I Read Canada Reads

I spent much of my Christmas holidays reading.  That is to say, I read when I wasn't crocheting or watching Netflix or both.  Basically, I hibernated for two weeks.  And it was amazing.  And I miss it already.

Digging into the Canada Reads books has become my winter mission.  I started with Esi Edugyan's Half-Blood Blues.

This is a fascinating story that dropped me into a world I didn't know existed and had never even considered: the Jazz scene in Germany during the Nazi regime.  It's a complicated emotional portrayal of guilt and regret from a character who was ultimately powerless, but who spends his life blaming himself for what he should have done.

As well-crafted (and well-researched) a novel as it may be, the only thing Canadian about this book is its author.  Also, it already won the Giller Prize in 2011 and was a finalist for the GGs and the Man Booker.  I kind of feel like this book has already received its public accolades.  So while it's a great book, it's not the underdog I'm hoping to cheer for in this year's Canada Reads competition.

Shelagh Rogers did a great interview with Esi Edugyan for her radio show, "The Next Chapter" and it provided some great aural distraction while I did several loads of laundry one day.

After Half-Blood Blues, I decided to tackle The Orenda.  I've never read anything by Joseph Boyden, but I feel like his books follow me around.  I find them on tables in bookstores with signage like, "The Best Novels You've Never Read."  The Orenda has also received a lot of press coverage, so I decided to give it a go.

I was glad I warmed up with Half-Blood Blues: compared to Edugyan's novel, The Orenda is a brick.  This novel is narrated by three characters: a Jesuit priest, a Huron warrior, and a young aboriginal woman taken from another village who becomes the warrior's 'adopted' daughter.  It was difficult to ease into--kind of like a fast-paced conversation that began without you--but once the narrators' stories began to intertwine, it was difficult to set the book down.  (Bonus: You can build some good muscles with this one!  It's large, available only in heavy hardcover, and hard to quit!)

A review from Quill and Quire comments on The Orenda's "blockbuster feel," adding, "The Orenda will be this year's Book of Negros, I think."  We could definitely do worse for entertaining, Canadian historical fiction!

Entertaining as it may be, it's definitely not fluff.  One impactful episode in the novel occurs when the priest loses the wampum that the warrior was to present to another tribe as part of a peace negotiation.  He bemoans: 

• "I have lost my people's story, my gift to the ones who are our enemy, in the hope of changing that course." (p. 108)

This implies that Canadian history played out the way it did because the stories of certain peoples were lost or dismissed.  (Yikes.  This entry is starting to sound like a high school essay.)

Where Boyden's novel differs from many of the aboriginal themed/flavoured/inspired novels that I have read (and they are a genre of personal interest...I have read many!) is that the picture he paints of aboriginal history is much more brutal and complicated than the peaceful, idealistic scene that is typical.  I will be very interested to hear the commentary that accompanies this novel in the Canada Reads debates.  I'm hoping this book makes it to the final rounds because I know it will generate great discussion.

I guess I should stop here.  More Canada Reads comments to come.

More Canadiana in Germany (#bookaday 9)

Reading makes you nicer.  In case you were looking for another great reason to savour a quality piece of fiction this summer, there it is.  You can read this Time editorial if you want to know the details.  The editorial also covers "carnal versus spiritual reading."  (And yes, typically reading a novel would fall into the latter category.)  We are becoming a society that does too much reading for information's sake and not enough reading for enjoyment's sake.  As a Primary teacher and lover of fiction, this freaks me right out.  Like the environmental citizen who drives a Prius or buys only organic just to do his/her part, I decided to up my ratio of spiritual to carnal reading this summer, just to do what I can to counteract the depletion of love for literature in our society.

I just had to figure out a way to work the carnal vs. spiritual thing into a post about Linden MacIntyre's The Bishop's Man, the latest novel to entertain my brain.  The book is about a Canadian Catholic priest who specializes in keeping the notorious "sins of the Fathers" out of the spotlight.  (Ah? You see the spiritual vs. carnal connection now?)  This novel won the 2009 Giller Prize. And yes, it's CBC's Linden MacIntyre who co-hosts the fifth estate.  So basically you're looking at a low-risk investment here if you're after a good read.  Guaranteed return on your time, folks.

What I thoroughly enjoyed about MacIntyre's writing was his ability to capture thought patterns.  He brings the reader in, out and through narrator Father McAskill's layers of memories and creates a collage of detail that allows the reader to understand McAskill's past and present as one complicated, organic whole.

The language is beautiful as well.  MacIntyre is able to call attention to words through protagonist Father MacAskill's love of of them.  The story is anchored in Canadian geography and explores themes of family, community and masked identity.

