Our young separatist narrator is imagining his own future and the future of Quebec, and both man and nation are struggling with matters of expression and independence, in Hubert Aquin's Next Episode (published in 1965, translated by Sheila Fischman in 2001). “I am the fragmented symbol of Quebec’s revolution, its
Despite its sedate and unassuming cover, Pauline Holdstock's The Hunter and the Wild Girl begins in a rush. Goose Lane, 2015 "With a shriek of splintering boards, the girl breaks into daylight and stands blinded, panting, sucking air as if it were a great hot soup, her chest
Penguin-Razorbill, 2012 Mariko Tamaki's (You) Set Me On Fire (2012) Read: At the hair salon, on the TTC, standing in line: everywhere. Allison's voice is strong and compelling. I could pick up this story and immediately fall into step with her, even if I only had a very
Is it too much? Or, just enough. What am I to make of this final story in my Alice Munro reading project. (I read her last collection, Dear Life, in 2012.) While rereading Too Much Happiness, I was constantly aware of the references to being happy, to happiness, in the
There are five windows on the cover of Sigal Samuel's debut novel; in only one of them does a pair of people appear. Freehand Books, 2015 In three of the windows there is a solitary silhouette, and in the window at the top, the blind is nearly pulled to
