Book Review: Binge by Douglas Coupland

By Dahl Botterill

Binge is a collection of 60 very short stories, each about three to four pages long and focusing on a different primary character. Many of the characters pop up again in other stories, but each is the main focus only once. Sometimes this multitude of perspectives provides an opportunity to see an event from a different angle, and other times it only provides a different look at a particular character as they live through some totally separate moment in time. There’s plenty of opportunity for the curious reader to map out these events and interactions into a larger whole, but such effort isn’t really necessary; even with the most casual read, these interlocking parts provide each story with a little more depth and breadth than it contains solely within itself.

This isn’t to say that the stories require the overlap to thrive. Each story stands successfully alone, and while some are obviously going to be stronger than others, nothing feels like a lost cause, especially when you’re on to the next story within a couple of minutes. Many of these characters are not good people, or even likeable, but they all feel real—if a little absurd—and none of them seems so far gone that one can’t relate to them a little. Relatable characters that feel intriguingly real is an aspect of storytelling that Douglas Coupland has always excelled at, and so Binge winds up being perhaps the perfect way for him to return to fiction after almost a decade of focusing on other projects. There are some larger plot arcs to be found here, but they aren’t the essence of the collection. Binge is all about the characters. It’s much more about people and what they’re capable of than it is about what they are all doing.

For somebody that’s never enjoyed Coupland, this short story collection is unlikely to change their mind. Reading Binge, with its focus on characters that run the gamut of moral and charismatic possibilities, is like steeping oneself in the most polarizing aspect of books like All Families are Psychotic and Worst. Person. Ever. On the other hand, for somebody that enjoys Coupland’s character work in all its forms, the book feels brilliant for the exact same reasons. Dynamic characters of the wild and weird variety are a trademark of Douglas Coupland’s, and Binge is a collection that really works to show that off.

Book Review: Today We Choose Faces by Roger Zelazny

By Dahl Botterill

Roger Zelazny is perhaps best known for his Amber stories, consisting of ten novels released in two 5-volume arcs and a multitude of shorter works linked to the Amber setting. However, Zelazny’s non-Amber books and stories outnumbered the Amber ones, and with very few exceptions didn’t link up to one another either. A winner of many awards over his lifetime, Roger Zelazny was a master of worldbuilding, creating incredible characters and settings, and telling grand tales within the span of a couple hundred pages, only to move on to entirely new ideas with his next book. This ability to bring a world full of wonder to life around the reader is one of my favourite things about Zelazny’s work, and Today We Choose Faces is one of these books.

The novel opens with a mafia enforcer named Angel who has been revived after a couple of centuries of cryogenic sleep. Initially it seems he’s a bit of a conversation piece for the various members of the now legitimate COSA Incorporated, but he eventually learns he’s there to do the same thing he’s done in the past. Trained in modern technology and weaponry, he’s tasked with the assassination of a mad scientist who is causing trouble for his descendants. While Angel is busy with his interplanetary assassination attempt, though, the world destroys itself in a massive war, and he finds himself alone with the mad scientist’s records and technology at his fingertips.

The next portion of the novel jumps forward several generations, where the surviving remnants of humanity live near-utopian lives in a massive trans-spatial indoor facility called the House, where each region (or Room) exists separately on an interplanetary scale, connected by Passages that offer instantaneous transport between Rooms. The House—and by extension the survival of humanity—is in the care of a group of telepathically semi-linked individuals called the Family, the members of which are led by a man named Lange who serves as their “nexus.” Somebody is hunting the Family, and after generations of increasing peace among humanity, nobody is particularly prepared to deal with such a thing. Except, perhaps, the voice inside Lange’s head telling him to “Pull pin seven.”

Today We Choose Faces is book that is filled to overflowing with ideas, and Zelazny uses all of them to great effect. It is a tale of the endless tug-of-war between humanity’s destiny and its fate, but also of cloning, interstellar architecture, psychic self-surgery and mnemonic sacrifice, survival and free will, and so much more. It’s not a long book, but Today We Choose Faces is a thrilling ride while it lasts, filled with more than enough concepts to keep its reader on their toes as they’re dropped into a story that’s already running full tilt towards its own conclusion.

Book Review: An Expensive Education by Nick McDonell

By Dahl Botterill

Nick McDonell burst onto the literary scene when he was only 17 years old with his debut novel Twelve. It wasn't perfect, but it was very good, even without factoring in the age of its author. Composed of tight and efficient prose reminiscent of Hemingway, it took an up-close look at the intersection between privilege, violence, and drugs. There is an almost journalistic sense of immediacy that made it feel particularly real, and this sense of saturation is something that survived his journey into adulthood.

An Expensive Education, published in 2009, showcases a more experienced writer, and a more experienced human being as well. The characters are a little older, and the setting has grown to encompass the world, but that immediacy is still very present. While the setting of this more-than-a-spy story is very much international, its core revolves around Harvard University—it's the sun around which all the varied characters spin. This core presents another link to McDonell's previous work, in that there is a lot of privilege at work here. As in Twelve, privilege and entitlement aren't universal aspects of the cast of characters, but it provides the framework through which they often interrelate.

An Expensive Education follows several very different characters over the course of its duration. Michael Teak is a Harvard-educated spy, present for the death of a revolutionary named Hatashil and the destruction of a village at the indirect hands of his government. Susan Lowell is a Harvard professor who's just won the Pulitzer for her book about that same revolutionary. Her student David grew up in the aforementioned village while his girlfriend uses her privilege in occasionally misguided attempts to do good while furthering her own prospects. Attempts that will eventually lead her to Teak as well. These characters are surrounded by more students, more professors, more academics and pundits, and shadowy puppet masters.

