Out of the Dark by Julie Lawson Halifax: Nimbus Publishing, 2023 $14.95 / 9781774712344 Reviewed by Alison Acheson * “… just don’t get anything fancy. We are who we are”: words spoken by the main character’s mother in Julie Lawson’s middle grade/young adult novel Out of the Dark. The words reflect a theme to the…
Read more 1940 For YA readers: Halifax in WWI
Antarctic Pioneer: The Trailblazing Life of Jackie Ronne by Joanna Kafarowski Toronto: Dundurn Press, 2022 $25.99 / 9781459749535 Reviewed by Amy Tucker * Prepare to embark on an awe-inspiring adventure as author Joanna Kafarowski takes us on a captivating exploration of one of the most remarkable women in the history of polar exploration in her…
Read more 1939 Remarkable journey of courage
The Watchers’ Club: A Novel of Innocence and Guilt by G. Kim Blank Sante Fe: Sunstone Press, 2023 $36.00 / 9781632935304 Reviewed by Bill Engleson * Overture— My opportunity to review G. Kim Blank’s first novel, The Watchers’ Club, came about rather serendipitously. A mutual friend sent me a link to a recent Victoria…
Read more 1938 Boys coming of age (in a compact murder mystery)
This Is How You Start to Disappear by Astrid Blodgett Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 2023 $24.99 / 9781772127133 Reviewed by W.H. New * The twelve stories that comprise This Is How You Start to Disappear are emotionally connected with each other. They don’t feature the same characters; they don’t ever quite resolve the…
Read more 1937 Against invisibility
The Drowning Woman by Robyn Harding Toronto: Grand Central Publishing, 2023 $28.00 / 9781538726761 Reviewed by Jessica Poon * The Drowning Woman by Robyn Harding is disturbing, juicy, riveting, and true to Harding’s previous work—the perfect nocturnal accompaniment to guarantee sleeplessness, but the fun kind. In terms of scandalizing secrets, think Big Little Lies, only…
Read more 1936 Thriller with monstrous, ‘unequivocally irredeemable’ men
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…
Read more 1935 United through art
Wrack Line by M.W. Jaeggle Regina: University of Regina Press, 2023 $19.95 /9780889779532 Reviewed by Joe Enns * Wrack Line, M.W. Jaeggle’s debut book of poetry, examines life in consideration of transitions and liminal distances “as crucial as the space / between prayer beads.” Jaeggle uses the wrack line—the area of seashore where organic material and…
Read more 1934 Isolation, grief, poetics, birdsong
Highway of Tears: A True Story of Racism, Indifference and the Pursuit of Justice for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls by Jessica McDiarmid Toronto: Penguin Random House Canada [Doubleday Canada], 2020 $21.00 / 9780385687577 Reviewed by David Milward * Missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls (MMIWG) remains a grave crisis in Canada….
Read more 1933 Calling a spade a spade
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
The Geography of Belonging: A Love Story of Horses & Africa by Oriane Lee Johnston Cortes Island: Salmonberrry Arts and Publishing, 2023 $25.00 / 9781777149222 Reviewed by Isabel Nanton * A wise person once posited that one of the many pleasures of reading memoir is identifying parallels with our own lives. If that holds true,…
Read more 1931 Take your own country with you
The Matryoshka Memoirs: A Story of Ukrainian Forced Labour, the Leica Camera Factory, and Nazi Resistance by Sasha Colby Toronto: ECW Press, 2023 $24.95 / 9781770417359 Reviewed by Theresa Kishkan * More than 3 decades ago, on a family camping trip, I bought a set of matryoshka dolls in an art gallery in Wells, BC….
Read more 1930 From one generation to another
Stillwater by Darcy Friesen Hossack New Westminster: Tidewater Press, 2023 $22.95 / 9781990160202 Reviewed by Candace Fertile * Darcy Friesen Hossack’s debut novel, Stillwater, plays on her own Mennonite and Seventh-day Adventist (SDA) background. The main character, Lizzy, a teenage girl with aspirations of a medical career, is forced to move with her family to…
Read more 1929 Perseverance in a closed community
The Five-Bottle Bar: A Simple Guide to Stylish Cocktails by Jessica Schacht Victoria: Touchwood Editions, 2022 $28.00 / 9781771513760 Reviewed by Rebecca Coleman * Have you been out for drinks lately? At some of my favorite cocktail bars, drinks are now in the $20 to $25 range, and even at chains, you’re looking at between…
Read more 1928 DIY cocktails
Class Warrior: The Selected Works of E.T. Kingsley by Benjamin Isitt and Ravi Malhotra (eds.) Athabasca: Athabasca University Press, 2022 $34.95 / 9781778290046 Reviewed by Ron Verzuh * Chances are you’ve never heard of Eugene Thornton (E.T.) Kingsley. Chances are also good that if you had heard of him you might not like him or…
Read more 1927 Impossiblist Maverick
After That by Lorna Crozier Toronto, Ontario: McClelland & Stewart, 2023 $22.95 / 9780771004285 Reviewed by Mary Ann Moore * Language was Lorna Crozier’s consolation when her partner of forty years, Patrick Lane, was ill with “strange symptoms, which side-stepped any diagnosis.” The result was Through the Garden: A Memoir (with Cats). After Lane died…
Read more 1926 Bereavement, ‘impeccably expressed’
I Only Read Murder by Ian Ferguson and Will Ferguson Toronto: HarperCollins Canada, 2023 $24.99 / 9781443470766 Reviewed by Jessica Poon * I Only Read Murder is a zippy whodunit by Victoria’s Ian Ferguson and Calgary’s Will Ferguson with plentiful red herrings, comedic zingers, and miscommunication. If you’re looking for fun escapism with a satirical…
Read more 1925 Murder-mystery, where comedy prevails
Stedfast by Ali Blythe Fredricton, NB: Goose Lane/ Icehouse Poetry, 2023 $19.95 / 9781773103051 Safety Razor by Emily Osborne Guelph, ON: Gordon Hill Press, 2023 $20.00 / 9781774220856 Reviewed by Joe Enns * Two BC poets use different poetic techniques to connect their lived experience to the ancient and eternal. Stedfast, Ali Blythe’s third poetry…
Read more 1924 The lived, the eternal, the ancient
The Fierce: The Untold Story of the Teenager Who Took on the Worst War Criminal Living in America by Judy Piercey Cheltenham, UK: The History Press, 2023 £20.05 / 9781803991153 Reviewed by Peter Hay * The Holocaust was not a single event, confined to a singular city or country, nor was it caused by one…
Read more 1923 A complex path to justice
Stikine Odyssey: From Adventure to Activism with The Great River by Peter Rowlands Victoria: FriesenPress, 2023 $24.49 / 9781775238348 Reviewed by Trevor Marc Hughes * What is it that draws adventurers to the Stikine River? For me, in 2012, it was a desire to see this beautiful, and integral, landscape in northern British Columbia before…
Read more 1922 Irresistible Stikine
Time to Wonder – Volume 2. A Kid’s Guide to BC’s Regional Museums: Vancouver Island, Salt Spring, Alert Bay, and Haida Gwaii by S. Lesley Buxton and Sue Harper Victoria: Rocky Mountain Books, 2022 $22.00 / 9781771605069 Reviewed by Valerie Green * In view of the recent closure of Point Ellice House and Gardens in…
Read more 1921 Treasures from the past