Reviews

★ The Secret Voyage of Sir Francis Drake, 1577-1580

Did Sir Francis Drake visit Vancouver Island, the Queen Charlottes, and the coast of Alaska 200 years before any other European? Geographer, ex-B.C. politician, and sailor Samuel Bawlf sure makes a strong case for such ... Read More »

November 25, 2003 | Filed under: Children and YA Non-fiction, History

Reservoir of Ancestors

By Keith Garebian

On the night I should have started reading Keith Garebian’s first collection of poetry, Reservoir of Ancestors, I instead went to see Ararat, the film by Atom Egoyan about the Armenian genocide in Turkey (1915-1917). ... Read More »

November 25, 2003 | Filed under: Poetry

Wild Cat

By Jacques Poulin, Sheila Fischman, trans.

Jacques Poulin is one of Quebec’s best and most-loved writers, winner of the Governer General’s Award for Les Grandes marées (Spring Tides) and the Prix France-Amerique for Le Vieux chagrin (Mr. Blue). Thoughtful and wryly ... Read More »

November 25, 2003 | Filed under: Children and YA Non-fiction, Fiction: Novels

Fields of Fire: The Canadians in Normandy

By Terry Copp

At the two Canadian military cemeteries in Normandy, where over 5,000 Canadian citizen-soldiers are buried, modern cynicism shatters in the face of profligate sacrifice. That the sacrifice was not in vain is without doubt. But ... Read More »

November 25, 2003 | Filed under: History

The Stars as Seen from This Particular Angle of Night

By Sandra Kasturi, ed.

Any organizing principle so loosely defined as to comfortably include Milton’s Paradise Lost and a poem about robots clearly derivative of Ted Hughes’ The Iron Man is likely of little to no use for a ... Read More »

November 25, 2003 | Filed under: Poetry

A Guide to Canadian Children’s Books

By Deirdre Baker and Ken Setterington

There are abundant British and American guides to children’s books, but it’s extremely rare to find Canadian titles in their pages. If for no other reason than national pride, we needed McClelland & Stewart’s A ... Read More »

November 25, 2003 | Filed under: Reference

Napoleon’s Buttons: How 17 Molecules Changed History

By Penny LeCouteur and Jay Burreson

The story goes that during Napoleon’s Russian campaign tin buttons on the French soldiers’ uniforms disintegrated in the cold. The soldiers were too busy holding up their pants to fight. This is history from an ... Read More »

November 25, 2003 | Filed under: History

Museum of Bone and Water

By Nicole Brossard, Erin Mouré and Robert Mazjels, trans.

Although not strictly in the tradition of the language poets of the 1970s, Quebecoise poet Nicole Brossard’s work has always been marked by serious language play and Museum of Bone and Water, in an exquisite ... Read More »

November 25, 2003 | Filed under: Poetry

The Wisdom of Water

By Karen Hood-Caddy

The setting in The Wisdom of Water isn’t Walkerton, Ontario, site of one of the country’s worst environmental disasters, but it’s eerily similar: tainted water from an outdated treatment plant, malfunctioning equipment, and an irresponsible ... Read More »

November 25, 2003 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

An Innocent in Newfoundland: Even More Curious Rambles and Singular Encounters

By David McFadden

Fans of the Toronto poet, non-fiction writer, and all-round wit David McFadden have become familiar with his trademark travel-narrative style through his previous books An Innocent in Scotland and An Innocent in Ireland. McFadden now ... Read More »

November 20, 2003 | Filed under: Reference

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