A quick glance at my bookshelves and you would think that Jane Urquhart is one of my favourite authors. I have all of her novels save one -- a couple of hardcovers purchased new -- but I have a habit of leaving them unfinished. Nonetheless, the themes she pursues in
Kathleen Winter's Annabel House of Anansi, 2010 (Looking for a swallow rather than a full glass? ORANGE Squirt below.) Like Margaret Atwood’s Surfacing and Kate Grenville’s The Secret River, it’s impossible to imagine Kathleen Winter’s Annabel being set anywhere other than the landscape therein. “In Croyden Harbour human life came
Michael Ondaatje’s In the Skin of a Lion Knopf, 1987 I first read this as a teenager. I’d already been reading a lot of adult literature, even if I was still regularly re-reading childhood favourites like the Anne books and still discovering some classics like K.M. Peyton’s Flambards stories and
I didn’t fall in love with a book during this Canada Reads. Last year I fell in love with Nikolski (and, hey, it even won), and I’ve fallen for others throughout my long relationship with Canada Reads. It’s hard not to hope for that. But of course the odds are
If I was coming into these debates not having read these books, I think I’d be readily swayed by Lorne Cardinal’s defense of Carol Shields’ novel, Unless. (With Sara Quin weighing in on the other end of the table.) I’m not just saying that because Unless is one of my
