Reviews

Day of the Dog-tooth Violets

The list of chapter titles in Ontario writer Christina Kilbourne’s debut novel reads like a poem: “Salted Fish, Smoked Fish, Pickled Fish”; “A Successful Excursion”; “Bad Eyes, A Son for Hamar.” That poetic sensibility carries ... Read More »

February 5, 2004 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Cold Fear

By Rick Mofina

When 10-year-old Paige Baker wanders off a camping trail to look for her dog, she has no idea of the danger she’s put herself in. Her parents, Doug and Emily, are so wrapped up in ... Read More »

February 5, 2004 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Making a Killing

By Warren Dunford

The relatively recent fad for irony – its use and misuse – can make it hard to know how to read some fiction. Like equally tricky efforts to be satirical, sometimes irony is evident, delicious, ... Read More »

February 5, 2004 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Ditch

By Hal Niedzviecki

Voice is visceral, it’s of the guts, whereas the daily tinkering of today’s society is primarily cerebral: we think more than we feel, we count more than we sing. To find voice, when voice is ... Read More »

February 5, 2004 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Flesh Wounds and Purple Flowers: The Cha-cha Years

By Francisco Ibañez-Carrasco

Franciso Ibañez-Carrasco’s first novel is a beautiful and often difficult book about searching for the source of one’s humanity. Flesh Wounds and Purple Flowers follows Camilo, a strong-willed gay Chilean who escapes Santiago for Vancouver ... Read More »

February 5, 2004 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Sparrow Nights

By David Gilmour

David Gilmour’s latest novel may not win him a pack of new readers, but his fans will think it just fine. Sparrow Nights covers some perennial Gilmour themes – male desire and unrequited sexual obsession ... Read More »

February 5, 2004 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

That’s What I Am

By Al Waxman

In our celebrity-devouring culture, it is a rite of passage for the famous, the would-be famous and the infamous to cash in on their Warhol-allotted 15 minutes by penning a memoir. And thus we are ... Read More »

February 5, 2004 | Filed under: Memoir & Biography

Shocking Beauty: Thomas Hobbs’ Innovative Garden Vision

By Thomas Hobbs

For those who consider gardening a spectator sport, autumn is the off season. The sweet surprises of spring, the colours that burgeoned then blazed through the summer, are all over now. There’s nothing to look ... Read More »

February 5, 2004 | Filed under: Sports, Health & Self-help