There are a lot of people to keep track of, and a lot going on, and if An Expensive Education has a weakness, it's that one may find themselves far more interested in what happened to some of these characters than to others. Both in the sense of the plot and characters, the political intrigue is occasionally more interesting than the various machinations of the young American elite, but neither aspect is a total miss, and each certainly benefits from the inclusion of the other. On some level, it's telling a slightly different story than it seems to be, and that is perhaps what makes this book something special. There might not be very many authors that could make both war-torn countries and Harvard campuses feel so lived in; McDonell manages to do both while connecting the two via strands of uniquely terse prose, weaving a signature momentum into the tale.

Book Review: Something is Killing the Children by James Tynion IV, Werther Dell'Edera, and Miquel Muerto

By Dahl Botterill

Content warning: violence, gore

Something is Killing the Children opens with a sleepover. Boys goofing around, playing truth or dare, telling scary stories. Things ramp up quickly though, and by the next morning only one of those boys remains alive, trying to explain the unexplainable to local law enforcement. He’s scared and possibly in shock, so he tells them he didn’t see anything. After a day of abuse at school from kids who think he had a role to play in the tragedy, he’s approached by an odd, wide-eyed young woman who asks him to tell her everything he remembers and promises that she’ll believe every word. “No matter how weird it is. No matter how scary.” Her name is Erica Slaughter, and she hunts monsters.

Book one of Something is Killing the Children collects the first 15 issues of the ongoing comic series into one oversized hardcover volume. It covers Erica’s experiences in a town called Archer’s Peak, and over these 15 issues Tynion introduces enough characters to really breathe life in to the town. Archer’s Peak is made up of people, and those people lend a real gravity to the events taking place. The missing and murdered children have families, and those families don’t always make Erica’s job easier.

James Tynion IV does a great job of worldbuilding here; not only does he create the very alive and mourning town of Archer’s Peak, but he also provides hints as to Erica’s origins with the Order of St. George’s House of Slaughter. Something is Killing the Children is the best kind of slow burn, where the pacing is solid, generating a better story through detail, exploration, and character development rather than rushing from one action sequence to the next. The immediate tale of Archer’s Peak clearly benefits, but so does the series potential in general. Smart writing ensures that much of the fine and fun detail serves both purposes simultaneously, benefiting both the immediate arc and the ongoing series without overwhelming the reader with information unnecessary to either.

Werther Dell’Edera handles the art side of Something is Killing the Children, and he is a very suitable choice. His rougher drawing style doesn’t always feel as polished as some other titles, but it does a phenomenal job of conveying emotion, and in doing so is one of the ways the book really hooks the reader into the pain and loss of Archer’s Peak. It feels very primal, which is a fantastic fit for a book about monsters and people and the fine lines that separate some of them. The art carries emotional weight, and that lends power to the book’s impact.

This isn’t a book that will necessarily grab the reader by the throat from the first pages, but it will quietly tap their interest, and begin to put down roots. As it grows and swells over its duration into something bigger than it initially seems, Something is Killing the Children becomes not only a really great horror comic, but a great book as well.

Book Review: Deep House by Thomas King

By Dahl Botterill

Thomas King is an award-winning writer who grew his fame with stellar literary fiction before expanding into nonfiction, children’s literature, poetry, and more. In the early 2000s, he delved into the mystery genre under the pseudonym of Hartley Goodweather, penning two funny and well-received detective novels to very limited fanfare, and for a decade or so, that seemed to be all we would ever see of detective-turned-photographer-turned-reluctant-detective Thumps DreadfulWater. Those two books were republished without the pseudonym shortly after The Back of the Turtle and The Inconvenient Indian made King a household name, and they found a much broader audience. Thomas King returned to the DreadfulWater mysteries and has to date given us four more; Deep House is the sixth mystery novel starring Thumps, and the series is going strong.

King’s strengths have always made his writing something special. His writing is playful and recognizes the value and beauty in everyday lives and events; King’s humour is kind and his characters so very real. Such traits made his early works stand out, but also serve his mystery writing to great effect. The setting of Chinook is a smallish town that feels more lived in with every book. Characters and locations change and grow from title to title, and the reader is drawn in by this familiarity. Characters who in so many books might be cookie-cutter placeholders providing clues or moving the plot along are instead thinking, feeling individuals that breathe life into the setting and make every little moment matter.

Deep House continues this grand tradition. It isn’t likely to be a book that changes a reader’s perspective of the world, but it will certainly draw them in and make them feel like they’re a part of what’s happening in Chinook. The mystery starts small, with an abandoned, burned-out van, and grows over time. As it grows, its many threads touch on so many aspects of Thumps’s life as to make it unavoidable, and this sense of something unseen growing is mirrored somewhat in the town, where its businesses and community are awakening and changing in the aftermath of the pandemic. Chinook is a town filled with people, and King introduces his reader to many of them. The degree to which one gets to know everybody that exists even tangentially to Thumps DreadfulWater, and the fact that he knows people just about everywhere he goes, builds up a sense of community that permeates the setting. Both the dialogue and DreadfulWater’s inner narrative are engaging and fun to read, and really set the book apart.

The mystery is teased out effectively, keeping everybody guessing while providing a momentum that ensures the reader will always want to read just a few more pages, but there is more to this book than a mystery. Were the mystery excised entirely from Deep House—no vandalism, no murder, no intrigue at all—it would still be an entertaining read about the relationships between the diverse individuals that make up a community. It would still be Thomas King.

Book Review: Moonshot edited by Elizabeth LaPensée and Michael Sheyahshe

By Dahl Botterill

Moonshot: The Indigenous Comics Collection was originally released by Alternate History Comics in 2015. They followed it up with a second volume a few years later, and all three volumes are now available through Inhabit Education Books. Each book collects short works by a variety of Indigenous creators from all over North America, and the third volume is another fantastic collection. Moonshot Volume 3 focuses on stories that illustrate the concept of “Indigenous Futurisms,” stories that tell of “the past, present, and future as being a nonlinear reality.” It’s a concept that provides the Indigenous creators being showcased a lot of room to breathe, and the result is a truly diverse collection of comics and illustrated stories.

