BOOK REVIEWS

Like Rum-Drunk Angels

Perhaps more than any other genre, the western seems a relic of the past, to the point where a new literary example – say, Patrick deWitt’s The Sisters Brothers – is almost automatically viewed as ... Read More »

March 12, 2020 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels, Reviews

Joni: The Lyrical Life of Joni Mitchell

By Selina Alko

Vancouver-raised, Brooklyn-based author-illustrator Selina Alko first heard Joni Mitchell’s music when she was nine years old attending summer camp in B.C. It made an enduring impression. In her author’s note for Joni: The Lyrical Life ... Read More »

March 9, 2020 | Filed under: Kids’ Books, Picture Books

Out of My Mind: A Psychologist’s Descent into Madness and Back

By Shalom Camenietzki

“Insight” is a word that gets thrown around a lot in psychiatric circles: a patient who has it is someone who understands that they are ill, whereas lack of insight is considered to be a ... Read More »

March 9, 2020 | Filed under: Memoir & Biography, Reviews

★ The Dyzgraphxst

By Canisia Lubrin

Canisia Lubrin’s second full-length collection is an ambitious project, combining a lyric attention to the representation of the self with an epic scope and focus on the fate of a community, in this case on ... Read More »

March 9, 2020 | Filed under: Poetry, Reviews

Trending: How and Why Stuff Gets Popular

By Kira Vermond and Clayton Hanmer (ill.)

Hula Hoops, Cabbage Patch Kids, and pet rocks are often dismissed as nothing more than silly, fleeting frivolities. But in the new non-fiction book Trending: How and Why Stuff Gets Popular, Norma Fleck Award–winning author ... Read More »

March 5, 2020 | Filed under: Children and YA Non-fiction, Kids’ Books

The Subtweet

By Vivek Shraya

Vivek Shraya has become one of Canada’s most well-known chameleons of the arts and culture. Shraya has received praise in different artistic realms, including five separate nominations for Lambda Literary Awards and a nomination for ... Read More »

March 5, 2020 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels, Reviews

Coming Up for Air

By Sarah Leipciger

No spoilers here: the first line of Sarah Leipciger’s Coming Up for Air is “This is how I drowned.” The narrator who delivers it is inspired by L’Inconnue de la Seine (the unknown woman of ... Read More »

March 2, 2020 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels, Reviews

How a Woman Becomes a Lake

By Marjorie Celona

Marjorie Celona’s taut, melancholy sophomore novel opens on New Year’s Day in a frigid corner of Washington State. Officer Lewis Côté finds Vera Gusev’s car abandoned in a parking lot near a frozen lake, “doors ... Read More »

March 2, 2020 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels, Reviews

Nattiq and the Land of Statues

By Barbara Landry and Martha Kyak (ill.)

The stakes of environmental-science books for kids have risen dramatically as climate change hurtles toward the point of no return. Four new titles, running the gamut from informational to fictional, celebrate the beauty of trees ... Read More »

March 2, 2020 | Filed under: Kids’ Books, Picture Books