Essay: The Mysterious and Difficult Hermann Otto Tiedemann by Robert Ratcliffe Taylor First published November 26, 2017 * In this essay written specially for The Ormsby Review, Robert (Rob) Ratcliffe Taylor provides biography of Hermann Otto Tiedemann (1821-1891), the German-born surveyor, engineer, architect, and artist. He was one of thousands attracted to Victoria by the…
Read more #211 From Prussia to Victoria
Edges of Empire: A Documentaryby Rhodri Jones (Rhodri Windsor-Liscombe) Vancouver: Rarebit Press, 2017$20.00 / 9780994941237 Reviewed by Julian Wake First published Nov. 23, 2017 * Born in 1946, Rhodri Windsor-Liscombe studied at the Courtauld Institute of Art at the University of London and came to Canada to teach art history at McGill in 1974. He…
Read more #208 An intellectual journey
First published Nov. 24 REVIEW: Reluctant Warriors: Canadian Conscripts and the Great War by Patrick M. Dennis Vancouver: UBC Press, 2017. $39.95 9780774835978 Reviewed by Jim Kempling The ongoing centennial review of Canada’s involvement in the First World War continues with Reluctant Warriors: Canadian Conscripts and the Great War, by Patrick Dennis. After three years…
Read more #205 125,000 reluctant patriots
First published Nov. 5, 2017 A century since Vimy and Passchendaele: Two wars, two families, one message By Howard Macdonald Stewart * For Remembrance Day 2017 we offer a moving reflection by Howard Stewart on war’s impact on his family in the twentieth century. Howard touches on the personal and emotional repercussions on the families…
Read more #195 Remembrance Day, 2017
Blaise Cendrars Speaks…by Blaise Cendrars. Edited and with an introduction by Jim Christy, translated by David J. MacKinnon Victoria: Ekstasis Editions, 2016$24.95 / 9781771711906First published in Paris by Denoël, 1952 and 2016 Reviewed by Serge Alternês Review first published Oct. 16, 2017 * This upcoming Remembrance Day we might recall and commemorate Blaise Cendrars (1887-…
Read more #183 Modernist poet Blaise Cendrars
Cuba from the Inside by Alan Twigg First published September 5, 2017 * For anyone with an abiding love or interest in Cuba, there are many books about the place–more than ten of which are by British Columbians. For instance, when an American professor named Maurice Halperin met Che Guevara in Mexico, prior to Fidel…
Read more #164 Cuba from the inside
First published August 30, 2017REVIEW: War Torn Exchanges: The Lives and Letters of Nursing Sisters Laura Holland and Mildred Forbes by Andrea McKenzie (editor). Vancouver: UBC Press, 2016. $32.95 / 9780774832540 * REVIEW: Sister Soldiers of the Great War: The Nurses of the Canadian Army Medical Corps by Cynthia Toman Vancouver: UBC Press 2016. $34.95 / 9780774832144…
Read more #162 The sisters of war
First published July 11, 2017 REVIEW: From the Klondike to Berlin: The Yukon in World War I. by Michael Gates Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2017. $24.95 / 978-1-55017-776-3 Reviewed by Jim Wood The outpouring of centenary books about aspects of Canada’s involvement in the Great War, 1914-1918, continues with From the Klondike to Berlin: The Yukon…
Read more #149 From Yukon to the Western Front
Light Within the Shadows: A Painter’s Memoir by Pnina Granirer Vancouver: Granville Island Publishing, 2017 $24.95 / 9781926997849 Reviewed by Janet Mary Nicol First published June 29, 2017 * Pnina Granirer was creative from an early age, but she didn’t come in to her own artistically until the “third act” of her life journey. This…
Read more #145 Pnina’s three lives
The Sacred Herb / The Devil’s Weed by Andrew Struthers Vancouver: New Star, 2017 $19 / 9781554201150 Reviewed by Erika Dyck First published June 23, 2017 * British Columbia is the perfect setting for this timely book on pot. Canadians have come to revere the infamous B.C. bud, and we Canadians living east of the…
Read more #142 Sacred Herb & Devil’s Weed
