Ms. Tagaq is an Inuit throat singer and Polaris Prize winner in 2014. She can now add author to her artistic gifts. This is a remarkable first novel. There is the often difficult reality of living in Nunavut as a young person: endless summer sunshine, the dark and brutally cold winter, and human difficulties like substance and sexual abuse. And there is a magical imaginary component, sometimes based on dreams. Ms. Tagaq’s prose is accompanied by graphic poems and a few illustrations. Highly imaginative writing.
Category: family
The Homecoming – Andrew Pyper
This story begins simply with the reading of the will of an often absent and thus mysterious husband/father. But there is an unusual condition in the will: the family must live for a month in an isolated forest lodge in the Pacific Northwest before they can inherit a substantial estate. What could go wrong? And there are surprises. And more surprises that increasingly seem sinister, until secrets produce fear and much more. Is every part of the Quinlan family life a fabrication? Brilliant writing.
Dual Citizens – Alix Ohlin
Regular readers of this book blog know that I have a specific affection for introspective relationship books. This book by Ms. Ohlin is a perfect read, in my opinion. The story enters on two sisters, Lark and Robin, from their early childhood in Montreal and their complicated relationship with their mother Marianne, to adulthood in New York and the Laurentians. Lark is the main character, someone who hopes that silence will produce invisibility. The story contains vivid descriptions of art, music and film, motherhood and even wolves. The writing is divine; highly recommended.
Chop Suey Nation – Ann Hui
There are two parts to this book. The first is a cross-Canada road trip to visit Chinese-Canadian restaurants that feature the ubiquitous but non-traditional chop suey dish. This epic trip begins in Victoria and concludes with a memorable visit to a one-person Chinese restaurant in Fogo Island, NL. Just the encounter with Newfoundlanders would make this book with reading. But the second part of the book is the story of the author’s father, his early life in China and eventual immigration to Canada. At its core, this is a moving treatment of parental sacrifice. A great read.
Everything Under – Daisy Johnson
This is a really excellent novel set in contemporary England. The core of the story is a complicated mother-daughter relationship but it is much more: the use of a private language and a river creature and supplemental characters. The timeline is an interesting feature of the story telling. Johnson’s writing reminds me of Sarah Winman, so high praise.
Stay With Me – Ayobami Adebayo
This is a powerful story set in Nigeria, 1985-2008. The story centres on a couple, Yejide and Akin, who are struggling with infertility against the background of profound traditional family pressure to have children. A loving relationship is tested by lies and a stunning betrayal. What will we sacrifice for family? The story involves very strong emotions with Nigerian political instability as a constant background force. Very fine writing. This book is also from a VPL list of “books that broke our hearts”.
Unsheltered – Barbara Kingsolver
Kingsolver previously wrote the marvellous The Poisonwood Bible. Her new book has two story lines, about people who live in the same house in New Jersey: one family in 1874 and a contemporary family in 2012. Both stories involve dealing with hardships. In 2012, the issue is economic instability and insecurity (making me think of some classic Lionel Shriver books). In 1874, a biology teacher is conflicted by the controversy about Darwin versus traditional religion. The way Kingsolver links the alternating family stories is masterful and her knowledge of biology is exceptional. This is a very interesting worthwhile read.
Priestdaddy – Patricia Lockwood
The author leaves her Mid-Western home at age 19 to be married but after 12 years, financial constraints forces her and her husband to return to the parental home. This gives her the opportunity to remember an unconventional upbringing: a flamboyant and charismatic guitar-playing father usually (un)dressed in only his underwear, who, by the way, is a Catholic Priest with a wife and 5 children (how can that be, you may ask?); and a long-suffering over-protective mother. There are some eye-popping childhood experiences like attending an anti-abortion rally at a very young age. Ms. Lockwood also takes this opportunity for reflection, producing a memoir that is often comic but also poignant. And for a published poet, her writing is wonderful such as this description of a church space: “The ceiling is low and the lights flicker fluorescently and emit an insect whine. The whole place smells like where coffee goes to die”. Highly recommended; thanks to Sarah’s friend Elizabeth for this recommendation.
Suzanne – Anais Barbeau-Lavalette (translated by Rhonda Mullins)
Canada Reads contender. This is a beautifully written book, a fictionalized biography of the author’s grandmother who abandoned her young children to live a separate life. So the book is an attempt by the author to discover the story of her grandmother and in the process, the author achieves some understanding and respect for this mysterious part of her family history, the missing grandmother. It was a mistake, in my opinion, for some of the CR panel to dwell obsessively on why a young mother would abandon her children in 1952. Rather, the reader should accept that this was her choice for complicated and yes, inexplicable reasons; Suzanne never requested forgiveness yet the author (her granddaughter) does achieve some reconciliation from the reconstruction of Suzanne’s missing history. The writing is poetic, beautifully written in the second person. The story unfolds in non-linear tantalizing episodes, some detailed, some mysterious with gaps. This is a truly evocative read and highly recommended.
What David Read 