Quill and Quire

Reviews

In the Cage

By Kevin Hardcastle

Kevin Hardcastle’s debut novel demonstrates that the violent depredations dramatized in the fiction of Cormac McCarthy are not confined to the Texas–Mexico border: rural Canada works just fine as a locale. In the Cage finds ... Read More »

August 14, 2017 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

First Snow, Last Light

By Wayne Johnston

The publication of Wayne Johnston’s 1998 novel, The Colony of Unrequited Dreams, brought as much consternation as praise. While Johnston’s portrayal of Newfoundland’s “father of Confederation,” Joey Smallwood, proved contentious, another character emerged as a ... Read More »

August 14, 2017 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

★ If Clara

By Martha Baillie

Martha Baillie’s sixth novel is a metafictional story told from the points of view of four characters: Clara, a reclusive, mentally ill writer; Julia, a curator and Clara’s sister, who questions Clara’s sanity; Maurice, Julia’s ... Read More »

August 14, 2017 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Bellevue Square

By Michael Redhill

With Bellevue Square, the first panel of a projected triptych titled Modern Ghosts, Michael Redhill puts his protagonist, Jean Mason, through wringer after wringer. As witnesses and vicarious participants, readers can appreciate Jean’s otherworldly predicaments, ... Read More »

July 31, 2017 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

★ Demi-Gods

By Eliza Robertson

It’s a rite of passage for young novelists to tackle rites of passage: the sun-dappled, backward-glancing, coming-of-age fable is as regimented and routinized as any lean-boned crime thriller or bulky, mock-Victorian doorstop. There is currently ... Read More »

July 31, 2017 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels