A slim debut volume of poems is by turns elegiac and allusive. And—whether focussed on a widow’s grief, a wife of Henry VIII, or rain in Tofino—it roves widely as well. —Isabella Ranallo reviews Portraits, by Lacey Jones (N.p.: Nerdy Kat Books, 2025) $14.36 / 9780986120886
A poetry series—with an aim to “produce beautiful volumes and to alert readers to poems that remain vital to thinking about urgencies of the contemporary moment”—lives up to its ambitions with authoritative, revelatory essays and an impressive sampling of a poet’s “visceral,” “wry,” “potent,” “grim,” and intermittently comical poems. —Steven Ross Smith reviews Hunger: The Poetry of Susan Musgrave, selected with an introduction by Micheline Maylor (Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier UP, 2025) $23.99 / 9781771126953
Personal darkness and a generational chasm are examined in an urgent long poem—where a grandmother reaches out to a youth immersed in video game realities. —Isabella Ranallo reviews Encrypted, by Arleen Paré (Qualicum Beach: Caitlin Press, 2025) $20.00 /9781773861647
In this touching poetic novel, a pair of exes are accompanied by simmering grief and guilt as they journey from southern Ontario to Tofino. —Jessica Poon reviews Moon Road, by Sarah Leipciger (Toronto: Viking, 2024) $26.00 / 9780735249691
Poet foregrounds nature imagery in her thoughtful inquires about family, cultural heritage, grief, and identity. —Daniela Elza reviews We Follow the River, by Onjana Yawnghwe (Qualicum Beach: Caitlin Press, 2024) $20.00 / 9781773861388
“[F]or those who want to understand something of human journeys—and how to mourn, how to live with grief—” this YA novel “is a study in how we might navigate.” —Alison Acheson reviews Where Was Goodbye?, by Janice Lynn Mather (Toronto: Simon & Schuster Canada, 2024) $23.99 / 9781665903950
A wild ride of a debut novel portrays an aggrieved widow and self-described “aimless fool.” —Trish Bowering reviews Norma, by Sarah Mintz (Toronto: Invisible Publishing, 2024) $22.95 / 9781778430404
First published Feb. 1, 2018. Trailer Park Elegy by Cornelia Hoogland Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2017. $18.95 / 9781550178159 Reviewed by Mary Lou Soutar-Hynes Trailer Park Elegy is not Cornelia Hoogland’s first book-length long poem. Her Woods Wolf Girl (Wolsak & Wynn, 2011), for instance, is a Canadianized, modern retelling of Little Red Riding Hood…
Read more #242 A brotherly love revisited