January 6, 2013
Whitetail Shooting Gallery by Annette Lapointe
Imagine Alissa York’s Fauna but in rural Saskatchewan and with all the sentimentality stripped away. Imagine lots of sex, kissing cousins, a gunshot to the face, and a set of teeth that get kicked in over and over again. Imagine a family farmhouse, country roads, the kind of place you might want to move to raise your kids if you don’t look too closely. The hockey player, the pastor’s daughter, how he’s giving blow jobs to his teammates, and she’s having sex with her best friend. All those things that go on down in teenage caves in the basement, the kinds of people who live in holes in the ground, poring over pornography, vampire novels, Flowers in the Attic, scarcely coming up for light.
Oh, and horse books. “It’s those damn fillies again. They’re everywhere. That particular shade of sun-drenched blond hair spontaneously generates short fiction for girls when nobody’s looking.” And in a sense, this is a horse book, but not in the way you think. Jen is big, not at all graceful as she scrambles up on her horse’s back. The book begins with gunfire, buckshot in her horse’s neck, and Jen’s own body is full of holes. The shooter was her cousin Jason, the circumstances behind the incident quite unclear, and clarity never really comes, the plot circling around the mystery over and over, as two decades pass.
“Clarity never really comes.” I think this sentence is important, actually, as Whitetail Shooting Gallery baffled me thoughtout, disturbed and troubled me, but it also intrigued me, continually surprised me, never stopped me wondering what would happen next. It’s an anti-pastoral, a complicated portrayal of rural life. It’s the story of Jen and Jason, two cousins whose relationship was always strangely tangled or predatory, who drift apart in their teenage years. Jason is troubled by his shattered family, and while Jen’s family remains strong, her parents don’t really know her. She struggles to reconcile her feelings, her yearnings, her body, with expectations of womanhood. (Significantly, at the arena where Jen teaches figure-skating and Jason plays hockey, the girls’ change room is labelled “Visitors”). She runs around with a pack of wild girls, girls with fleshy bodies, hair, nails and teeths. They’re all a bit feral, and they long for lairs, the kind boys get:
“If Jenn were a boy, she’d have claimed the family basement for her cave. It would be her birthright, She’d have crawled underground and lined her cement cave with clothes and animal hair, and she’d plot how to capture her chosen other-person, how to drag them down into the dark and chew on them.”
The narrative follows Jen and Jascon through their teens, twenties and into their thirties, and demonstrates how each is shaped by their early years, by the peculiarities of the land that bore them, what is possible to be overcome and what isn’t. Both continue to have their closest relationships with animals, Jason with the ferrets and lizards he keeps as pets, and Jen ending up working in a zoo. The line between humans and their fellow-creatures remains ever-blurred, which is one of the most interesting parts of the novel, of so many.
Annette Lapointe’s literary reputation was established with Stolen, which was nominated for the Scotiabank Giller Prize in 2006. And here in her second book, she’s turning Can-Lit on its head, challenging not only her readers’ sensibilities, but also ideas about what a novel should be. And the latter seems to be a requirement for the kind of book that I like best.
January 3, 2013
Our Favourite Kids' Books Lately
Lumpito by Monica Kulling: The evening Lumpito arrived in our lives, Harriet wanted to read it over and over. She’s a sucker for dog books, and Lump became beloved right away. In vivid illustrations by Dean Griffiths, we discover how a little dachshund finds his way into the heart (and home!) of Pablo Picasso. Neither Picasso nor his art are really the focal point of book, but I love that through Lumpito, Picasso becomes a point of reference and part of Harriet’s world.
This is Not My Hat by Jon Klassen: I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know–Jon Klassen is amazing. We were so excited for his new book, which is beautiful and just as subtly sinister as I Want My Hat Back. Harriet loves it, and enjoys it every time she imagines she’s outsmarted the story again.
Goldilocks and the 3 Dinosaurs by Mo Willems: Once again, Willems is no undiscovered gem, but we love everything he does. And for our girl who is especially partial to dinos, we thought this one would be perfect. The book is geared for someone a bit older than three, and much of the humour is lost on Harriet, but we love it, and she gets off on the silliness. It’s the Three Bears turned inside out with a useful moral: if you find yourself in the wrong story, get out.
A Good Trade by Alma Fullerton: In gorgeous illustrations by Karen Patkau, readers follow Kato, a small boy on his morning route to get water for his family in his small village in Uganda. We notice the vivid colours of his clothing and his friends’, the community spirit, and in the background are soldiers on guard, the fact that the children are shoeless. When an aid truck rolls into the village, Kato is intrigued by what’s inside, and imagines what he might give the aid worker in exchange.