First published June 17, 2017 REVIEW: Gently to Nagasaki: A Spiritual Pilgrimage, an Exploration Both Communal and Intensely Personal By Joy Kogawa Halfmoon Bay: Caitlin Press, 2016. $24.95 978-1-987915-15-0 Reviewed by Patricia E. Roy The librarian who provided the Cataloguing in Publication information gave Joy Kogawa’s Gently to Nagasaki a call number in the 800s…
Read more #140 Joy Kogawa’s reflections
Postcards from unknown soldierby Sandi Ratch First published May 2, 2017 * Faced with a handful of family postcards signed only by “Dick,” Sandi Ratch gave herself a detective quest: to identify the messenger who had gone to continental Europe to fight in World War I. In this Ormsby exclusive, Sandi Ratch relates the specifics…
Read more #127 Postcards from unknown soldier
Beyond Germs: Native Depopulation in North America Catherine M. Cameron, Paul Kelton, and Alan C. Swedlund (editors) Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2015 U.S. $29.95 / 9780816535545 Reviewed by Jody Decker First published March 18, 2017 * As a follow-up to Courtney Kirk’s review of Tom Swanky’s controversial The Smallpox War in Nuxalk Territory [See…
Read more #106 Devastation beyond germs
A Perfect Eden: Encounters by Early Explorers of Vancouver Island by Michael Layland Victoria: TouchWood Editions, 2016 $39.95 / 9781771511773 Reviewed by Robin Fisher First published Mar. 3, 2017 * When I returned to the coast after a decade living on the prairies I settled initially on Vancouver Island. Speaking to a friend who had…
Read more #98 Early Island attachments
I Had an Interesting French Artist to See Me This Summer: Emily Carr and Wolfgang Paalen in British Columbia by Colin Browne Vancouver: Figure 1, in collaboration with the Vancouver Art Gallery, 2016 $24.95 / 9781927958780. Reviewed by Elisabeth Otto First published Feb. 27, 2017 * Writer, documentary filmmaker, and cultural historian Colin Browne has…
Read more #95 Wolfgang meets Emily
The Miracle Mile: Stories of the 1954 British Empire and Commonwealth Games by Jason Beck Halfmoon Bay: Caitlin Press, 2016 $29.95 / 9781987915006 Reviewed by Roger Robinson First published Feb. 15, 2017 * In The Miracle Mile, Jason Beck explores the planning, hitches, and setbacks involved in Vancouver’s hosting of the 1954 British Empire and…
Read more #88 The ’54 Games began modern B.C.
Inge Bolin Thirst in the Andes: Climate Change and Solutions for Survival First published Feb. 14, 2017 * Inge Bolin’s first novel, When Condors Call (Nanaimo: Chaska Publications, 2010) follows a young physician from the Peruvian Andes in search of a cure for Leishmaniasis, a disfiguring disease. Her 2016 stay in Peru enabled her to…
Read more #87 Peruvian sojourn
Guilty But Insane. J.C. Bowen-Colthurst: Villain or Victim? by James W. Taylor Cork, Ireland: Mercier Press, 2016 €14.99 / 9781781174210 Reviewed by Joe Simpson First published Dec. 14, 2016 * In Guilty But Insane, James W. Taylor traces the life of British Army officer Captain John Bowen-Colthurst of the Royal Irish Rifles. A veteran of campaigns in India, Tibet,…
Read more #63 An Imperial crackpot in BC
The First Signs: Unlocking the Mysteries of the World’s Oldest Symbols by Genevieve von Petzinger New York: Simon & Schuster, 2016 $36.0 (U.S.) / 9781476785493 Reviewed by Chris Arnett First published Dec. 2, 2016 * In The First Signs: Unlocking the Mysteries of the World’s Oldest Symbols, Genevieve von Petzinger explores the geometric images found…
Read more #57 Decoding European rock art
Live Souls: Citizens and Volunteers of Civil War Spain by Serge Alternês and Alec Wainman Vancouver: Ronsdale Press, 2015 $24.95 / 9781553804376 Reviewed by Larry Hannant First published Dec. 2, 2016 * Live Souls: Citizens and Volunteers of Civil War Spain contains the stunning documentary record of 1,650 photos taken over three years in Spain…
Read more #56 A Quaker in the Spanish Civil War