There’s an abundance of different art styles at work here, from the classic superhero stylings of “Slave Killer” to the soft shades and lines of “Sky People,” and the bold blocks of bright colour in “Sisters.” The stories also vary a great deal in tone and scale. “Our Blood” and the aforementioned “Sky People” follow a few characters over a short while in settings that feel fairly contemporary. “Future World and Xenesi: the Traveler” blends science fiction with broad temporal strokes, while “They Come for Water” and “Waterward” blend tradition with horror and a sense of timelessness. 

Moonshot Volume 3 is comprised of over a dozen tales written and illustrated by a wide variety of Indigenous creators from all over the continent, and the result is a fascinating collection of stories from distinct voices. If there is a disappointing aspect to the book, it’s that including so many stories require each tale be fairly brief and will leave the reader wanting so much more. Along with a foreword that expands on the concept of Indigenous Futurisms and provides some additional information on the individual stories, the collection also includes a short sketchbook of concept drawings and biographies of the contributors, including references to a number of their longer works. Perhaps a little something to read while hoping for the fourth volume of this important and thought-provoking series. 

Book Review: Buckaroo Banzai Against the World Crime League et al. A Compendium of Evils by The Reno Kid with E. M. Rauch

By Dahl Botterill

I was very excited to discover that Buckaroo Banzai Against the World Crime League: A Compendium of Evil existed. While I’ve never read The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension, I loved the movie; it’s a ridiculous steamroller of uninhibited creativity that plays like a love letter to every bombastic film genre you’ve ever seen. To be perusing the shelves at a bookstore and see a sequel staring back at me seemed too good to be true, and I couldn’t wait to read it. I went in hoping for a wild and crazy thrill-a-minute mess in all the best ways, offbeat and colourful, full of weird characters and over-the-top twists and turns. 

Well. It does have some weird characters. And it is indeed a mess.

It isn’t that nothing interesting happens, or that the characters aren’t weird, but the writing style is such that everything happens at a positively glacial pace. Twists and turns become long lazy arcs that the reader has entirely too much time to prepare for, and the bulk of that time is spent on tangents, blind alleys, and dialogue that goes nowhere. In a different book or genre that might work, but Buckaroo Banzai suffers; it feels like a book that doesn’t know what it is. 

The writing often feels childish, with the frequent curses misspelled for some largely unexplained reason and a plethora of attention given to toilet humour and bodily functions. The expected audience is ostensibly declared to be young but what may be intended as juvenile comes off as crass and off-putting much of the time. Not only is the self-indulgent style hard to get into, but the language occasionally feels so out of place as to knock the reader right back out. There is certainly a dedication to the weird and offbeat, but it all feels overwritten. The end result is prose that feels manic but lacks any momentum, and the novel is crippled by this incongruity. Rauch takes hundreds of pages to cover what a classic science fiction author would have divulged in thirty, resulting in a story that suffocates under the weight of its own world-building.

I’m sure there are some folks out there that would enjoy this book. Given an effective editor and some very deep cuts, there might have been an entertaining sequel in here somewhere, but in its current form I find it hard to believe it saw publication.

Book Review: Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata

By Dahl Botterill

Keiko Furukura has always found people confusing. As a child, she was disciplined for reacting strangely to social situations, and while she would eventually understand that her actions were considered socially unacceptable—dead budgies on the playground weren't potential dinner, and a shovel wasn't the ideal way to end a fight between fellow schoolchildren—she could never understand why. She was loved and cared for, but she didn't feel those emotions herself. She withdrew, toed the line, and avoided drawing negative attention until she stumbled upon a part-time job at a convenience store.

To say Keiko thrives in the convenience store would be an overstatement, but it does provide a place where she can fit into contemporary society. The job comes with detailed instructions pertaining to every aspect of employment, from customer interactions to personal health and hygiene. The biggest problem for Keiko when we meet her in Convenience Store Woman is that she's been at the convenience store for 20 years, and thus, once again finds herself at odds with the societal expectations of those around her. She's reached an age where she's expected to have either a husband or a career and having no interest in either is once again causing friction in her life.

Convenience Store Woman reminded me of Camus' Outsider in a lot of ways. Keiko doesn't just find herself incapable of fitting in, but the people around her can't fathom why this is the case. In many ways, this inability of those around her to understand how Keiko relates to the world reflects her inability to understand how she's supposed to—the difference is that she doesn't expect them to. She devotes a tremendous amount of effort trying to fit others' expectations and lessen the discomfort of those around her, often at great detriment to herself, but very few other people expend the same energy into accepting her the way she is.

This book is a quick read and quite unlike anything else I've read recently. Sometimes funny, sometimes sad, Convenience Store Woman introduces a protagonist that merely wants to exist. Keiko isn't seeking romance or adventure or success; her greatest drive is to fit into society, not necessarily well, but just well enough that her existence isn't troublesome to those around her. Convenience Store Woman is a great read about a fascinating character, and I enjoyed it very much.

Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata has been translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori.

Book Review: God is Not a Fish Inspector by W.D. Valgardson

By Dahl Botterill

My first and only previous experience with W.D. Valgardson was in high school; Gentle Sinners was on the curriculum at the time, and it was the book no student wanted to read. I remember almost nothing about it, but the name of the author of course stuck with me, so when I spotted a book of short stories with his name on it, I decided to give him another go. I have a bit of a soft spot for Canadian fiction, and it seemed foolish to have that one novel, read years ago amidst the complaints of an entire class, define an author for me.

I'm glad I did. I enjoyed God is Not a Fish Inspector a great deal, and it certainly scratched that classic CanLit itch. It has some funny bits, and occasionally pulls at the heartstrings, but it also serves up the tragedy you might be expecting from the genre. Violent clashes between man and nature, along with some more subtle clashes between men and women, provide a baseline of conflict that runs through many of the stories. The common setting (most of the stories are set in and about the Interlake Region of Manitoba) ties them all together and lets your imagination get comfortable.