The Stone Hatchlings by Sarah Tsiang: We loved this one, a follow-up to Tsiang’s A Flock of Shoes. Abby is back, and she’s found two little eggs. They’re just stones, says her mother, but then we already know that Abby’s mother is often full of nonsense. In Abby’s vivid imagination (and with a great deal of care), the stones hatch into beautiful birds that become her companions. And when it’s time for the game to finally end, Abby’s ready when it does. (I interviewed Sarah Tsiang about the book last fall.)
LMNO Peas by Keith Baker: Not just another alphabet book (plus, it urges on Harriet when peas are on her plate. “Look,” I say. “They’re peas and they’re unique!”). This book is a triumph of design, written in jaunty verse and I love that this alphabet is astronauts, explorers, gigglers, investigators, outlaws, readers, voters vets and volunteers. Also that it has introduced, “Can you dig it?” into Harriet’s vernacular, and at one teaching point (“Kings”) features Elvis. We all love this one.
This Moose Belongs to Me by Oliver Jeffers: Jeffers is another underground kidlit sensation that only I have ever heard of or loved (ha). His new book is a bit of a departure visually, employing the collage technique he’s used in other books but this time using backdrops from old fashioned landscape paintings. It’s a funny little story about a boy who thinks he owns a moose, but the moose is most determined to own itself (and is partial to anyone giving away apples).
January 2, 2013
My Christmas with Caitlin Moran
It is never Christmas properly for me unless I get to spend most of the day curled up on my mother’s sofa reading a book. This year’s book was Caitlin Moran’s Moranthology, which I received in hardback from my sister-in-law, which was only fair because I turned her onto How to Be a Woman last year. It’s a collection of Moran’s columns from the Times from over the years, interviews with characters from Paul McCartney to Lady Gaga, synopses of episodes of Sherlock and Downtown Abbey, celebrity gossip notes, and columns of wider social significance–on poverty, feminism, activism, and more. Moranthology is clearly more a collection of newspaper columns than a book proper, but for those of us who have fallen in love with Caitlin Moran, it makes a fabulous read.
The other book I got for Christmas was Astray by Emma Donoghue, from Stuart who was determined to buy me a book I hadn’t asked for, a surprise book. He went through my 2012 Books Read list, examined my shelves (to-be-read and otherwise), and had my Book City account checked to ensure I hadn’t bought the book and hidden it. As Harriet ended up telling me what all my other presents were (a cast-iron enamel pot and a tea towel), the book turned up to be my only surprise at all, and it was a lovely one.
I have also just realized that ten years ago, I never would have imagined that receiving a cast-iron enamel pot and a tea towel for Christmas would thrill me as it did, but it did! Though mostly because the tea towel is of the Barbara Pym variety. My husband is wonderful man indeed. And I guess a decade is a long time to change in.
December 31, 2012
Terror and Joy
“For 2009, I make no resolutions, because things will be changing whether I will them to or not, and certainly, I am no longer (as) in control of it all.” Which is a thing I wrote exactly 4 years ago, supposing myself to be so brave and open-minded, but what I didn’t know then was how unhappy it would make me to lose control of it all, that I’m really not the type to go with the flow. Having a baby made me more aware of the fixedness of my limitations than anything else I’ve done before, except perhaps for that summer I spent alone adventuring in Europe and crying in phone booths.
So really, my most important resolution for 2013 is not to break. That I employ every bit of my minuscule store of patience. That I’m able to weather the difficult days with an awareness of where they’re taking me, which is to a place where I belong. To face forward, even with all the terror, that terror that is so inextricably mixed with the most enormous joy.
Happy New Year. May 2013 bring you fantastic books, a glorious summer, topped-up glasses and so so much clafoutis.
December 30, 2012
2012: My Year in Books
For the most part, my year in books was a good one, but somewhere around October, it all fell to pieces. I blame my own circumstances for this mostly, but it’s true that books this Fall didn’t spark my enthusiasm as those from the Spring had. There was a time in the spring when I was so on a roll, not sure that there wasn’t a book in the entire world that wasn’t wonderful. By October, I’d stopped keeping track of the books I was reading, deciding I didn’t care about that sort of record anymore, though when I came out of my first trimester stupour, I realized I did, and spent an anxious hour putting my whole list back together.
