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June Author of the Month: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Wednesday, Apr 24, 2013 at 7:13pm

Set in Nigeria, The Purple Hibiscus (2003) and Orange-Prize-winner Half of a Yellow Sun (2006) separately reveal Adichie's deftness as a storyteller. Refusing to simplify the problems or solutions, Adichie's postcolonial writings ask questions about the roles played by colonialism and present day corruption in the land of her birth.

Although Adichie's latest novel, Americanah, ranges far beyond the author's homeland in a story of love and race spanning three continents, it remains very much a tale of Nigeria. As teenagers in a Lagos secondary school, Ifemelu and Obinze fall in love. Fleeing the military dictatorship of Nigeria, Ifemelu goes to study in America but Abinze is detained by immigration officials and is eventually put in handcuffs and deported. Years later, when they reunite in Nigeria, neither is the same person. Obinze is the kind of successful "Big Man" he'd scorned in his youth and Ifemelu has become an "Americanah," a local term of disdain for people who have become Americanized.

"A keenly observed examination of race, identity and belonging in the global landscapes of Africans and Americans."
-Colum McCann.

Categories: Saskatoon, Winnipeg, Author of the Month

May Author of the Month: Philip Kerr

Tuesday, Apr 23, 2013 at 5:02pm

England's Philip Kerr enjoyed a stellar literary debut. March Violets, the first of his Bernie Gunther novels, appeared in 1989 to wide critical appreciation. By the time the third novel in the series was published two years later, Kerr's reputation was established. Not wanting to be typecast, he turned to writing standalone thrillers and children's books that disappointed some of his readers. But even Kerr could not deny Bernie Gunther, and he returned with his dogged German sleuth in The One From the Other in 2006.

In Kerr's new book, A Man Without Breath, Bernie has a new job at the German War Crimes Bureau in Berlin. The year is 1943. A month has passed since the stunning defeat at Stalingrad, but unsettling reports are circulating of a mass grave in a forest near Smolensk. Polish officers killed by the Russians? This would give the Nazi regime an unexpected propaganda victory over the Russians. Bernie is dispatched to gather evidence. Once there, however, he discovers a cunning killer is hiding behind the carnage, someone Bernie must put a face to before the killer puts an end to Bernie.

Categories: Mystery & Crime, Saskatoon, Winnipeg, Author of the Month

April Author of the Month: Helen Humphreys

Wednesday, Mar 20, 2013 at 8:07pm

Helen Humphreys is a versatile writer, open to and adept at experimentation. Though many of her novels are based on historical events, her lyrical prose harkens back to her beginnings as a poet. "Stark, precise poetry," said Kirkus Reviews of her 2008 novel Coventry which was a finalist for the Trillium Book Award. Her work has also been selected as a New York Times Editors' Choice and a Globe and Mail Best Book of the Year.

Humphreys takes up a new challenge in her latest book Nocturne, a deeply felt, haunting memoir both about and for her younger brother Martin, who passed away before she could come to terms with the fact that he had terminal cancer. Speaking directly to him, she lays bare their secrets, their disagreements, their early childhood together, their intense though unspoken love for each other. A memoir of grief, an honest self-examination in the face of profound pain, this poetic, candid and intimate book is an offering not only to the memory of Martin but to all those who are living through the death of family and friends.

Categories: Saskatoon, Winnipeg, Author of the Month, Newsletter

March Author of the Month: Joyce Carol Oates

Wednesday, Feb 27, 2013 at 2:26pm

One of the most prolific and versatile contemporary American writers, Joyce Carol Oates has published myriad novels, short stories, poems, and plays, as well as books and articles of criticism and nonfiction. Oates focuses on what she views as the spiritual, sexual and intellectual decline of modern American society. Employing a dense, elliptical prose style, she depicts the cruel and the macabre to delineate the evil with which individuals must contend. She is a recipient of the National Book Award and the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in Short Fiction.

An eerie story of possession, power and loss, The Accursed marks new territory for Oates with a combination of authentic historical detail and chilling supernatural elements. Princeton, New Jersey, at the turn of the 20th century is a genteel town for genteel souls. But something is corrupting its residents. Vampires and ghosts haunt the dreams of the innocent. A young bride is abducted by a shape-shifting, vaguely European prince. And in the Pine Barrens that border the town, a terrifying underworld opens up.

Categories: Saskatoon, Winnipeg, Author of the Month, Newsletter

February Author of the Month - Martin Amis

Wednesday, Jan 30, 2013 at 2:32pm

Regarded as a groundbreaking novelist, Amis satirizes the excesses of youth and contemporary society with an incisive wit similar to that of his father, author Kingsley Amis. Employing fast-paced prose infused with contemporary slang and profanity, Amis portrays characters who are obsessed with sex, drugs, violence and materialistic pursuits. Amis, commonly known as Britain's enfant terrible, is widely regarded as a moralist whose novels admonish the vices of his age.

His most recent novel, Lionel Asbo, features the terrifying yet weirdly loyal thug of the title. Lionel has always looked out for his ward and nephew, the orphaned Desmond Pepperdine. He provides him with fatherly advice (always carry a knife) and is determined they should share the joys of pit bulls (fed with lots of Tabasco sauce), Internet porn, and all manner of more serious criminality. Des, on the other hand, desires nothing more than books to read and a girl to love (and to protect a family secret that could be the death of him). When his uncle wins £140 million in the lottery, Lionel's true nature remains uncompromised while his problems, and therefore Desmond's, only multiply.

Author photo by Isabel Fonseca

Categories: Saskatoon, Winnipeg, Author of the Month, Newsletter
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