God is Not a Fish Inspector sets the hook early in the story that provides the collection with its title, a tale of an elderly fisherman who continues to fish illegally long after he's retired, refusing to give up this important piece of his identity. He sneaks out early every morning and takes great pleasure in outwitting the local fisheries officers, much to the consternation of his religious daughter.

“Granite Point” and “In Manitoba” both tell of young women longing to escape relationships with men who are often more concerned with their success than their humanity, while painting a revealing and unpleasant picture of the racism poisoning their communities. As with many of Valgardson's stories, these tales touch on the drive for gain resulting in loss of a greater sort, both on a personal level and in a broader sense of communal success.

Romance takes centre stage in “A Private Comedy” and “A Business Relationship,” albeit not in traditional sense. Love can of course take many forms, running the gamut from destructive to redemptive, and Valgardson considers many of these forms throughout this short story collection.

To call God is Not a Fish Inspector a nostalgic read seems obvious at this point in time—published in 1975, the book is nearly 50 years old—but it doesn't feel inaccurate; this collection encapsulates so much of what Canadian literature used to be that it feels like more than just an example of its era, but instead truly representative of it. 

Book Review: The Warriors by Sol Yurick

By Dahl Botterill

content warning: youth violence, sexual violence, rape

Sol Yurick's The Warriors is not a complex book, but it is at times a difficult read. A modern retelling of Xenophon's Anabasis, the novel follows members of a youth gang called the Dominators making their way across New York City. They make this journey twice. The first time is under the watchful eye of their leader, Papa Arnold, as they journey to an all-gang Grand Assembly at Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx. This trek occurs under truce, as each gang sends representatives to the Assembly. When the Grand Assembly devolves into chaos and violence, the boys are forced to undertake the return journey to Coney Island without their leader, through traditionally hostile territory with no expectation that any truce will still be respected.

The titular warriors are not good people. They are violent, aggressive individuals obsessed with maintaining reputations based on strength, sexuality, and a lack of any real empathy. They are also children. The oldest is still a minor merely approaching adulthood, and the youngest carries a comic book around with him that he loves because the illustrations mean that he can enjoy the book despite the fact he hasn't yet learned to read. This is part of what makes it a difficult read. All of these characters are boys that have been forced to 'grow up' too quickly, and 'growing up' in their environment is a largely negative development. They don't really mature as humans so much as they calcify into toxic men. Their lives are hard, and these kids survive and belong by devoting themselves to each other, but they bond through activities like assault, murder, and rape. The Warriors is a good book and an eye-opening experience, but it can be a very rough read sometimes, and will definitely not be for everybody.

First published in 1965, The Warriors was no doubt just as, if not more so, shocking for readers at the time, but I found it a particularly interesting read in an era that's put a name to toxic masculinity and similar concepts. The Dominators is a youth gang filled with boys masquerading as men, but the 'masculine' traits they've focused their attention on are a motley amalgam of comic and tragic. Being able to urinate the furthest is as much a badge of honour as being the strongest fighter or the most stoic and unfeeling. At one point, they challenge each other to stick their heads out the subway window to determine "the Man With The Most Heart"; the winner—and most manly—is the one who gets their head so close to the tunnel walls that his short hair is scraped, broken, and tinged gray by the walls.

The Warriors isn't all cruelty and mayhem. While much of the book focuses on the Dominators' actions, it occasionally provides glimpses into how one of the boys, Hinton, feels about everything he's involved in. He's conflicted at times, often uncomfortable, but he also doesn't really see any other options open to him. These are the people that have given him a place to belong, and whether it's a great place to be or not, it's what he's got. He is a child with little hope, and only one path that's openly visible to him. As much as the book tells a tale of violence and the pursuit of reputation, The Warriors is also a terribly sad book. 

In Conversation with Terry Fallis author of Operation Angus

With Dahl Botterill

Photo by Tim Fallis

The High Road was released over a decade ago, and you've written a number of successful novels during the years between; what brought you back to Daniel and Angus? Is this something that's been brewing the entire time? How did the years apart influence or help the story?

When I finished The High Road, I never really had any intention of returning to Angus and Daniel again. I wanted to see if I could write something other than political satire. So over the next eleven years, I wrote five more novels, all different and none about politics. But a funny thing happened during those eleven years. At every reading and talk I would give, someone would always ask, (and I do mean always) When is Angus coming back? It’s humbling and gratifying to create characters that seemed to have struck a chord with so many Canadians. So I finally said to myself, “Why am I fighting this?” So Angus is back by popular demand. I wondered if after eleven years I still knew the characters. But I soon learned as I started to map out the new story that they had been in my head and heart the whole time, just waiting to return for another adventure. It was like pulling on a favourite sweater again. But I decided not to make it a purely political satire like the first two. Rather, I wanted to attempt to write a comic thriller of sorts, where the high stakes and danger of a thriller come together with humour. I’m still not sure if I’ve succeeded in treading that fine line, so I’ll leave that to the readers to decide.

Daniel and Angus were first introduced to the world in your debut novel The Best Laid Plans, and in some ways you were, too. How does it feel coming back to the characters that gave you your start and why do these specific characters stay with you? 

While I was nervous before I started, I need not have been. It really did feel wonderful to be immersed again in the world of Angus, Daniel, and the rest of the crew. I think I’m fond of the these characters for the same reason so many readers are. Angus is one of a kind. His principles, his honesty, his ethics, his curiosity, his commitment and his kindness come together in a way that just makes people like him and want to support him. And Daniel is just a good guy, trying to do the right thing, while keeping Angus out of trouble. They are both people you wouldn’t mind having at your side in moments of high drama. I also think Angus represents the kind of politician many Canadians want to elect. 

Was it at all difficult to revisit Angus McLintock's Ottawa? Were there any unexpected challenges in returning to this setting? Conversely, were there any aspects that you expected to be difficult but discovered to be surprisingly easy or comfortable?

