Between Good and Evil: The Stolen Girls of Boko Haram by Mellissa Fung Toronto: HarperCollins Canada, 2023 $36.99 / 9781443456081 Reviewed by Isabel Nanton * Canadian Journalist Mellissa Fung has written an important book which amplifies her documentary Captive, the story of three Nigerian girls captured by Boko Haram (which translates as “Western education is…
Read more 1785 Lost in Sambisa Forest
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…
Read more 1773 ChatGPT and me
Home is where the street is: Commercial Drive photos and poems by Rodney De Croo * I’ve lived in East Vancouver for thirty-five years. East Van is where I rented my first basement suite apartment after living on the streets as a young man struggling with addiction. It was in the basements of churches and…
Read more 1767 Home is where the street is
Announcing the BC Review interview series by Richard Mackie * In November 2022, at the most recent board meeting of the Ormsby Literary Society, the chair, Byron Sheardown, suggested that we open a YouTube channel and start an interview series. Board member Trevor Marc Hughes jumped at the suggestion. “I’ve got filmmaking experience,” he said,…
Read more 1757 Announcing interview series
Sheila Norgate If You Are Reading This: A/Mem.oir/ish/ Gabriola Island: Ladies Institute Press, 2022 (printed by Hignell) $22.00 / 9780994761811 Reviewed by Susan Sanford Blades * It should come as no surprise that a memoir written by a multi-media artist who pushed the boundaries of normal throughout her professional life does not follow the general…
Read more 1751 A feminist life examined
Anthony Thorn. For the Honour of Art: Essays and Opinions by Lyndon Grove, Ihor Holubizky, and Brent Raycroft (editors), with contributions by Anthony Thorn, Robert Amos, and Garry Gaudet Victoria: Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, and Regina: the MacKenzie Gallery, 2022. Printed by Friesens, Altona, Manitoba $34.99 / 9780888853868 Reviewed by Theo Dombrowski Note: interviews…
Read more 1749 Calling Anthony Thorn
Mother Tongue Publishing Limited: Trade Books and Limited Editions 1995-2021 Salt Spring Island, 2022 Available here for $10.00 including postage A special report by Phyllis Parham Reeve * Mona Fertig has retired. How can that be? For more than 40 years Mona has been a force of nature in BC’s literary community. First, there was…
Read more 1743 Mother Tongue bites its tongue
Song of the Sparrow: A Memoir by Tara MacLean Toronto: HarperCollins Canada (HarperAvenue), 2023 $25.99 / 9781443465120 Reviewed by Catherine Owen * Memoirs by artistic creators are rarely not rife with a range of forms of suffering. That art can offer transcendence is one of its core values, and in the life of PEI songwriter,…
Read more 1740 The song must persist
On editorial illustration by Mariken Van Nimwegen * “You were an editorial illustrator? So you did the cartoons in the newspaper?” Well no, I say. Cartooning is a genre of drawing that’s usually part of the editorial pages where it satirizes a current news item, either local or international, and tends to be positioned close…
Read more 1739 The art of editorial illustration
Dance Me to the End: Ten Months and Ten Days with ALS by Alison Acheson Victoria: TouchWood Editions, 2019 (also available as an audiobook) $22.99 / 9781927366868 Reviewed by Lee Reid * “What will become of me? Who will take care of me? Will you stay with me to the end?” People ask these questions…
Read more 1734 Moving to the end
Alone in the Great Unknown: One Woman’s Remarkable Adventures in the Northwestern Wilderness by Caroll Simpson Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2022 $26.95 / 9781550179941 Reviewed by Catherine Owen * As I load birch logs a local woodsman has chopped into my wood pit bin, groaning slightly at the work in only minus three conditions, I…
Read more 1733 Maintenance and sustenance
Don’t Tell: Family Secrets by Donna McCart Sharkey and Arleen Paré, editors Bradford, ON: Demeter Press, 2023 $44.95 / 9781772584240 Reviewed by Mary Ann Moore * Sisters Donna McCart Sharkey and Arleen Paré have gathered contributions of essays and poetry from sixty-one writers for Don’t Tell: Family Secrets. McCart Sharkey who grew up in Montreal…
Read more 1731 Secrets spared and shared
See You Later Maybe Never by Lenore Rowntree Surrey: Now or Never Publishing, 2022 $19.95 / 9781989689400 Reviewed by Amy Whitmore * What does a tough, creative woman do when she retires to join her husband (and to avoid accepting her new “ageist” position in the fashion industry) in his retirement? Turn into a lust-struck…
Read more 1730 The Vanessa papers
Ariadne Then and Now: The Labyrinth and the End of Times (third edition) by Carol Matthews Seattle and elsewhere: NeoPoiesis Press, 2022 $21.95 ($16.95 (U.S.) / 9798985833607 Reviewed by Lenore Rowntree * A modern labyrinth in the classical Cretan-style with the addition of Chartres-style double-ax shapes at the turning points. A stone construction labyrinth surrounded…
Read more 1728 Out of the labyrinth
Definitely Not James Herriot: A Memoir, of Sorts by Jocelyn Reekie Campbell River: Peregrin Publishing, 2022 $21.95 / 9781896402208 Reviewed by Valerie Green * Jocelyn Reekie’s small book is a delightful treasure for anyone who loves animals. This short memoir covers Reekie’s life from the time she discovered a passion for animals as a child…
Read more 1717 Quadra Island chronicles
Thick Skin: Field Notes from a Sister in the Brotherhood by Hilary Peach Vancouver: Anvil Press, 2022 $22.00 / 9781772141955 Reviewed by Catherine Owen * “People love to read about work” — Stephen King The best writers make readers interested in a subject they never imagined they might be compelled by. I think of Cormac…
Read more 1711 Manways and shabby motels
A Dancer’s Pilgrimage by Lolla Devindisch Salt Spring Island: Rainbow Publishers & Invocation Press, 2022 $20.00 / 9781778160301 Reviewed by Wendy Judith Cutler * I was born beside the smouldering flames of the Mexican volcano Popocatépetl (p. 9). This was how eight-year-old Lolla Devindisch began her memoir at the time. Decades later she returned to her…
Read more 1707 From Popocatépetl to Salt Spring
Our Homes on Indigenous Lands: Stories of My Ancestors Across Turtle Island by Mali Bain Surrey: Hancock House, 2022 $24.95 / 9780888397416 Reviewed by Ken Favrholdt * Our Homes on Indigenous Lands: Stories of My Ancestors Across Turtle Island is a deceptively lean book about family history but entails a broad canvas that spans over…
Read more 1704 Turtle Island chronicles
Kiss the Red Stairs: The Holocaust, Once Removed by Marsha Lederman Toronto: Penguin Random House Canada (McClelland & Stewart), 2022 $35.00 / 9780771049378 Reviewed by Charlotte Schallié * “Kiss the Red Stairs. The Holocaust, Once Removed” is a deeply resonant memoir exploring the interconnectedness of history, memory and lived experience in the aftermath of the…
Read more 1703 The Holocaust past and present
Holden After and Before: Love Letter for a Son Lost to Overdose by Tara McGuire Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press, 2022 $24.95 / 9781551528939 Reviewed by Colin James Sanders * Human beings, not unlike other creatures, contend with the death of loved ones, navigating grief and mourning in varying ways. Tara McGuire of Vancouver channeled her…
Read more 1702 Fragments of grief & mourning