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…
Read more 1821 Treasure maps, hangovers, inner turmoil
A Sentimental Education by Hannah McGregor Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University, 2022 $24.95 / 9781771125574 Reviewed by Suzanne James * In her introductory “Author’s Note,” Hannah McGregor half-apologizes/half-explains this work, a collection of essays which blends memoir, “collective feminist meaning-making” and – most significantly – a discourse on what it means to care “deeply” and “ferociously.”…
Read more 1820 Caring ferociously
Printer’s Devils: How a Feisty Pioneer Newspaper Shaped the History of British Columbia, 1895-1925 by Ron Verzuh Qualicum Beach, BC: Caitlin Press, 2023 $28.00 / 9781773861036 Reviewed by Patricia E. Roy * Small town newspapers can reveal much about the communities they serve. Indeed, Ron Verzuh suggests that Printer’s Devils “plays a double role, first…
Read more 1819 The personalities behind the paper
Nerve: Lessons on Leadership from Two Women Who Went First by Martha Piper and Indira Samarasekera, with a foreword by Kim Campbell Toronto: ECW Press, 2022 $36.95 / 9781770416017 Reviewed by Amy Tucker * In a world where the glass ceiling is still very much present, Nerve: Lessons on Leadership from Two Women Who Went…
Read more 1818 The world of leadership
BC & Yukon Book Prizes shortlist evening Book Warehouse Broadway Vancouver, May 11, 2023 by Trevor Marc Hughes, non-fiction editor * It was hot, but the breeze kept the sun in check. I entered the Broadway book shop to see the BC & Yukon Book Awards banner. It was surrounded by several people, wine…
Read more 1817 An evening on Broadway
Wreck Bay: An Amanda Doucette Mystery by Barbara Fradkin Toronto: Dundurn Press, 2023 $21.99 / 9781459743878 Reviewed by Bill Paul * Amanda Doucette has worked overseas as an aid worker and across Canada with men and women who have struggled, “battered by addiction.” She’s nearing forty and has a history of trauma. While organizing activities…
Read more 1816 An ‘atmosphere of isolation and suspicion’
In the Defense of Liberty: a novel by Keith Maillard Calgary: Freehand Books, 2023 $24.95 / 9781990601415 Reviewed by Lenore Rowntree * When the story opens, it’s the middle of the afternoon, in the month of June. Mason is in a stranger’s truck rolling toward Merida University through “beautiful goddamned Ohio Country, all that green…
Read more 1815 A ‘stacking of visions’
The Ridge by Robert Bringhurst Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2023 $22.95 / 9781990776250 Reviewed by Harold Rhenisch * When poetry flows through Robert Bringhurst, it sounds of wind, trees, waves, stones knocking in surf, and scraps of birds flashing past. It even sounds like a philosopher talking to those things. Bringhurst is a gardener who…
Read more 1814 At home on Quadra Island
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…
Read more 1813 Welcome Trevor and Brett
Such a Lovely Afternoon: Stories by Patti Flather Toronto: Inanna, 2022 $22.95 / 9781771338844 Reviewed by Candace Fertile * The nine stories of North Vancouver’s Patti Flather’s debut collection, Such a Lovely Afternoon, are so crammed with concrete details and believable problems that it’s impossible not to run the stories as short movies in your…
Read more 1812 Families in dysfunction
Two books reviewed by Sheldon Goldfarb: Best Canadian Essays 2021 edited by Bruce Whiteman Windsor, Ontario: Biblioasis, October 19, 2021. $22.95 / 9781771964371 (paperback) * Best Canadian Essays 2023 edited by Mireille Silcoff Windsor, Ontario: Biblioasis, November 15, 2022. $22.95 / 9781771965033 (paperback) * What makes a good essay? For that matter, what makes an…
Read more 1811 What makes a good essay?
Ruby Red Skies by Taslim Burkowicz Halifax and Winnipeg: Roseway Publishing an imprint of Fernwood Publishing, 2022 $24.00 / 9781773635606 Reviewed by Steven Brown * Ruby is not happy. She feels taken for granted by both husband and daughter. Her opinions don’t matter. Her husband talks down to her, openly mocks her, is oblivious to…
Read more 1810 Intrigue, then and now
Love, Pamela by Pamela Anderson Toronto: HarperCollins Publishers [Dey Street Books], 2023 $30.00 / 9780063226562 Reviewed by Susan Sanford Blades * The 1990s were not kind to their female icons. Female stars were instantly worshipped and just as quickly scorned for the very attributes that led to their fame. Kate Moss for her gamine thinness,…
Read more 1809 Beyond the red swimsuit
Patterson House by Jane Cawthorne Toronto: Inanna Publications, 2022 $22.95 / 9781771339391 Reviewed by Valerie Green * In her novel Patterson House, Jane Cawthorne has produced a warm yet tragic story of a once-wealthy Toronto family who still own a stately mansion known as Patterson House. Cawthorne begins in 1873 with the ghostly voice of…
Read more 1808 The rich and the desperate
Well Aged: Making the Most of Your Platinum Years by Ralph Milton Madeira Park: Douglas and McIntyre, 2021 $24.95 / 9781771623100 Reviewed by Lee Reid * “Why did I wait until age eighty before I grew up?” quips author and retired publisher of Kelowna’s Wood Lake Books Ralph Milton, now aged 89. Growing old means…
Read more 1807 A worthwhile anecdotage
Workboats for the World: The Robert Allan Story by Robert G. Allan, with Peter A. Robson, and with a foreword by Peter G. Noble Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2022 $99.95 / 9781550179873 Reviewed by Phyllis Reeve * The ferry George Black has plied the waters of the Yukon River between Dawson City and Alaska since…
Read more 1806 All the world’s a harbour
Indigiqueerness: A Conversation About Storytelling by Joshua Whitehead, in dialogue with Angie Abdou Athabasca, Alberta: Athabasca University Press, 2023 $19.99 / 9781771993913 Reviewed by Mary Ann Moore * Joshua Whitehead doesn’t feel ashamed writing about sex he says. When he went home to “the rez,” he’d prefer helping the women in the kitchen where all…
Read more 1805 Nêhiyawêwin: being Cree
Purr: The Science of Making Your Cat Happy by Zazie Todd, with a foreword by Pam Johnson-Bennett Vancouver: Greystone Books, 2022 $32.95 / 9781771648141 Reviewed by Kirsten Bell * Mark Twain once said that ‘If man could be crossed with the cat, it would improve man, but it would deteriorate the cat’. This quote highlights…
Read more 1804 A purrfectly useful guide
The Vicar’s Knickers: The Mildly Catastrophic Misadventures of Tony Vicar, Book 2 by Vince R. Ditrich Toronto: Dundurn Press, 2022 $19.99 / 9781459747289 Reviewed by Caileigh Broatch * The Liquor Vicar, the first of Vince R. Ditrich’s three book series, introduces wannabe musician Tony Vicar. He’s missed his big break by a couple of years…
Read more 1803 The locals of Tyee Lagoon
Kamloopa: An Indigenous Matriarch Story by Kim Senklip Harvey with the Fire Company Vancouver: Talonbooks, 2020 $16.95 / 9781772012422 Reviewed by Amanda Wandler * This story, this ceremony is for our Indigenous Peoples, it is to give voice and illuminate the power of Indigenous womxn. It is about our unwielded power and unsuppressed Settler supremacy…
Read more 1802 Return of the matriarchs