Ottawa hasn’t really changed that much and the new novel opens just a few weeks after The High Road ends. But adding the assassination plot as the story driver did make the novel feel a little different to write, because I was having to adapt to a faster pacing and more action packed scenes than in the previous two novels. Balancing the humour with the action was a little tricky, too. But I was immediately comfortable writing Angus, Daniel, and the other familiar characters again.

Operation Angus has a very Canadian feel to it, but at the same time there's something unexpected and amusing about the juxtaposition of Canadian politics and a classic spy tale. What process brought you - and Daniel and Angus, of course - to the genre? 

I always try to challenge myself as a writer to do something at least a little different in each novel that I haven’t done before. In this novel, it was the idea of writing a comic thriller or spy story. While I’ve read and enjoyed lots of thrillers, I’d never written one, let alone a funny thriller. So it was a way to return to these wonderful characters, but with a fresh story that thrust them into a different world and challenged them in many new ways.

You've spoken in the past about how a confluence of enormous luck and fortuitous small details affected your journey from writing The Best Laid Plans to becoming a published author of multiple books. Does your literary success play much of a role in your writing such as your process, themes, concepts, or overall experience or are you able to pack away those thoughts and enjoy the simple pleasure of writing?

I still have difficulty believing that I actually now have eight novels under my belt! I’m always accompanied on the journey by self-doubt and I like it that way. I want to be the same writer who sat down 15 years ago to write The Best Laid Plans without knowing I could do it. So I have no difficulty pushing away thoughts of literary success because I always doubt that it will happen. I’m still writing in the same room in our house as I was on my first novel, so it all feels just the same. And that works well for me, I think.

Can you tell us a bit about what project you’re working on next?

Without giving too much away, I’m working on a funny novel that looks at aging, male friendship, grief and recovery, and family, with a little bit of music thrown in for good measure. The novel will be set in Toronto and Paris. The challenge I set for myself in this novel is to write a narrator who is my own age, 62. All of my narrators to date have been younger than I am, likely because I still feel like I’m locked in amber at about 35 years old! 

What advice would you give to aspiring authors who are trying to navigate the publishing world?

I would tell them not to worry about the publishing side until they’ve written, edited, and polished, the very best manuscript they possibly can. Put all of themselves into the writing. That’s what’s important. When they get to the publishing part of the equation, they should pack a lot of patience and perseverance. They’re likely to need it. But it’s the writing that really counts.

What is your “must-read” book recommendation and what book has had the most impact and influence on your writing?

It’s hard to pick just one, so let me suggest that for my “must-read” pick, I’d go with A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles. I really loved this story and the main character. I chose it for our book club and it ended up being our highest-rated book of the year. 

As for the book that had the most impact on my writing, I would say John Irving’s A Prayer for Owen Meany. You may not know that John Irving is my mentor. Don’t worry, John Irving doesn’t know either. But I have learned so much from reading Irving’s novels, particularly his skill at juxtaposing humour and pathos.

Book Review: Operation Angus by Terry Fallis

By Dahl Botterill

Operation Angus is my first Terry Fallis book. I've never read his work, so I was a little hesitant about diving into an established series. The novel primarily follows Angus McLintock, recently re-elected Member of Parliament for Cumberland-Prescott, and Daniel Addison, his Chief of Staff, as they prepare for a brief post-G8 meeting between the Canadian prime minister and the Russian president. While in London to discuss the plans for said event, they are contacted by a clandestine agent looking to recruit their help investigating a potential assassination plot. Unfortunately, partly as a result of events outlined in previous books, they don't have many friends among the branches of government they most need help from. So, our unlikely heroes are obligated to go it alone, investigating with the help of Daniel's partner Lindsay, her grandmother Muriel, and Muriel's friend Vivian, a former CSIS official living at the Riverfront Seniors' Residence with Muriel. 

My concerns about stepping into a series already underway were unnecessary. Fallis does a great job at providing just enough information at pertinent moments that I felt neither lost nor bogged down by excessive retelling. Finding a balance between enough and too much can be tricky sometimes, but I had no issues with Operation Angus. The characters aren't tremendously complex, which made stepping into the already-established world of said characters as a novice much easier. This simplicity could be an issue in a meatier book, but Operation Angus is a fairly light romp at heart, so it works. The author's prose is comfortable and easy to read, the story was fun and often amusing, and the sizeable cast of characters was enjoyable and easy to keep track of. 

The book also strikes some profoundly Canadian chords and contradictions, from the very particular nature of the politics to the gentle nature of some of the roadblocks faced by Angus and Daniel. Their enemies, political and otherwise, undermine their efforts without stooping to full-blown impropriety, guided by but never driven by personal vendettas. The Ottawa they inhabit includes both beautiful locations and unfortunate building projects, often in close proximity to one another. Even our heroes find themselves walking a fine line between their motives and responsibilities.

With all this said, Operation Angus won't be for everybody. Readers generally drawn to heavier fare may find themselves a little underwhelmed, but it certainly doesn't do anything wrong. For folks that enjoy a bit of Canadian humour with a playful attitude and a dash of politics, this might be just the ticket. 

Book Review: Motor Girl Omnibus by Terry Moore

By Dahl Botterill

"I don't need any help! Okay? I carry my own load! No one has to help me! I help them! I'm the strongest person in the room! That's how it works!"

Samantha Locklear lives and works in a junkyard in Nevada, pulling parts from old cars with only the company of a 600-pound gorilla named Mike. It's a reclusive life, and it suits her just fine, until late one night, a flying saucer crashes into the junkyard. She quietly helps the aliens get on their way, and the next day assumes it was all a dream until her tiny little world is suddenly filled with new faces trying to get in on the UFO game.

Sam Locklear is also a veteran with three tours behind her, having survived two bombings and ten months of torture as a prisoner of war. She suffers from debilitating headaches, hasn't contacted her family since returning home, and her best friend in the world exists entirely in her head. 