I’ve already shared my books of the year. I’ve also read some poetry, though I never know how to talk about it here, so I don’t. Some of the best books I’ve read this year that weren’t new were Subject to Change by Renee Rodin, The House With the Broken Two by Myrl Coulter, So Beautiful by Ramona Dearing, Bilgewater by Jane Gardam and All the Anxious Girls on Earth by Zsuzsi Gartner. Like everybody, I loved Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl and How to Be a Woman by Caitlin Moran. And the most amazing book I’ve read all year, the review that brought me more hits than any other I’ve ever written, Firebrand by Rosemary Aubert, “Loving the mayor is a bit like that”. Other notables of 2012 were Tanis Rideout’s Above All Things, Jo Walton’s Among Others, Kyo Maclear’s Stray Love, Noah Richler’s What We Talk About When We Talk About War, Alice Petersen’s All the Voices Cry, Zadie Smith’s NW, dee Hobswan Smith’s Foodshed: An Edible Alberta Alphabet, Sussex Drive by Linda Svendsen, Miranda Hill’s Sleeping Funny, and Daniel Griffin’s Stopping for Strangers. And Isabel Huggan, the very best thing I found all year. I loved her two short story collections so very much, and have her third book Belonging lined up for not so far into the future.
I did not succeed in my 2012 New Year’s Resolution, which was to finally finish reading John Cheever’s collected stories. I am beginning to think that “collected stories” volumes are not necessarily reader-friendly. Or maybe the problem is simply me.
I’ve read 120 books this year so far, and may get two more in before the year is out, as I’m just about finished Ali Smith’s collection The First Person and Other Stories. 120 is less than I’ve read in years past, but then I’ve also been reading for work more than I ever have before. It has been a very busy year, bookwise, with less room to read for pleasure than I’ve ever known, what with the work stuff and the obsolescence of naptime, but then I also know that I’m lucky to be paid to read at all. And that I’ll probably be breastfeeding again in about six months time, which comes with its own agonies, but ample time to read (one-handedly, all night long [yawn]) is not one of them. I’ve also been too isolated in a Can-Lit bubble this year, and need to branch out beyond. In 2013, I plan to do something about that.
Anyway, long live books! Long live authors! Long live small Canadian presses, which publish most of the best stuff out there. I’ve spent the last two weeks reading indulgently, and it’s been a pleasure, reading for reading’s sake. The definition of holiday. And I’ve got some exciting books lined up for the new year–new Lisa Moore, new Kate Atkinson! Also getting around to the 2012 books I’ve been slow on–John Lanchester’s Capital, for one, and others. As ever, I am looking forward.
December 29, 2012
Treasures and others
I’ve decided to remain unabashed about my propensity to read only/mainly female authors, at least until most of the literary world clues in to the fact that they’ve got the same prejudice but just in opposite. And now, apropos of, um, something, a few highlights from the Globe and Mail’s year-end book recommendations list, which I always enjoy and has found me some treasures in years past.
From Robert Hough: “One of the best is Any Human Heart, by William Boyd, all the more so because the central figure is male – a growing rarity in an industry that falls all over itself trying to please female readers.” Charming.
Miriam Toews sells me on Alison Bechdel’s Are You My Mother?, though I suspect Miriam Toews could sell me on anything.
Sarah Polley reads while breastfeeding! And while she recommends we read Anton Piatigorsky’s The Iron Bridge, which I really do want to read, but she notes we should wait ’til baby is weaned: “Generally it’s best to save books about how dictators become dictators for times when you are not lactating – this is something no one told me.”
From Ian Baruma: “Alas, this left little time for contemporary fiction, most of which seems to pale in terms of daring and ambition compared to Melville or Joyce…” Yawn. Though both he and Laura Penny recommend Moby Dick, and my feeling is that Laura Penny never steers one far wrong.
I loved Katia Grubisic’s recommendation of Patrick Warner’s Double Talk, which I’ve been interested in and now I absolutely want to read.
And thank goodness for Lisa Moore: “I choose books by Three Wise Women…” Zadie Smith, which I already know is great,Christine Pountney, which I’m getting a feeling about, and you can always trust a reader who is recommend Elizabeth Bowen, oh yes, you can. I also think that if I spent the rest of my life only reading what Lisa Moore told me to read that I would probably be all right.
And Martin Levin was good enough to recommend one book by a woman, “the great Jane Gardam’s Crusoe’s Daughter,” which I totally want to read now and Gardam is great indeed, though I am beginning to suspect that Jane Gardam is Martin Levin’s go-to woman writer (at least when conversation necessitates), what Woolf is to so many others, but at least he’s read her.
December 19, 2012
The Fairy Door
For me, the blogosphere has always been about inspiration, new discoveries, things to learn, and people to learn from. And while very often I’m unable to measure my own life up to those seemingly perfect ones I find online (I can’t decorate a cake for shit, my knitting is always wonky, and if I had a lifestyle blog, it would be called “Cluttered and Dusty”), I usually come away better f0r these encounters. My life is so much richer for what other bloggers have shown me to strive for over the last decade.
