I had never read anything by Olive Senior before, but I had heard of her, and I knew she was a good writer, so picking up The Pain Tree was an easy decision for me. As was recommending her, and gushing about her publisher Cormorant Books on the radio last week. If you’re looking for…
My fixation on Alberta writers comes with good reason. I’m on the board for the Writers’ Guild of Alberta yo! Their mission is to connect, encourage, inspire, promote and support Alberta writers and their writing, so it would be a down right travesty if I didn’t feature them on one of my radio segments this…
Is this book literary? Yes. Is this book a thriller? Yes, of sorts. Is this book a worthwhile piece of historical fiction? Definitely! The Butcher’s Hook by Janet Ellis is a lot of different things, it’s very unique in so many ways that it will appeal to many different audiences. But before I get into…
All summer long, I’m appearing weekly on CBC’s Homestretch to talk about new books worth reading this summer. Each week, I’m focusing on a different genre, and yesterday I spoke about historical fiction. You can hear the segment here if you are interested. I don’t intend on listening to it myself, because hearing your voice…
This is one effed up family. White Elephant by Catherine Cooper follows mother Ann, father Richard and son Tor as they struggle to navigate their new world in Sierra Leone at the beginning of the civil war there. I found this a really fascinating premise for a novel; three white people are transplanted from their…
The mountain landscape pictured on Amy Stuart‘s breakout thriller Still Mine has crossed my computer screen many times this year-it was a buzz book for 2016, so I was super excited to crack it open. Apparently it isn’t available in the U.S. until August, so my American readers are getting a jump start! I’ll make…
My reading of this book seems to have coincided with a very important milestone in my life: the marriage of a best friend. I find this happens to me quite frequently; I will pick up a book and find it is the perfect thing to be reading at that very specific time in my life….
Oh jeez guys, oh jeez. I seem to have been on a streak lately, reading books about children dying, being kidnapped, and other horrible things. Billie Livingston’s The Crooked Heart of Mercy continues this terrible theme as it begins with the accidental death of a two year-old, while he is at home with him Mom…
Many Can-lit fans will know of Peter Behrens. He comes out with a new book every few years, he’s won the GG for his fiction in the past, and he looks like he a real-life cowboy. I will admit that I’ve harboured a bit of a crush on him in the past, and when I…
In honour of the recent Alberta Book Awards being given out, I wanted to highlight another wonderful book I just finished by an award-winning Alberta author Joan Crate. Black Apple follows a young Aboriginal girl named Sinopaki as she is forcefully taken from her family and brought to the residential school of St. Mark’s. Throughout…
The good folks at Penguin Random House Canada heard that I had a kid, so they sent me a picture book to enjoy with my daughter. They didn’t ask for a review in return, but I feel as if it’s the least I can do, so here it goes, a review of a kid’s book:…
People who work at or attend universities seem to make numerous appearances in Amina Gautier’s collection of short stories The Loss of All Lost Things. Is this a problem? No, of course not, and it makes a lot of sense when you discover that Gautier is a professor of creative writing at the University of…