Terry Moore's Motor Girl layers comedy and drama over one another in a moving exploration of psychological trauma, focusing on Sam's intentionally small slice of the world and the way that slice is shaped and defined by the physical and emotional injuries she sustained as a Marine in Iraq. Sam is both incredibly strong and tragically broken, and each of these aspects sometimes gets in the way of the other. Her PTSD makes it difficult for her to help all the people she wants to, or even to stare reality full in the face, and her refusal to be anything but “the strongest person in the room” at all times prevents her from dealing effectively with her trauma. Moore's character work is on full display here, with everybody playing dual roles; most are developed both as individuals and as reflections of Samantha's own personality.

Terry Moore is probably most famous for Strangers in Paradise, and in Motor Girl, his cartoonist's sensibilities are on full display as he returns to a style of art that will feel particularly familiar to readers of that other work. It's a little rougher style than some of his more recent titles—he apparently returned to primarily using a brush for this title—and it fits the work perfectly. Moore's art is minimal without being simple, each line full of emotion and gravity, and it does a masterful job of tying the serious and silly aspects of the book together. Motor Girl is a great book that packs a huge amount into its relatively short length. It's an obvious recommendation for anybody that's already a fan of Moore's previous work and a great introduction to Moore's style and writing for anybody a bit overwhelmed at the idea of diving into one of his lengthier titles. 

Book Review: Leviathan Wakes by James S. A. Corey

By Dahl Botterill

Leviathan Wakes is set in a just distant enough future in which humanity has advanced technologically enough to have expanded into the solar system but no further, and without really solving a lot of the issues that plague us today. This juxtaposition of growth and stagnation results in a setting filled with new and exciting environments populated by characters and factions with easily recognizable motivations and flaws. It all manages to feel familiar despite being full of spaceships, railguns, and alien bioweapons. 

The author—James S.A. Corey is a pseudonym for Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck writing together, but for simplicity, I'll refer to them in the singular—also does a great job of using actual science without drowning the story in it. The extra effort lends the story some extra credibility without ever slowing it down. 

Leviathan Wakes is written in the third person but plays with this perspective a little, shifting its focus back and forth between two characters in alternating chapters throughout, bookended with a prologue and epilogue that focus on different characters entirely. The first of our two primary characters is Miller, a past-his-prime detective working on Ceres station when he's assigned a missing persons “kidnap job.” His focus on this task becomes obsessive and drags him all over the solar system, where he eventually crosses paths with James Holden. Holden is the book's other focal character, who's in a relatively dead-end job as the executive officer on an ice-running ship when a nearby distress beacon turns his life, along with the lives of a few crew members, upside down. The story starts small but grows quickly and inexorably from a bit of mystery and intrigue to a potential interplanetary war between Earth, Mars, and the fledgling Outer Planets Alliance. 

The growth of the story showcases a real strength of Corey's—Leviathan Wakes is brilliantly paced. It starts out interesting and manages to maintain its momentum throughout its considerable length. It isn't always shootouts and chases, but it's always drawing the reader forward, whether through direct action, political intrigue, or just fascinating science fiction. As the first book in an ongoing series, this is a good sign, and the success of both The Expanse as a book series and the television show based on it seems a good indication that James S.A. Corey manages to keep that pace up over time. I'm certainly looking forward to reading more. 

Book Review: Finder: Chase the Lady by Carla Speed McNeil

By Dahl Botterill

Finder: Chase the Lady is the newest book in Carla Speed McNeil's Finder series of graphic novels. The story follows Rachel Grosvenor as she tries to turn her social victories from Voice into something meaningful—or at the very least useful. As a newly titled member of the Llaverac clan, she finds herself overwhelmed by responsibilities and expectations and is desperately trying to find a balance between what she needs and what everybody around her wants. Rachel is trapped between the social demands of her clan, the material sponsorships she's dependent upon, and the spiritual needs of those around her. Like the previous volume Third World, this book is in colour, which, while not strictly necessary, can provide some additional visual cues in a story set largely in a social bubble filled with nearly identical individuals.

Finder is often a particularly dense work of art. The world it paints is not simply expansive but also very full. From the very first Finder book, there is an expectation of an engaged readership that's seeking something special and ready to do their part. Every page thick with characters, plot, and promise, the immersive quality of these books stems in part from the painstaking care Carla Speed McNeil puts into her world. The detail doesn't cease at the borders of each particular tale but extends far beyond the setting in question.  

There is also a distinct lack of extraneous explanation, as the reader experiences the world of Finder as though they've been dropped into it, piecing the larger picture together as the story progresses. This is one of the things I love about Finder. McNeil trusts her readers to keep up as best they can and fully utilizes the comic format to provide just enough context to place the action in the larger setting. She also provides extensive notes that can be alternately helpful and fascinating, but they are best saved for future reads, as the rush and flow of the format drive the experience alongside the plot.

This technique has the potential to alienate a new reader to some degree, and as the eleventh volume of an ongoing series, Chase the Lady is at a bit of a disadvantage in this respect. Finder has followed a variety of interrelated characters and told many distinct stories over the years.  While Chase the Lady primarily follows just one of those and certainly stands as a story that can be enjoyed independently, there is a lot more here for somebody already versed in the setting. Somebody who's already familiar with Rachel Grosvenor and those around her, or even the world she inhabits with its clans and titles and expectations, will certainly find the book an easier fit. 

Finder is easily one of my favourite series. Chase the Lady is a fantastic entry, beautiful to behold, filled with incredible ideas and well-considered explorations. It may not be the easiest entry point for new readers, but it is a magnificent work of art and a pleasure to experience. 

Book Review: The Girl With All the Gifts by M.R. Carey

By Dahl Botterill

Years ago, the first time I saw The Girl With All the Gifts sitting on a shelf, I noted Carey's name on the cover and thought it seemed interesting that there was another Carey out there writing. That it should be the same writer that I knew from the pages of Hellblazer and Lucifer didn't occur to me at all. Maybe I'd have read it much sooner had I known. Regardless, I'm certainly glad to have done so now.

