Watermark by Jennifer Farquhar

[dropcap]When[/dropcap] I was a young lad, my parents owned a cottage that fronted on a small lake in South Eastern Ontario. While I swam in the water by day, I never ventured near the shore at night. That was when all kinds of things came forth out of the depths to languish on the shore …

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Through Sunlight and Shadows by Raymond Fraser

Sadly, Through Sunlight and Shadows would prove to be Raymond Fraser’s swan song, as he passed away just a few short months after its publication. It is his fourteenth book of fiction and is an all-new volume of “memoirs” of his fictional/semi-autobiographical character, Walt Macbride. While regular readers of Mr. Fraser’s will be familiar with …

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The Land’s Long Reach by Valerie Mills-Milde

This is the book that I was awaiting from Valerie Mills-Milde. I had to patiently wait two years from the time that her exceptional debut novel After Drowning (2016, Inanna Publications) was released. That book won a 2017 IPPY Silver Medal for Contemporary Fiction. Of After Drowning, I stated: “After Drowning is an intriguing, well-paced and mysteriously …

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The Homing Place: Indigenous and Settler Literary Legacies of the Atlantic by Rachel Bryant

From Wilfred Laurier University Press’ Indigenous Studies Series comes Rachel Bryant’s The Homing Place, which refuses to be pigeon-holed to any one category.

This Time Might Be Different: Stories of Maine by Elaine Ford

[dropcap]In [/dropcap]the healthcare world in which I work, a “sentinel event” is defined as: “any unanticipated event in a healthcare setting resulting in death or serious physical or psychological injury to a patient or patients, not related to the natural course of the patient’s illness.”  In the day to day mundane world in which we …

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The Art and Passion of Guido Nincheri by Mélanie Grondin

The beauty of many old churches (particularly cathedrals, basilicas, etc.) is in their architecture as well as in their religious art, whether it is the many large frescoes or the exquisite stained glass windows that adorn them. The late (1885-1973) Italian-Canadian artist and stained glass master Guido Nincheri has enjoyed a recent resurgence of interest, …

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The Last Beothuk by Gary Collins

[dropcap]Prior [/dropcap]to The Last Beothuk (2017, Flanker Press), Mr Collins’ last book was Desperation: The Queen of Swansea (2016, Flanker Press), which won a “The Very Best!” Book Award in the Historical Fiction category for that year. At the time, I posited that Mr Collins was at the top of his storytelling game. One could …

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Finishing the Road by David Cozac

Canadian author David Cozac was born and raised in Toronto. He works for the United Nations. In the past, he worked for several human rights organizations, including PEN Canada and Canadian Journalists for Free Expression. [perfectpullquote align=”right” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”#42494F” class=”” size=””]Finishing the Road is the type of book you don’t want to put …

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First Things First: Early and Uncollected Stories by Diane Schoemperlen

[dropcap]Diane [/dropcap]Schoemperlen is the award-winning author of twelve books of fiction and non-fiction. In 2016, she published is This Is Not My Life: A Memoir of Love, Prison, and Other Complications regarding her relationship with a federal inmate serving a life sentence for second-degree murder. Diane has lived in Kingston, Ontario, since 1986. [perfectpullquote align=”right” …

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Once Upon A Time in West Toronto by Terri Favro

In 2012 Terri Favro’s novella The Proxy Bride (Quattro Books) won the Ken Klonsky Quattro Novella Award. Fellow Inanna author Lisa de Nikolits said of The Proxy Bride: “A beautiful snapshot of a time past and present: a vignette of small town Niagara, home to passionate Italians, their lives portrayed lovingly with sensual prose and operatic lyrical descriptions.” Once …

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Homecoming: The Road Less Travelled by Wayne Curtis

Prolific Miramichi author Wayne Curtis, whose most recent collection of fictional short stories was In the Country (2016, Pottersfield Press), has just released a new collection entitled Homecoming: A Road Less Travelled (2017, Pottersfield Press). The book’s thirteen stories, many interrelated, contain the idea of returning to a place either one has escaped from or …

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No Fury Like That by Lisa de Nikolits

“Each of us is a seeker, walking along Eternity’s Road, which has no beginning and no end.” —Sri Chinmoy An apt quote to begin a review concerning a book that deals with aspects of eternity, and whatever your belief (or beliefs) are, you may have to suspend them temporarily to fully enjoy this new offering …

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A Bird on Every Tree by Carol Bruneau

A Bird on Every Tree won The Very Best! Book Award for Short Stories. [dropcap]Carol [/dropcap]Bruneau is the author of six books, including the recent These Good Hands. Her 2007 novel, Glass Voices, was a Globe and Mail Best Book. She lives with her husband in Halifax, where she teaches writing at NSCAD University. [perfectpullquote align=”right” …

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New Brunswick Was His Country by Ronald Rees

[dropcap]Ronald [/dropcap]Rees was born in Wales and for the past twenty-five years, he has lived in St. Andrews, New Brunswick. New Brunswick Was His Country: The Life of William Francis Ganong (2017, Nimbus Publishing) is his latest book. The name of William Francis Ganong was unfamiliar to me until I read Nicholas Guitard’s book The …

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