I mostly read fiction, memoirs, and poetry--preferences that are reflected in my night table choices. I've selected books that have been published relatively recently, because I believe it's important to support new works. (I've allowed myself one exception, The Smoking Diaries, by Simon Gray, which I excuse on the grounds that it's new to me.)
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Categories: Reviews, Discussions, Authors, Winnipeg, Night Table Recommendations
The concept of father memoirs is a fascinating one. Confronting fathers directly and publicly is not, and never has been, easy: the patriarch should judge and not be judged. To write about the father is to sit in judgement upon him, and for most cultures this was a taboo too strong to be overcome. The Greeks, despite their searingly perceptive stories about father child interactions, did not attempt to do so-nor did the Romans, the Italians of the Renaissance, the Elizabethans, or even the Romantics. Paradoxically--but not surprisingly, given the rigid paternalism of the age and the attendant psychological pressures--personal father writing, like radical feminism, is a product of the Victorian era.
In 1907, six years after the death of Queen Victoria, Edmund Gosse published Father and Son. Once the taboo was broken, writers were quick to take advantage of the new possibilities. The 20th century saw a steady increase in the number of father memoirs, and, now that the boomers are aging and seeking to immortalize themselves, such memoirs are becoming as ubiquitous as tattoos. And, as with tattoos, some are visceral works of art. The six books described below give an idea of how poignant, rich and rewarding father memoirs can be.
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Categories: Reviews, Discussions, Authors, Night Table Recommendations
In this creepy, three generation novel, tells the story of how a teacher/principal sexually assaults girls he teaches on the Canadian prairies in the 1920's and '30's. We watch in horror as Parley Burns slip slides through the lives of women, destroying them utterly. glowing prose exposes the secretive nature of women's relationships with their mothers and daughters as, unable to name the horror that slinks among them, they live with austerity and pressure-cooker sexual repression.
From the author of the Giller Prize-winning Late Nights on Air, Alone in the Classroom is a beautifully written novel about a difficult subject.
Categories: Reviews
Hired killers Eli and Charlie Sisters set out from Oregon City in 1851 for Sacramento, California and the gold fields to complete a contract for their boss. In a fog of alcohol and the stress of coping with a beloved but bumbling horse, Eli and Charlie stagger on, executing anyone who gets in their way. As they win and lose a fortune in gold on more than one occasion, the brothers re-examine their relationship and their purpose in life.
The Sisters Brothers is a gory, brutal yet somehow funny re-telling of the classic western and has just won the 2011 Governor General's Award for Fiction as well as the 2011 Rogers Writer's Trust Award for Fiction. It is being talked about by many booksellers around here and will appeal to readers of any age and of many literary tastes.
Categories: Reviews
A crime writer I am also a crime reader and probably about 80% of my reading is crime novels. I also like to read books set in Canada whenever possible, and sometimes that makes for a difficult search. Canadian crime writers still have the impression that they have to set their books in the U.S. and pretend to be Americans. There are noticeable exceptions, but despite the success of many Canadian - set mystery books on the world stage, setting a crime book in Canada, with Canadian characters and Canadian issues, is seen as taking a risk.
Fortunately there are a number of excellent Canadian writers prepared to take that risk. One of my favourites of the last couple of years is The Weight of Stones (Dundurn Press) by Ottawa's C.B. Forrest. Weight of Stones is a crime novel in that that protagonist is a Toronto police officer and he is on the trail of some 'bad guys' but (like the very best crime novels) it is so much more. The main character, Charlie McKelvey, is consumed by grief and guilt. Grief over the death of his son, and guilt in what he sees as his part in the death because he threw the troubled young man out of the house. Forrest's portrait of McKelvey's anguish, which has destroyed his marriage and is well on the way to destroying his career, is so heart-rending I was surprised when I met Forrest to find, not a drunk ex-cop with a grudge against the world, but a happy young man in a happy marriage. Excellent writing does that.
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