Reviews

Semi-Detached

When Laura Keys, the contemporary protagonist of Elizabeth Ruth’s Semi-Detached, first enters the house at Two Condor Avenue on an icy winter day in Toronto in 2013, she feels as if she has “stepped into ... Read More »

September 6, 2023 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels, Reviews

Do You Remember Being Born?

By Sean Michaels

“So what happens when you don’t need a human being to write anything anymore? When you can just turn to your magic smartbox and say, ‘Write me a novel about ornithologists and spies?’” This question, ... Read More »

September 6, 2023 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels, Reviews

Like Every Form of Love: A Memoir of Friendship and True Crime

By Padma Viswanathan

In 1997, Padma Viswanathan – more than decade away from the publication of her lauded debut novel, The Toss of a Lemon – secluded herself in a decommissioned tugboat docked in a Vancouver Island marina. ... Read More »

August 30, 2023 | Filed under: Memoir & Biography, Reviews

Learned by Heart

By Emma Donoghue

Historical fiction often dwells in the gap between what happened and what was recorded. The best examples also explore the historical conditions for why that gap exists. Emma Donoghue’s latest novel, Learned by Heart, does ... Read More »

August 30, 2023 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels, Reviews

★ The Abduction of Seven Forgers

By Sean Dixon

A novel as sheerly entertaining as it is profound is a rare treat, and Sean Dixon’s newest work is exactly that. The Abduction of Seven Forgers is the latest fiction for adults by the ... Read More »

August 23, 2023 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

★ Skid Dogs

By Emelia Symington-Fedy

“Sugar, and spice, and everything nice; / That’s what little girls are made of.” So goes the old verse that, in spite of its antiquated views on gender, remains a popular nursery rhyme. Girls have ... Read More »

August 16, 2023 | Filed under: Memoir & Biography, Reviews

★ Avalanche

By Jessica Westhead

White people’s anxieties, anger, fear, and self-doubt regarding race and racism are placed centre stage in Avalanche, the provocative and illuminating new collection of short fiction by Toronto-based Jessica Westhead, the author of two books ... Read More »

August 9, 2023 | Filed under: Fiction: Short, Reviews

★ Not That Kind of Place

By Michael Melgaard

Based on a brief description, a reader might think they know what to expect from Not That Kind of Place, the stunning debut novel by Toronto-based writer Michael Melgaard. The background is simple, but harrowing: ... Read More »

August 2, 2023 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels, Reviews

Gin, Turpentine, Pennyroyal, Rue

By Christine Higdon

Near the end of Christine Higdon’s evocative and provocative novel Gin, Turpentine, Pennyroyal, Rue, Isla McKenzie wonders how different things will be for the next generation, who “could live through the twentieth century, and even ... Read More »

July 26, 2023 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels, Reviews

Brown Boy

By Omer Aziz

In his memoir Brown Boy, journalist, lawyer, and recent Radcliffe Fellow Omer Aziz delivers a compelling account about growing up in Canada, struggling to find his way in life as the son of Pakistani immigrants, ... Read More »

July 19, 2023 | Filed under: Memoir & Biography, Reviews

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