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
The Dad Dialogues: A Correspondence on Fatherhood (and the Universe)by George Bowering and Charles Demers Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press, 2016$17.95 / 9781551526621 Reviewed by Christian Fink-Jensen First published March 15, 2017 * Vancouver writers George Bowering, born in 1935, and Charles Demers, born in 1980, had daughters – Thea and Josephine – more than forty…
Read more #104 Literary greenhorn dads
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
The Defiant Mind: Living Inside a Stroke by Ron Smith Vancouver: Ronsdale Press, 2016 $22.95 / 9781553804802 Reviewed by Mark Forsythe First published November 15, 2016 * Ron Smith, the founder of Oolichan Books, thinks the word “stroke” is far too light to describe a brain that has been “attacked” or “carpet bombed.” In his…
Read more #43 Defiance, hope, and healing
Let Them Eat Dirt: Saving Our Children from an Oversanitized World by B. Brett Finlay and Marie-Claire Arrieta (Greystone) $19.95 Reviewed by Mark Forsythe First published October 17, 2016 Our kids need dirt and face licks from the family dog. We live in an obsessively clean world with antibiotic soaps, cleansers, antibiotic drugs and body…
Read more #27 Let them eat dirt