Stories explore ‘tropes of older womanhood’
Hopeful pictures of women at midlife and after… Carellin Brooks reviews Your Body Was Made For This, by Debbie Bateman (Vancouver: Ronsdale Press, 2023) $21.95 / 9781553806929
Humour & comedy
A ‘deliciously dark and clever experiment’
Short fiction collection “succeeds beautifully.” Candace Fertile reviews Anecdotes, by Kathryn Mockler (Toronto: Book*hug, 2023) $23.00 / 9781771668446
Everyday as endearing
Post-Modern Mini-Comics by Colin Upton Wolfville, NS: Conundrum Press, 2023 $10 / 9781772620849 Reviewed by Jeffrey Stychin * Who is Colin Upton? An outcast, a punk, a nomad, a pioneer, a realist, a savant, a regular human faced with the problems of everyday life filled with nuances and trivialities? The choice is up to you,…
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Story collection features whimsy and wit
Ten Stories that Worried My Mother by Winona Kent New Westminster: Blue Devil Books, 2023 $14.99 / 9781777329495 Reviewed by Ginny Ratsoy * Best known as a writer of cozy mystery novels, New Westminster’s Winona Kent has organized this eclectic collection of mostly previously published works (dating from the early 1980s to the 2020s) chronologically….
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1961 Logging camp life
The Rangitangs: Life on the Edge – A Humorous Look at Coastal Loggers Float-camp Life from the 1920s to 1950s by Mike Whalen Self-published by Mike Whalen, 2023 $40.00 (soft cover) / 978173885723 Reviewed by Matthew Downey * Inspired by the cartoon collection from which it draws its name, The Rangitangs: Life on the Edge is…
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1951 Victorian history as a ‘ludicrous romp’
In the Belly of the Sphinx by Grant Buday Victoria: TouchWood Editions, 2023 $25.00 / 9781990071157 Reviewed by Carol Matthews * In the epigraph to his latest novel, Mayne Island’s Grant Buday reprints this question by Celine: “And where, I ask you, can a man escape to when he hasn’t enough madness inside him?” Celine,…
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1980s East Van nostalgia
East Side Story: Growing Up at the PNE by Nick Marino Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press, 2023 $21.95 / 9781551529332 (paperback) Reviewed by Sheldon Goldfarb * When I moved to Vancouver in August 1985, Nick Marino, aged 17, was working his last summer at the PNE. To me the PNE (the Pacific National Exhibition) was some distant…
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1945 A ‘thoughtful … outrageous … funny’ collection
Queers Like Me by Michael V. Smith Toronto: Book*hug Press, 2023 $20 / 9781771668507 Reviewed by Carellin Brooks * “Is a day tormenting oneself really a day / of nothing?” observes the wry first-person speaker of “Everyday,” from Michael V. Smith’s gorgeous new book of verse, Queers Like Me. Neatly skewering the first-world problems of…
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1935 United through art
Bloom Where You Are Planted: 50 Conversations with Inspiring British Columbians by Beka Shane Denter Victoria: Heritage House Publishing, 2022 $39.95 / 9781772034295 Reviewed by Valerie Green * This book by Beka Shane Denter is an inspirational collection of interviews in the form of Q&As with photographs, of a group of fifty (forty-nine women and…
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1932 A ‘rollicking, heart-stopping, fraught, and hopeful’ debut
Once Upon an Effing Time by Buffy Cram Madeira Park: Douglas & McIntyre, 2023 $24.95 / 9781771623605 Reviewed by Carellin Brooks * The title of Buffy Cram’s Once Upon an Effing Time hints at its contents: a child’s fairy tale, if not exactly by the book. This version is closer to the classical Brothers Grimm…
Read more 1932 A ‘rollicking, heart-stopping, fraught, and hopeful’ debut
1909 Regimented and tedious in Montreal
