares insights into many stories that I often wondered about and I’m grateful for the opportunity to learn about the victims and be able, in my way, to express my sorrow at their tragic lives.
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Everyone Here is Lying by Shari Lapena
About the book: Welcome to Stanhope! A safe neighborhood. A place for families.
William Wooler is a family man, on the surface. But he's been having an affair, an affair that ended horribly this afternoon at a motel up the road. So, when he returns to his house, devastated and angry, to find his difficult nine-year-old daughter, Avery, unexpectedly home from school, William loses his temper.
Hours later, Avery's family declares her missing.
Suddenly Stanhope doesn't feel so safe. And William isn't the only one on his street who's hiding a lie. As witnesses come forward with information that may or may not be true, Avery's neighbors become increasingly unhinged.
Who took Avery Wooler?
Nothing will prepare you for the truth.
My Review: I had the great pleasure of interviewing Shari Lapena (Not a Happy Family) along with Gilly Macmillan (The Fall) and Louise Mangos (The Beaten Track) at Shetland Noir and it was a blast! I loved Not a Happy Family so much that I requested an arc of Everyone Here is Lying and I just loved it! It’s a perfect escape read; gripping, chilling and creepy.
I hoped you’ve enjoyed these reviews! The Minerva Reader and I will be on hiatus until the Fall and I hope everyone will have a fabulous summer! Next on my to-read list is The Merry Widow Murders by Melodie Campbell and I can’t wait. Remember to support Canadian books wherever you can and share the love by writing reviews or posting on social media. Publishers and authors greatly appreciate any and all love.
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STATIONS OF THE CROSSED by Carol Rose GoldenEagle, Inanna Publications
About the book:
Recalling Easter church services she attended as a child, Carol Rose GoldenEagle draws on the “stations of the cross,” the annual ritual of the priest presenting plaques depicting the stages of Christ’s persecution to his resurrection. Using these early teachings as a springboard for critical reflections, the poems in Stations of the Crossed look back but, more importantly, look forward to reclaim the gifts given by Creator within Indigenous culture. Carol Rose GoldenEagle’s searing new poetry collection examines the dark legacy of the Residential School System, Church and government doctrine, and the ongoing impacts on Indigenous Peoples’ lives across Turtle Island.
My review:
If a faith cannot withstand the investigations into human failings, then that faith is hollow and lacks a solid foundation. And, let’s say those foundations have been found to be morally unfound, why then should we hesitate to raze them to the ground? Why are we so afraid to face the facts of what happened? Why, according to a recent article in The Walrus, is the trend, with regard to residential schools, to shy away and deny this genocide?
Surely true faith should be stronger than that. And indeed, with Stations of the Crossed, Carol Rose GoldenEagle shows us that there is faith, waiting in the darkness. It may not the faith we’ve been conditioned to accept but it is there.
Ultimately, this collection is faith-affirming and uplifting and I, for one, embrace it wholely, and I thank Carol Rose GoldenEagle for these writings at this dark time.
“darkness is always present but allow it in only when needed
during those times to avoid another trap
real or imagined
you will find your way out listening to the whispers of the Spirit
following it
faith
in yourself
and in Creator and those who surround us”
Amazing Grace
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THE GET by Dieter Kalteis, ECW
About the book:
Lenny Ovitz has plenty of secrets, and his wife, Paulina, has become a liability. His life would be so much better without her in it.
It’s the mid-’60s in Toronto, and Lenny works for a ruthless gangster whose travel agency is a front for a collections racket in the Kensington Market area. Lenny’s days are spent with his partner, Gabe, terrorizing the locals into paying protection on their shops and their lives. On the side, Lenny and Gabe co-own a tenement block that they bought with dirty money borrowed from shady individuals. Overextended, Lenny plans to pay them back with more borrowed money from other loans and by re-mortgaging his house, without the knowledge of his wife.
Tired of his lies and scheming, Paulina demands a divorce. Lenny is certain she’s going to take him for everything, leaving him unable to pay the debt on the tenement block. And that’s likely to get him pitched off one of his own rooftops. Lenny would rather get than be gotten, so he comes up with a surefire way to end both his marital and money problems — Paulina’s going to have to get whacked.
My review:
I always get a kick out of Kalteis’s work; it’s funny, and sharp as a tack with gritty characters and whip-smart dialogue. Kalteis creates cinematic characters that will stick with you well after you've finished the book; feisty noir thugs looking to screw each other over and come up with inventive ways to beat the rap.
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AVALANCHE by Jessica Westhead, Invisible Publishing (coming September 26th, 2023)
About the book:
"Things used to be easier, but even in those carefree days, the rules were in place for a reason. And that reason so we can all agree. So we can all have the same standard applied across the board. So there is no special treatment, which no one should receive. This is why we need the rules." The stories in Avalanche combine humor with an earnest examination and indictment of white entitlement, guilt, shame, and disorientation in the wake of waking up to the reality of racism. Focusing on the perspective of white, cis, straight, and mostly middle-aged and middle-class characters, this collection shines a light on the obliviousness of white privilege, the violence of polite, quiet racism hiding just under the surface of mundane, everyday situations, and the anguished flailing of well-intentioned white ladies desperate to confirm their essential goodness at all costs. Westhead writes with compassion and empathy for both her frustrating and frustrated white protagonists and the racialized characters who encounter them, and uses humour not to comfortably distance white readers from the harmful behaviour of her self-absorbed protagonists, but to pull them in close to recognize—and reckon with—those familiar parts of themselves, and to become more aware of the insidious systems of white supremacy at work behind the scenes.