The Girl With All the Gifts opens slowly and carefully, first introducing a young girl named Melanie and her teacher Miss Justineau. Melanie's entire life consists of a cell, a corridor, a classroom, and a shower room that she sees once a week. She lives alone in the cell, attends classes with other children in the classroom, and uses the corridor to travel between the two, strapped into a wheelchair and under armed guard. Melanie has a few teachers, but only Miss Justineau matters to her. Miss Justineau is kind, thoughtful, and—though Melanie perhaps doesn't initially realize this for what it is—sometimes sees the children as children. This is notable because, as we soon learn, the children are not merely children, but an anomalous type of monster that can think and feel when they're not desperately trying to eat people, and Melanie's world is a bunker in a military base, one of the few remaining strongholds of civilization in a world overrun by zombies.

Things soon fall apart, as things so often do in these stories, and Carey focuses for much of the story on a few individuals. The plot is not complicated, but that isn't really a problem, as the driving force behind The Girl With All the Gifts is in the characters. Melanie and her companions are pretty archetypal at first, but as they are each forced to compromise and develop during their journey, they grow into more realized individuals.

Miss Justineau never ceases to be a teacher, Caldwell will always be an obsessed scientist, and the soldiers are still soldiers, but as they explore the world that humanity has lost control over, they each become much more than their role. 

Melanie develops the most, of course, as she's experiencing almost every aspect of the world for the first time, but some of the most interesting aspects of her growth relate to her relationship with those around her and the power dynamics between them. She goes from being rendered almost powerless because of the way her potential power is feared, to gaining more autonomy, but also a different sort of power—more about what she is capable of as a person than her potential for violence as a monster.

M. R. Carey's The Girl With All the Gifts is a great read, slipping from horrifying to human and back again, reveling in the struggle to find hope at the end of the world.

Book Review: Generation A by Douglas Coupland

Dahl Botterill

Douglas Coupland is perhaps best known for his ability to tap into the most immediate and relevant aspects of the interplay between media and technology and capture how that interaction affects people. That ability is certainly on display in Generation A, a novel that wears its literary debts and connections on its sleeve while also attempting to tread some new ground. The story follows five individuals living all over a world without bees when, one by one, they each find themselves on the receiving end of a bee sting.

Governments and international organizations come down like a hammer, of course, and each of the protagonists finds themselves under careful study while deprived of any sort of sensory input or experience. When they are released back into the world, they discover that they've become the most famous people on the planet. Each handles this fame differently, but eventually, their shared experiences draw them all to a remote Canadian archipelago, where together they try to determine what exactly it is that they've all got in common.

There's a distinct narrative shift that occurs partway through Generation A, at which point, a story about five individuals coming together becomes five individuals telling stories collectively. The degree to which it works will probably depend on the reader. Plots and sub-plots begin to morph into one another as they fade into the background, and the characters one has invested in thus far divest their centrality to some degree as their own personal fictions take centre stage. It's interesting, and it works insofar as they're all really telling the same story Coupland has been telling all along—but it probably won't be for everybody.

Generation A is a good book. It's interesting, clever, and Douglas Coupland's writing is as enjoyable to read as ever. The novel is full of fun moments, cutting observations, and plenty of references and retrospections for the casual or committed reader. The author plays with storytelling and narrative in interesting ways and perhaps even generates some effective commentary on the interplay between desire and responsibility. But is it a great book? Probably not. If you're a fan of Douglas Coupland's writing and haven't read Generation A, you'll very likely find lots to enjoy here. If you've never read him before, there are better places to start.

Book Review: The Fifth Head of Cerberus by Gene Wolfe

By Dahl Botterill

It can be difficult to describe Gene Wolfe’s writing to the unfamiliar. It is clever, well-wrought, literary fiction that drips with countless fascinating ideas. There is a fullness to it that refuses to vacate your thoughts when you think you’ve finished with it. It is very much speculative fiction while also completely unlike what one might expect from such a simple description. As you make your way through a Gene Wolfe work, you’ll usually find yourself reading many stories—each character, each perspective, will carry a gravity of its own—but you’ll also be aware of all the stories you’re not being told directly. Wolfe has a way of making even the stories he’s not sharing utterly enthralling. This talent is on particular display in The Fifth Head of Cerberus, a collection of three increasingly related novellas that never cease playing with their own interconnectedness.

The first of these stories, sharing the collection’s title, introduces the reader to the twin worlds of Saint Anne and Saint Croix while focusing on the latter, and particularly on a science-obsessed young man growing up in his father’s brothel. This young man—while there are clues dropped as to his proper name, he is only ever directly referred to as Number Five—narrates the tale from a future time and place, looking back on his youth. The tale is told in a manner that assumes some common ground with the reader, and so his world is described in bits and pieces as details become pertinent to the tale being told. It starts on what feels like familiar ground, and it is only by putting those details together that one gradually realizes what Saint Croix and its culture look like. By this point, the reader feels a part of it, discovering the culture’s joys and horrors from within instead of having a basic description doled out at the beginning. 

The second story is very different in its structure. “A Story,” by John V. Marsch is perhaps more traditionally told but from an entirely different perspective in a pre-colonized Saint Anne. Its title provides some connection to the previous tale, but it feels more mythological, following the journey of two twins separated at birth and raised in rival communities as fate brings them violently back together just before the arrival of Terran colonizers. The Annese have only been mentioned briefly during the first story, so this new focus seems only tangentially connected (its named author is an anthropologist met by the previous novella’s narrator, Number Five), but it provides some intriguing insight while laying many threads and breadcrumbs that will be picked up later by the reader of V.R.T.

V.R.T. is the final tale Wolfe weaves in this book, and it appears much less organized than its predecessors. Woven achronologically from a multitude of documents and perspectives, and filled with both subtle and dramatic narrative shifts, this is the story that reveals the depth and breadth of the interrelationships found within The Fifth Head of Cerberus and its three novellas. Aspects of earlier stories that seemed inconsequential come into their own when viewed in a new context, and revelations abound. Each of these stories could stand alone if necessary, but the whole is truly greater than the parts themselves. 

