Banjo Lessons

In Tim Fisher, the anti-hero of David Carpenter’s seventh book, the prairie author has created an engaging character whose struggle toward independence and maturity fills this long and frequently very funny coming-of-age novel. Set in Alberta, ... Read More »

March 7, 2004 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

The Home Spa

By Anne Harding,Janice Biehn

Anyone with a passing interest in beauty treatments can tell you that avocados go on your face, not in your hair, but no one can give you these essential tips quite like a thick, glossy ... Read More »

March 7, 2004 | Filed under: Science, Technology & Environment

Baroque at Dawn

By Nicole Brossard,Patricia Claxton, trans.

It is easy to imagine Nicole Brossard, a small woman of great presence, declaiming lyric passages from her latest novel, Baroque at Dawn. The book is studded with long poetic riffs that cry out, even ... Read More »

March 7, 2004 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

Frameshift

By Robert J. Sawyer

Robert J. Sawyer has been making quite a name for himself recently in science fiction circles. In a handful of years the Thornhill, Ontario novelist has gone from writing pleasant but lightweight fantasy stories involving ... Read More »

March 7, 2004 | Filed under: Fiction: Novels

First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women

By Eric McCormack

The title of this novel (recycled from a 16th-century book by John Knox), an introductory note explains, is not to be interpreted as meaning a militant female troop. Rather, “regiment” means “magisterial rule.” We might ... Read More »

March 7, 2004 | Filed under: Children and YA Non-fiction, Politics & Current Affairs

Resurrection in the Cartoon

By Robert Priest

Torontonian Robert Priest’s first collection of poems in seven years is a decidedly mixed bag. A sometimes ironic, sometimes angry investigation of contemporary culture, the book tackles a wide variety of subjects. There are several poems ... Read More »

March 7, 2004 | Filed under: Poetry

Esprits De Corps: Quebec Poetry of the Late 20th Century in Translation

By D.G. Jones,Bernard Pozier, Louise Blouin, eds.

In Quebec today, artists do not, by and large, divide up along linguistic lines. There are not separate English and French dance or visual arts scenes. Only the literary community remains a case of two ... Read More »

March 7, 2004 | Filed under: Poetry

Asphodel

By Michael Redhill

Asphodel is so many books in one. If Toronto writer Michael Redhill were not so persistent in his return to a central rumination on the slow approach of death, I would have thought this a ... Read More »

March 7, 2004 | Filed under: Poetry

My Life as a Girl in a Men’s Prison

By Kate Pullinger

Literary trendspotting – like trainspotting – may be dismissed as a wanky pastime for idling minds, but there is some fun to be had. For every trend, I’m sure there can be unearthed a counter-trend, ... Read More »

March 7, 2004 | Filed under: Fiction: Short