Sometimes these bloggers make it all seem so hard though, out of reach, or perhaps they are just underlining the very things my own world is lacking (like an expensive camera, patience and artistic ability). I’m here to show you, however, that none of these things are really necessary to create a little magic in your lives, and the Fairy Door is case in point. Now, Fairy Doors are amazing. I think I heard about them while I was pregnant with Harriet, and I loved the idea of a tiny portal, a door to nowhere and anywhere, of a secret world beyond our own. I wanted that kind of everyday magic in our household, an otherworldly realm to believe in. So at some point in Harriet’s first year, I “built” one.
According to Pinterest and other fine sources, a Fairy Door is a beautiful thing. Apparently you can buy accessories for it. It’s one of those projects I would never ever have accomplished, or even tried, except that I made mine without a template. In fact, I made my Fairy Door without anything except a Sharpie marker, and it’s not beautiful, and my stairs are really dusty, but I promise you that neither of things mean that my daughter believes in the fairies any less.
Somewhere along the line, our Fairy Door became the home of the Hoopty’s, Mr. and Mrs. Hoopty and their daughter Harriet Hoopty who have been identified our own family’s reflections in the kitchen windows while we eat our dinner. (They must shrink down when they go home.) They have a younger child, a son called Hando, and they’ve also taken in Cousin Dupa since his parents disappeared and his babysitter died. Apparently, they’ve also just had a new baby, christened Butterfly, and it must have been a high-risk pregnancy because Mrs. Hoopty was in the hospital for 7 weeks. She’s been reported to be fine though.
Anyway, it doesn’t have to be as difficult as it appears, parenthood. Which is not to say that it’s easy, but there really are so many wonderful things for which almost nothing is all that’s required.
December 18, 2012
Reading indulgently
For the last week, I’ve been reading indulgently, books of the year either read or pushed aside, and I’ve been reading my own idiosyncratic to-be-read stack, the books I’ve bought at college book sales, discovered in clearance bins, at yard-sales, or scooped from cardboard boxes put to the curb. And I’ve only been reading thin books, anything too heavy (literally or otherwise) put away for a later date. I’m in the mood right now for progress, for the massive pile of books before me to appear to be getting under control. I’m in the mood also for books that will go down easy, that will surprise me, new discoveries. I’m so tired of the books that everybody’s talking about, which either means that I start saying what everybody else is, or else the book fails to live up to the hype and I start thinking everybody is stupid. It means, of course, that when I do start to rave about Elaine McCluskey’s The Watermelon Social that it’s a little bit lonely. Can I tell you how much I loved the line, “For God’s sake, Les, when we were young, radio stations played ‘My Ding-a-Ling'”? I’ve also read The Only Snow in Havana by Elizabeth Hay, which is such a strange and wonderful book, an ode to Mexico City and Yellowknife, and the ties between them. About love, loss and the fur trade. Both books were rife with stuff I didn’t understand, but I didn’t mind, and it didn’t hinder my enjoyment. I love these indications of further treasures locked within. And now I am reading The Chronicles of Narmo, which is the novel that Caitlin Moran wrote when she was 15, and I expect I could get though it in a single bath, and that there will be not much there that I don’t understand, but plenty that will make me laugh, and that’s most all right too.
December 17, 2012
Christmas Reads: The Christmas Birthday Story by Margaret Laurence
I hadn’t heard of The Christmas Birthday Story by Margaret Laurence until I read a collection of her letters A Very Large Soul in October. And I was intrigued by the sound of this book, “…a re-telling of the Nativity story, for use with small children. I wanted to tell it in such a way that small children would understand and be able to connect with it. I really wanted to emphasize the birth of the beloved child into a loving family.” For me, Christmas has always been about new life and family, and not any particular baby or family either, so I appreciated Laurence’s approach, particularly as she has religious knowledge to do it properly. Here is the Christmas story but without angels, God doesn’t get a mention. It’s a very human story of family, of travel, of a carpenter and his wife who are going to have a baby. The only thing otherwordly is that most peculiar star.
“That child Jesus grew up to be a man, and he was strong and hard-working, like Joseph the carpenter. He was gentle and kind, like Mary his mother. And he was something else, too. He was a wise teacher and a friend to all people./ So we remember him always, and at Christmas time we celebrate his birthday…”
Long out of print, copies are hard to come by online, but I am glad I tracked one down for us. It’s a beautiful story, ideal for those of us who are not religious but want our children to understand our culture, why we celebrate at this time of year. Helen Lucas’s illustrations are dated, but my child has been raised on vintage picture books and hasn’t noticed.
