Quill and Quire

Fiction: Novels

Pitouie

By Derek Winkler

“Adventure” and “intrigue” are two of the last words you would expect to ­associate with a novel in which the main character works a dead-end job as the associate editor of a waste management trade ... Read More »

January 24, 2011 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Sanctuary Line

By Jane Urquhart

It is not a fictional location, but in Jane Urquhart’s hands, Southern Ontario has become an entire imagined world, much like Thomas Hardy’s Wessex or William Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha County. Urquhart returns once again to this ... Read More »

November 16, 2010 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

How Should a Person Be?

By Sheila Heti

Relationships between identity, creativity, and friendship are explored in a humorous and intelligent – if somewhat monochromatic – manner in Toronto-based Sheila Heti’s new novel. Heti, who previously produced a novel (2005’s Ticknor) and short ... Read More »

November 16, 2010 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

★ Ape House

By Sara Gruen

Driven by a plot that defies convention, Sara Gruen’s Ape House is captivating. Her follow-up to the 2007 bestseller Water for Elephants is another story about animals, though its strikingly realized human characters turn out ... Read More »

November 16, 2010 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels