Poking fun at coastal locals
Coast Confidential: Trouble in Paradise, Vol. 1
by PJ Reece
Gibsons: Rolling West Productions, 2024
$19.95 / 9780995323544
Reviewed by Cathalynn Labonté-Smith
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PJ Reece is a geographer turned filmmaker turned writer. He has written scripts for big networks including National Geographic. After documenting stories worldwide for 60 years, Reece is happy to focus on writing set on BC’s Sunshine Coast. His short story collection, Throw Mama from the Boat and other Ferry Tales has become a Coast artifact since 2018. PJ lives in Gibsons, with his wife Pamela McGarry, who is also a writer.
Throw Mama from the Boat and other Ferry Tales has shades of Stephen Leacock and Arthur Black’s satirical and comedic tones, yet, his new work is written using a protagonist as in a novel. It’s a cross-genre attempt.
If you enjoy graphic novels, satire, and the colourful life of villages, you will enjoy the faux gossip-filled newspapers strewn throughout Coast Confidential. It’s like Mad Magazine meets Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town.
The book challenges locals to take a look at themselves through funhouse mirrors that the author holds up to their image. I should know, as he mentions my Friday morning writers’ group that meets at the same coffee shop that Reece haunts in the book, but I take no offence. My impression was that the voice in this uproarious story is to memorialize characters locked in his beloved place through the magic of satire.
The title itself invites a conspiratorial tone between the author and reader, whispering “Let me tell you the inner secrets of my village, just between you and me.” Reece draws you into an intimate smalltown mythology with well-drawn characters and conflicts that are universally recognizable. However, Reece adds his own twist of magical realism with talking birds and other humanoid species. If you’re looking for something out of the ordinary to read, Coast Confidential fits the description.
Will there be a Volume 2?
[Editor’s Note: Cathalynn Labonté-Smith has written the following. Try not to chuckle. Disclaimer: The following is entirely a work of satirical fiction.]
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GIBSONS GAZETTE: Latest news and bullet updates on the Sunshine Coast, Issue 100
Local author guilty of libel and slander in book Coast Confidential
Sunshine Coast Author PJ (Pajamas) Reece appeared before the circuit court in Sechelt this week after being charged with 24 counts of libel and slander from everyone that he mocked in his tongue-in-cheek book, Coast Confidential: Trouble in Paradise, Vol. 1.
Judge Justice and the jury heard testimony from those who felt injured by the writer’s portrayal, that was characterized by their lawyer, Murray McSuham, in their class action suit, as “mean.”
Reece’s response to the guilty verdict was, “This is the worst thing they could’ve done to me. What’s happened to freedom of speech? I will appeal and get them all in Vol. 2. No will touch my Reece’s Pieces.”
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[Editor’s Note: In case the above was too racy, our reviewer sent the following satirical bit for publication.]
“Harshest penalty” for irreverent writer
Gibsons Gazette staff
The Sechelt courtroom was packed to the gills when PJ Reece (heir to the Reece’s chocolate and peanut butter candy empire, maybe) stood before a judge and jury of his peers. Wolvens attended the trial, who were enraged for being outed to the public. They’re a shy, furry woodland species, who trace their ancestors to Sasquatches and other species they’d rather not divulge. Also, on the jury were several humans morphed into gulls—gumans, or hulls, also outed in PJ’s book, who were fitted with diapers for the long deliberation.
Plaintiffs named in the suit included, local bakeries, pubs, writers’ groups, the former cast and crew of The Beachcombers, present cast and crew of Murder in a Small Town, and the mayor, who even though he thought it was hilarious was portrayed as a female.
Reece commented, “They just want to get a piece of my fortune.” In response, he’s launching a countersuit likely for the free advertising and bump in revenues surrounding the release of the book.
Reece was visibly shaking in his gumboots when the jury found the satirical scribe guilty and sentenced him to have his work-in-progress, Vol. 2, workshopped by the Gibsons Writers’ Group, including a sensitivity edit. Also, for his penned offences he must supply Reece’s products for the annual Santa Claus parade for the children of Gibsons for the rest of his life.
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Part of the fourth generation on her father’s side to live in British Columbia, Cathalynn Cindy Labonté-Smith grew up in southwestern Alberta and moved to Vancouver to complete her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at UBC. She is the author of the BC-bestselling nonfiction book, Rescue Me: Behind the Scenes of Search and Rescue (Caitlin Press, 2022), is a member of Civil Air Search and Rescue, and lives in Gibsons and North Vancouver. She is the founder and president of the Sunshine Coast Writers and Editors Society and is the director of the SCWES Art & Words Festival.
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The British Columbia Review
Interim Editors, 2023-26: Trevor Marc Hughes (non-fiction), Brett Josef Grubisic (fiction)
Publisher: Richard Mackie
Formerly The Ormsby Review, The British Columbia Review is an on-line book review and journal service for BC writers and readers. The Advisory Board now consists of Jean Barman, Wade Davis, Robin Fisher, Barry Gough, Hugh Johnston, Kathy Mezei, Patricia Roy, and Graeme Wynn. Provincial Government Patron (since September 2018): Creative BC. Honorary Patron: Yosef Wosk. Scholarly Patron: SFU Graduate Liberal Studies. The British Columbia Review was founded in 2016 by Richard Mackie and Alan Twigg.
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