My review:
I have three goals with The Minerva Reader: to read, to recommend and, to learn. With Avalanche, I realize all three. Westhead’s prose is, as always, observative, precise and pitch perfect, with an undercurrent of humour that cuts to the bone in a not-entirely-comfortable way. But that’s the point of Avalanche, to make the reader uncomfortable. Westhead fearlessly challenges us to wipe clean the muddy windows of awareness. Embrace being rattled by this collection, it’s an important read.
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I AM CLAUDE FRANÇOIS AND YOU ARE A BATHTUB by Stuart Ross, Anvil Press.
About the book:
Stuart Ross’s sometimes poignant, sometimes outrageous third story collection deepens his exploration of the possibilities of the short story and narrative. A trio of tales probe fame through the lens of 1960s-70s French pop and disco icon Claude François; legendary Hollywood actor Lee Marvin saves the day, again and again; the citizens of a small town worship an all-knowing potato; a man dons a bib to devour his neighbour’s house; a tourist finds both love and a dead frog in Nicaragua; and, in one particularly educational anti-story, the author instructs readers in the art of writing the short story. In I Am Claude François and You Are a Bathtub, Ross, a veteran of the Canadian literary underground, unleashes his arsenal of pathos, absurdism, humour, and cantankerousness.
My review:
Reading a Stuart Ross collection of short stories is like opening up a vintage chemistry sets that were around in the 1970’s. The real ones, that created explosions and were probably as toxic as all hell but they were the real deal and was it ever fun to play with them!
I love reading Ross’s stories for exactly that reason – Ross is a word-alchemist and his combinations and perspectives are always so original and jolts your brain out of a rut and up into the air.
When I decided to genuinely study the craft of writing, back in 2000, instead of paying lip service to improving while hoping to be ‘discovered’, I enrolled at a few of Stuart Ross’s Bootcamps which were incredible.
So I was delighted to read the opening chapter: “The Elements of a Short Story” which felt like a bonus treat.
“Writing a short story is essential to creating conflict. This should happen on the first page. Begin in the middle of the action. She hits him on the head. He loses his job. The chaplain repairs the clock. Water-skiing. You have eight seconds to grab the reader’s attention. Have characters. Before you write, you should know everything about the setting. … When the threads of a story tie up into a satisfying knot at the story’s conclusion, there can be no greater satisfaction for writer nor for the reader. This is what is it all about. This is why we quit our job in order to write.”
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NOT A HAPPY FAMILY by Shari Lapena, Doubleday, Canada.
About the book:
In this family, everyone is keeping secrets--especially the dead. Brecken Hill in upstate New York is an expensive place to live. You have to be rich to have a house there. And they don't come much richer than Fred and Sheila Merton. But even all their money can't protect them when a killer comes to call. The Mertons are brutally murdered the night after an Easter Dinner with their three adult kids. Who, of course, are devastated.
My Review: A deliciously juicy and plump read, bursting with nefarious family who are just dying to do one another in! The characters are so delightfully evil that you can't put the book down, right to the final twist!
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ADRIFT by Lisa Brideau, Sourcebooks Landmark
About the book:
The truth won't always set you free...
Ess wakes up alone on a sailboat in the remote Pacific Northwest with no memory of who she is or how she got there. She finds a note, but it's more warning than comfort: Start over. Don't make yourself known. Don't look back. Ess must have answers. She sails over a turbulent ocean to a town hundreds of miles away that, she hopes, might offer insight. The chilling clues she uncovers point to a desperate attempt at erasing her former life. But why? And someone is watching her…someone who knows she must never learn her truth.
My Review: What a refreshingly unique – if terrifying – take on our dystopian future. Set in the stunning surrounds of Haidai Gwaii, the Canadian Galápagos, Ess's adventures will keep you engrossed right to the last word. I really enjoyed the characters, and the action was non-stop. Adrift would make a great movie!
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HATE STORY by Jeff Cottrill, Dragonfly Press
About the book:
A violent mob disrupts the East Toronto funeral service for unemployed loner Paul Shoreditch. The riot attracts sensational media attention, especially online, but is soon forgotten. Meanwhile, aspiring journalist, film fanatic and Internet addict Jackie Roberts discovers a bizarre online community that has been sullying Paul's name for years. What did Paul do to these people? Why is their animosity so intense? Why are they so secretive?
This offbeat mix of satire and mystery dares to tackle some of the most fiery and controversial social topics of our generation. Darkly funny, subversive and sometimes outrageous, Hate Story takes a sledgehammer to the disturbing modern trend of Internet bullying and shaming.
My Review: What a world we live in. And Jeff Cottrill's Hate Story captures it so perfectly. This book has its finger on the pulse of our social-media driven, groomed-to-hate society. The mirror that Cottrill holds up reveals a sadly accurate, blisteringly vicious society. I really enjoyed the fact that this novel didn't hold back in its characterisation and dialogue. Hate Story is a refreshingly honest sociological commentary while being hilarious at the same time.
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SUCH A LOVELY AFTERNOON by Patti Flather, Inanna Publication
About the book:
Such a Lovely Afternoon is a dazzling debut collection from award-winning Yukon writer Patti Flather.
A feisty young tomboy grapples with gender roles with sometimes hilarious results, a refugee single dad struggles for dignity in his northern community, and a malfunctioning compost toilet and wacky neighbours upturn a woman’s island cabin life, among other tales.
Against vivid landscapes from Canada’s West Coast to Hong Kong to the Yukon, Flather reveals poignant beauty, compassion and humour in everyday lives, with characters searching for identity and belonging, delving into their resilience and humanity.
My Review:
Such an extraordinarily lovely collection of short stories. The range of experiences, emotions, reactions, recollections, and turmoil in this collection blew me away. Devastating, insightful, heart-breaking and life-affirming, these stories will carry you to places you've never been, but once read, will stay in your heart forever. Kudos to this vivid and powerful writing.
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Thank you for reading A Turn of Phrase!