I stood in the hotel room bathroom to finish this one.  (It was late.  My husband needed sleep and I needed light to get through the last few chapters.)  It's that good.  Five out of five stars for this spiritual read.

Novel Thoughts (#bookaday 8)

When I read novels, I start a running narration in my head and suddenly life gets a lot more interesting.  The narration tends to adopt the style of whoever I happen to be reading at the moment.  Right now, it's Lisa Moore.  She has, as my husband observed, glancing over the pages as I took a moment to rest my eyes and return to reality on the airplane, a tendency towards long sentences that can themselves constitute a paragraph.

Lately, I've been feeling guilty about reading novels and trust me, it has nothing to do with their contents.  Well, not exactly.  I feel like I'm being too indulgent with my time, when there's much more I could be doing or learning.  I'm not sure where this idea came from, because it's absolute nonsense.  The world of book lovers continually shares the benefits of reading novels via social media.  I've been hoarding these bits of information in an attempt to quell my guilt.  Like a recent article about how reading novels makes us better thinkers--more accepting of ambiguity and less likely to make snap decisions.

But, back to Lisa Moore and Alligator.  I read February this past February (fitting, no?) since it was nominated for Canada Reads 2013...and I discovered another Canadian author to add to my list of True Patriot Loves.  No surprise, Moore's novel won the competition.  When I found her book Alligator amidst the hoard of novels at the Elora Book Sale, I snapped it up with excitement (and maybe a bit of reptilian instinct) and I've actually been putting off reading it until summer vacation, the way some people save a bottle of wine to open at just the right moment.

This novel explores the sometimes dull, sometimes heart-wrenching, sometimes beautiful agony of the "you're-all-I-have" relationships that tether us to time, place and circumstance.  In the same storytelling style as February, Moore's narration is delivered through several characters, their story threads interwoven and intersecting even if they are oblivious to it.  This novel is less about plot and more about character and will have you contemplating relationships and how it's possible both to stay and run away, to both grieve the loss of those existing right in front of you and be ever in the presence of the dead.

(Was that vague enough for you?  ;)  Long live the novel.  Let ambiguity reign.)

bookaday 7: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

So there's been a bit of a gap in my #bookaday attempt, but yesterday was my first official day of summer holidays, so let's consider my earlier blog entries to be appetizers before the summer feast!

Yesterday was an All About Me day.  Between naps and shopping, I pulled a book off the shelf and got to reading.  My first selection of summer?  The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie.

This is an underdog story about an aboriginal teen from the Spokane reserve who makes the decision to attend school off the reserve and struggles with his identity as he straddles two worlds.  Written with humour and stark honesty, I think this book would be a hit with any teenager.  I caught a tiny bit of a CBC radio program while driving around the other day and this book was being used as a class text (high school? university?  I'm not sure).  I think this book would be a great addition to a course syllabus, or great for a young adult book club.  (It's a National Book Award winner, so clearly I'm not the only one who thinks it's amazing!)

Four out of five stars for this one.  Beautiful language and creative illustrations.  (I'm holding back one star because the sports glory stories--this time it's basketball--are always a little bit corny for me.)

The Prophet's Camel Bell

Not every second hand store has a book section quite as organized as the one at the MCC Thrift Centre in New Hamburg.  During last weekend's shopping adventure there, I came across a box of about 20 New Canadian Library books.  What I wanted to do was buy the whole box, despite the fact that I already have many of the titles sitting on my bookshelf.  The new covers are just so appealing!

The New Canadian Library (NCL) has been around since 1958.  It's a collection of the classics of Canadian Literature.  I like how all the books are the same size and style, so they fit together so nicely on my bookshelves.  However, the publisher keeps re-releasing the library with a new set of covers, so I have several mini-collections.  I know you can't judge a book by its cover, but I think you can justify having several versions of the same book on your shelf just because the covers are a little different.

I finally settled on four titles (but it was a complete exercise in restraint):

• The Prophet's Camel Bell by Margaret Laurence
• The Fire-Dwellers by Margaret Laurence
• The Equations of Love by Ethel Wilson
• The History of Emily Montague by Frances Brooke ("Canada's first ever novel")

NCL editions, from oldest to newest.

Today, I started in on The Prophet's Camel Bell.  I actually read the first two chapters aloud to Dan while he did the dishes.  (I think I got the better end of that deal, but he says he likes hearing me read.)  Since it's a mix of Margaret Laurence's commentary on human nature (my love) and travel narrative (his), it was an enjoyable read for both of us.

Started: Sunday, April 8, with a mug of home-brewed coffee in hand (we will not buy Our Compliments Espresso again!)
Finished: in progress...