canadian literature

Pock-Marked and Pun-Spinning: Steven Mayoff Reviews RuFF by Rod Carley

Pock-Marked and Pun-Spinning: Steven Mayoff Reviews RuFF by Rod Carley

The major achievement of RuFF (Latitude 46 Publishing, 2024) is the artful way in which author Rod Carley weaves the slender threads of historical fact into a broader fictional tapestry to create a raucously pun-driven tale of Elizabethan politics, theatre, magic, and mayhem. The novel features a relatively familiar cast of characters from the theatrical scene in that era, including William Shakespeare, Thomas Middleton, Kit Marlowe, Richard Burbage, and Will Kempe. Women are given equal time in the form of Anne Hathaway, daughter Judith, and Magdalene Marbecke, known here as Maggie. Rounding out the motley crew are an assortment of allies, enemies, soldiers, peasants, peers, and political toadies – but most importantly, animals – specifically Shakespeare’s three-legged beagle, Biscuit; Judith’s cat, Gray-Malkin; and a crow named Cawdor.  

Alchemizing the Mundane: Steven Mayoff Reviews Yellow Barks Spider by Harman Burns

Alchemizing the Mundane: Steven Mayoff Reviews Yellow Barks Spider by Harman Burns

The main narrative thrust of Yellow Barks Spider (Radiant Press, 2024), the debut coming-of-age novella by Saskatchewan-born trans-woman, filmmaker, sound artist and writer Harman Burns, is a rural boy’s journey toward transitioning to a woman. But to describe the experience of reading it in terms of coining a genre, I’d have to call it a Prairie Gothic Phantasia. 

Excerpt from On Beauty by rob mclennan

Excerpt from On Beauty by rob mclennan

Upon the death of her widower father, there came the matter of dismantling his possessions. Emptying and cleaning the house for resale. It wasn’t as though either of the children were planning on returning to the homestead, both some twenty years removed, but it fell to them to pick apart the entirety of their parents’ lives from out of this multi-level wooden frame, a structure originally erected by their grandfather and great-grandfather immediately following the Great War.

Jewish Heritage Month Feature: Excerpt from Rubble Children by Aaron Kreuter

Jewish Heritage Month Feature: Excerpt from Rubble Children by Aaron Kreuter

May is Jewish Heritage Month, and we are delighted to host an excerpt from Rubble Children (University of Alberta Press, July 2024)—new short fiction from Govenor General Award Finalist Aaron Kreuter.

Rubble Children is an absorbingly timely and necessarily explorative read, tackling Jewish belonging, settler colonialism, Zionism and anti-Zionism, love requited and unrequited, and cannabis culture, all drenched in suburban wonder and dread. Engaging, funny, dark, surprising, this collection is a scream of Jewish rage, a smoky exhalation of Jewish joy, a vivid dream of better worlds.

RSR: Stella’s Carpet by Lucy EM Black

RSR: Stella’s Carpet by Lucy EM Black

If you do not have an appreciation for Persian carpets you will by the time you finish Lucy EM Black’s novel Stella’s Carpet. After reading Black’s vibrant descriptions of their artistry and rich history, I found myself searching the Internet for images of the patterns she writes about. But this is not a novel about carpets. At the heart of the story is a dysfunctional family with many secrets.

BOOK REVIEW: The Home Stretch: A Father, a Son, and All the Things They Never Talk About

BOOK REVIEW: The Home Stretch: A Father, a Son, and All the Things They Never Talk About

Everyone has parents. Everyone’s parents die. Yet the stories where parents and death intersect are unique.

George K. Ilsley’s recent memoir tells one such story. As a young adult, George left his Nova Scotia home, heading west, eventually landing in Vancouver—as far away as he could get while remaining in North America. Then, as he turns 50, his father turns 90, and his father needs, but doesn’t especially want, Ilsley’s care.