Bookworm By Robin Yeatman Toronto: HarperCollins Publishers, 2023 $23.99 / 9780063273009 Reviewed by Candace Fertile * It’s hard to understand why Victoria, the bookworm in Robin Yeatman’s debut novel, marries Eric. She doesn’t seem to have known him well before joining her life to his and is utterly miserable with him. Victoria spends most of…
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1906 The undoing of Lenny Ovitz
The Get: A Crime Novel By Dietrich Kalteis Toronto, ON: ECW Press, 2023 $26.95 / 9781770416840 Reviewed by Bill Paul * It’s 1965 and two street-wise Jewish hoods in Toronto, Lenny Ovitz and Gabe Zoller, hope to make bundles of money investing in a run-down tenement block near St. James Town. They’ve caught “wind that…
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1889 Wealth, family, and the ‘spectrum of female suffering’
Tell Me Pleasant Things about Immortality By Lindsay Wong Toronto: Penguin Canada, 2023 $32.95 / 9780735242364 Reviewed by Theo Dombrowski * Probably the West’s most iconic piece of short fiction begins with a shock: an office clerk wakes up one morning to discover that he has been inexplicably transformed into “vermin” (usually taken to be…
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1878 Satiric comedy with ‘relevant themes and a compelling plot’
Radio Jet Lag By Gregor Craigie Toronto: Cormorant Books, 2023 $24.95 / 9781770866713 Reviewed by Ginny Ratsoy * Radio Jet Lag, a lightly satiric comic novel, is at once a paean to the city of Victoria, a detailed account of the fast-paced world of radio broadcasting, a portrait of the trials and tribulations of contemporary…
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1872 An ‘adventure-filled whodunnit’ (for kids)
Shamus, The Urban Rez Dog, P. I. By Leslie Gentile Toronto: Cormorant/DCB, 2023 $14.95 / 9781770867079 Reviewed by Linda Rogers * Teacher, singer, and now writer Leslie Gentile’s second middle grade novel is Shamus, The Urban Rez Dog, P.I. There’s no doubt juvenile readers with an appetite for fiction to match Shamus shameless pursuit of…
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1863 Quick plot, too many twists
Scandal at the Savoy: A Priscilla Tempest Mystery (Book 2) by Ron Base & Prudence Emery Madeira Park, BC: Douglas & McIntyre, 2023 $19.95 / 1771623452 Reviewed by Amy Whitmore * “Our Savoy… is populated by made-up characters who exist only in the world that we shaped for them. The royal, rich and famous who…
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1862 ‘Part of the spectacle’
Naked Defiance: A Comedy of Menace by Patrik Sampler Vancouver, BC: New Star Books, 2023 $19.00 / 9781554202003 Reviewed by Steven Brown * A Comedy of Menace is the subtitle of this fine novel. Although it can be looked at as menacing comedy, there’s a lot else going on. Naked Defiance is also an arcane…
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1821 Treasure maps, hangovers, inner turmoil
Other People’s Secrets by Meredith Hambrock Toronto: Crooked Lane Books, 2022 $37.99 / 9781639100989 Reviewed by Caileigh Broatch Oakwood Hills is a lakeside resort—a place for summer vacationers to escape from the city and flock to blueish waters. It’s surrounded by beaches, cabins, and sunshine. For the characters of Other People’s Secrets, Oakwood Hills is…
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1813 Welcome Trevor and Brett
Welcome Trevor and Brett by Richard Mackie * On behalf of the Board of the Ormsby Literary Society and our Advisory Board I’d like to welcome Trevor Marc Hughes and Brett Josef Grubisic as interim editors of The British Columbia Review for the year May 1, 2023 to May 1, 2024. The position was made possible…
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1773 ChatGPT and me
ChatGPT and me by Larry Hannant * The media today is agog with artificial intelligence and its boundless possibilities to expand mere mortals’ striving towards perfection, or to relegate them to the scrap heap. The intensity quickened on March 14, with the release by OpenAI of version 4 of ChatGPT. In a thoughtful Globe and…
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