Discovering Andrew Miller’s work, at this stage of his career, reminds me of the solid sense of anticipation that I felt upon reading Rupert Thomson’s Secrecy (2013). As authors of 8 and 11 novels respectively, I’m surprised that I hadn’t been tempted to read one of their books until
The family stories in contemporary CanLit are not all that different from the stories and novels read by my grandmother’s generation. The women in my family did not read obsessively, no, but regularly, yes. What else was there to do in the evenings when your favourite show was in reruns
In which I read, while sitting in a café, in a library and in various TTC stations. While longer volumes, like Charles Palliser’s The Quincunx and Andrew Miller’s Now We Shall Be Entirely Free, stay at home. Charles Quimper’s In Every Wave (2017; Trans. Guil Lefebvre, 2018) Narrated by
Mavis Gallant’s first sentences are clear and purposeful: they orient readers and offer a glimpse of the story’s tone. “His mother had come of age in the war and then seemed to live a long greyness like a spun-out November.” Another remarkable aspect of her craft is the way
At first it is surprising. To come across the word ‘defenestration’ in a Mavis Gallant story. Often these are inward-looking stories, detailed and expansive glimpses into the interior lives of quiet – and often solitary – characters. Someone drives too quickly or protests the contents of a sermon, someone
