Quill and Quire

Fiction: Novels

Refuge

By Merilyn Simonds

“My son is dead,” 96-year-old Cassandra MacCallum says halfway through Merilyn Simonds’s artful and allusive new novel. It is a declaration, not a lamentation, one called forth by the unexpected and unwelcome appearance in her ... Read More »

July 16, 2018 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

★ French Exit

By Patrick deWitt

Do not be fooled by how disarmingly funny Patrick deWitt’s latest novel is. Though you will likely find yourself laughing out loud on numerous occasions while reading French Exit (assuming you enjoyed the author’s previous ... Read More »

July 12, 2018 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Foe

By Iain Reid

Domestic thrillers along the lines of Gone Girl and The Girl on the Train have boasted arguably unexpected staying power after climbing to the top of bestseller lists and remaining in the mass-market spotlight. Publishers ... Read More »

July 12, 2018 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Black Star

By Maureen Medved

In his 1797 essay, “On a Supposed Right to Lie from Altruistic Motives,” Immanuel Kant famously argued that people are strictly bound by moral principle to tell the truth in all situations, even when that ... Read More »

July 9, 2018 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

★ Kudos

By Rachel Cusk

The third in a trilogy of novels that describes the various encounters of a protagonist who shares many attributes with her author, Kudos marks the completion of a turning point in Rachel Cusk’s prolific bibliography ... Read More »

July 9, 2018 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

An Ocean of Minutes

By Thea Lim

Toronto resident Thea Lim’s debut novel is a dystopian time-travel story that defies genre conventions by concentrating on the interpersonal consequences of its plot. But somewhere along the line the narrative falls flat: despite the ... Read More »

July 5, 2018 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Adjacentland

By Rabindranath Maharaj

Rabindranath Maharaj’s new novel, though flawed, is a fiercely imaginative, powerfully written meditation on storytelling, uncertainty, identity, and time. Maharaj, the Trinidadian-Canadian author of The Amazing Absorbing Boy (which won the Trillium Book Award and ... Read More »

June 27, 2018 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Cold Skies

By Thomas King

Thomas King returns to the world of crime fiction with Cold Skies, the third book in the Thumps DreadfulWater mystery series. And this time, King’s own name is on the cover rather than the pseudonym ... Read More »

June 25, 2018 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

★ Chicken

By Lynn Crosbie

There are few authors who can get away with using words like “limbus,” “moiré,” and “souse” on the first page of a novel. Acclaimed poet and journalist Lynn Crosbie is one of them. Chicken, Crosbie’s ... Read More »

June 25, 2018 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Ayesha at Last

By Uzma Jalaluddin

Uzma Jalaluddin is the latest author to be smitten by Miss Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy, the lovers so beset by pride and prejudice. Ayesha at Last takes the 200-year-old romantic comedy of manners, ... Read More »

June 25, 2018 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels