You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
Broken Groundis a riveting exploration of the dark, brooding presence of the First World War in the lives of the inhabitants of a “soldier’s settlement” on Vancouver Island. From out of a stubborn, desolate landscape studded with tree stumps, the settlers of Portuguese Creek have built a new life for themselves. But when an encroaching forest fire threatens this fledgling settlement, it also intensifies the remembered horrors of war. The story of Portuguese Creek is told by several of its citizens, including a boy trying to recover from the sudden loss of his father, and a former teacher haunted by what happened to the soldiers he led in France. With a memorable cast of characters, and by turns heart-rending and tragic, humorous and humane,Broken Groundis a powerful novel that immerses us in the lives of an entire community.
None
Words We Call Home is a commemorative anthology celebrating more than twenty-five years of achievement for the UBC Creative Writing department -- the oldest writing program in Canada. The more than sixty poets, dramatists, and fiction writers included provide just a sample of the energy and vision the department has fostered over the years. From Earle Birney's pioneering efforts in 1946, to the birth of the department in 1965, to the present day, the programme has created a place for aspiring, talented writers.
The first-ever study of women in Canadian publishing, Toronto Trailblazers delves into the cultural influence of seven key women who, despite pervasive gender bias, helped advance a modern literary culture for Canada. Publisher Irene Clarke, scholarly editors Eleanor Harman and Francess Halpenny, trade editors Sybil Hutchinson, Claire Pratt, and Anna Porter, and literary agent Bella Pomer made the most of their vocational prospects, first by securing their respective positions and then by refining their professional methods. Individually, each woman asserted her agency by adapting orthodox ways of working within Canadian publishing. Collectively, and perhaps more importantly, their overarching approach emerged more broadly as a feminist practice. Guided by the resolve to make industry-wide improvements, these women disrupted the dominant masculine paradigm and reinvigorated the culture of publishing and authorship in Canada. Through their vision and method these trailblazing women became agents of change who helped transform publishing practice.
Profiles in Canadian Literature is a wide-ranging series of essays on Canadian authors. Each profile acquaints the reader with the writer’s work, providing insight into themes, techniques, and special characteristics, as well as a chronology of the author’s life. Finally, there is a bibliography of primary works and criticism that suggests avenues for further study. "I know of no better introduction to these writers, and the studies in question are full of basic information not readily obtainable elsewhere."-U of T Quarterly
Catching the Torch examines contemporary novels and plays written about Canada's participation in World War I. Exploring such works as Jane Urquhart's The Underpainter and The Stone Carvers, Jack Hodgins's Broken Ground, Kevin Kerr's Unity (1918), Stephen Massicotte's Mary's Wedding, and Frances Itani's Deafening, the book considers how writers have dealt with the compelling myth that the Canadian nation was born in the trenches of the Great War. In contrast to British and European remembrances of WWI, which tend to regard it as a cataclysmic destroyer of innocence, or Australian myths that promote an ideal of outsize masculinity, physical bravery, and white superiority, contemporary Canadia...
Women's creative labour in publishing has often been overlooked. This book draws on dynamic new work in feminist book history and publishing studies to offer the first comparative collection exploring women's diverse, deeply embedded work in modern publishing. Highlighting the value of networks, collaboration, and archives, the companion sets out new ways of reading women's contributions to the production and circulation of global print cultures. With an international, intergenerational set of contributors using diverse methodologies, essays explore women working in publishing transatlantically, on the continent, and beyond the Anglosphere. The book combines new work on high-profile women publishers and editors alongside analysis of women's work as translators, illustrators, booksellers, advertisers, patrons, and publisher's readers; complemented by new oral histories and interviews with leading women in publishing today. The first collection of its kind, the companion helps establish and shape a thriving new research field.
Covers setting, character building, plot, narration, metaphors, and revision, and includes exercises designed to improve writing skills
First pub. 1976. Well crafted short stories in the classic style of Mansfield & Lawrence. Concerns ordinary people and their inner lives. Author now recognised as one of Canada's great writers.
The Master of Happy Endings is a powerful new novel about memory, belonging, helping others, and the vagaries of the human heart. It is also a compelling story about how a man in his late seventies manages to conjure one more great adventure for himself. Axel Thorstad lives in a shack on a remote island off the coast of British Columbia. Once a popular school teacher and thespian who touched the lives of hundreds of his students, he now lives in retirement and mourns the recent death of his wife. But even this stoical giant of a 77-year-old finds the isolation too much. He begins to run want ads in newspapers offering his services as a tutor, and meets the indomitable Mrs. Montana. She hires...