The most interesting part of all, and the aspect that strikes me as most particular to Gene Wolfe’s writing, is that even when all three stories have concluded, there is a sense of so much more that may have been missed. The reader is trusted to do the heavy lifting, and so all three tales are filled with tiny clues and subtle misdirection that could be easily missed. Different readers may very well pick up on completely different connections and thus come away with varied impressions and conclusions. The result is a book that stays in your head after you’ve finished it, continues to be considered and picked away at in the back reaches of your mind, wondering what you might have missed your first time around and what you might discover if you approached it again. While it is indeed a few smartly written slices of speculative fiction brimming with strange ideas and concepts, The Fifth Head of Cerberus is also a clever bit of mystery that plays its cards so close you may not realize what you’re unravelling until you’re mulling it over afterwards. 

Book Review: Empire of Wild by Cherie Dimaline

by Dahl Botterill

History and monsters share the opening prologue of Cherie Dimaline's novel Empire of Wild. The history is one of displacement and community, while the monsters are both fantastic and all too real. 

Arcand is a small community made up of Métis families. Their ancestors were forcibly moved from Drummond Island to Georgian Bay in the early 1800s, only to be displaced again when their shorelines drew the eyes of developers. Cottages and vacation homes eventually pushed most of the Métis from the water up a dirt road into what would become Arcand. The roads and land thereabouts are home not only to the Metis and the local wildlife but also to the Rogarou, the werewolf and warning that remains long after so much else had been taken, hunting those that would betray or steal or hurt.

After this brief lesson, the book introduces Joan Beausoliel. Joan is grief-stricken and desperate in her eleventh month of searching for her missing husband. Victor was the love of her life, the person who fit her like nobody else could, but he disappeared after a disagreement over selling her family land to a developer. When no sign of him was found, the town and community gave up on looking for him, but Joan hasn't. Her life has become consumed by her search for Victor and by her attempts to fill the very empty space when she isn't searching. Joan is a mess when she stumbles into a revival tent in the local Walmart parking lot and finds herself face to face with a barely recognizable Victor that doesn't know her at all.

So begins the story of Joan's desperate efforts to save a man that doesn't know her from a threat that nobody can see, and it grows into a more interesting tale than I expected at first glance. I picked up Empire of Wild because I enjoyed The Marrow Thieves, but the brief synopsis left me expecting something a little more pedestrian, something that played it a little safer. I was very pleasantly surprised to discover otherwise.

Cherie Dimaline weaves history, culture, and werewolves into a thrilling novel of love, loss, and neocolonialism. The past and present are bound together by both the family members surrounding Joan and the dangers surrounding Arcand. All these interrelationships are described using words and sentences appropriate to the story. The writing sometimes flows extensively; other times, it's sparse, but it always fits the tale being told. Dimaline doesn't waste space with the unnecessary, and Empire of Wild is all the more beautiful a book for her discernment.

In Conversation with Michael Christie author of Greenwood

With Dahl Botterill

Photo by Cedar Bowers

Your previous books gave you ample opportunity to draw from personal experience but you've mentioned that Greenwood required a great deal more research. Were there any aspects of Greenwood's characters or plot that required a little less research? Any small opportunities to breathe your own tastes and experiences into the novel?

There are always these opportunities, in fact I doubt I could write about anything that I didn’t have at least some experience with. Often, I’ll do something in my normal, non-writing life, fully believing there will be no crossover between the two, until I eventually discover myself writing about it a few years later. This was the case for building our little house on Galiano Island, which I undertook mainly because I’m cheap and didn’t want to pay anyone to build it for us! But it was an experience that eventually informed the carpentry sections of Greenwood, and my general interest in wood and the lumber industry as well. But I feel a kinship with all the characters I’ve created, even those who have lived much different lives than I have. This is the wondrousness of fiction. To recognize our deepest selves in characters made of words.

Greenwood's story is multi-generational but it also presents very different attitudes and lives among those generations. Not only does each character have a very different personality but each also relates very differently to the trees that are so central to the novel. Was the breadth of these differences something that grew out of the story, or did the characters and their attitudes come first with the story being shaped by your cast?

You know I’m not really sure? I’m just awful at keeping a mental record of what idea develops in what order during a novel’s genesis. Because it’s often the case that the best ideas feel like they’ve always been so, and they rewrite those ideas that existed before them. My writing process is like a big, messy smorgasbord crossed with a riot, an event that the writing is an attempt to make some sense of and clean up. But with Greenwood, I guess there was no chance that I wouldn’t write about the vast differences among the personalities and ideologies of generations. Family members all aligned in their thinking make for a dull story! (And I doubt they actually exist. I mean, I’ve never met a family like that, have you?) But in the end, the many ways the various Greenwoods see trees compose almost a kind of history of environmental thinking in North America (in white, settler-colonial culture specifically, because indigenous people were obviously much more advanced in their ideas of ecology and stewardship.) From mere survival to wanton extraction to guilty appreciation to careful preservation to a kind of appreciative symbiosis. Hopefully we will be able make that last evolution.

Among such a wealth of characters are there any that you particularly identify with yourself either in the way they relate to trees and the world around them or just in some aspect of their personality?

As I mentioned, I identify with some aspect of all the characters in this book. I admire Everett’s resilience, Harris’s drive, Lomax’s doggedness, Temple’s pragmatism, Liam’s commitment to his work, Willow’s idealism, and Jake’s understanding of our interconnectedness with the natural world. Whether I actually have any of these qualities in any abundance is debatable! But I admire them all the same. In my mind, a writer doesn’t have any business creating a character with whom they do not identify, at least partially. The alternative makes for lifeless, inhumane fiction, which is something I would rather not write, or read. 

Your previous novel (If I Fall, If I Die) was set in your hometown of Thunder Bay and it resulted in a setting that felt not only very lived in but also very familiar - flaws and all - to the people that live there. Greenwood takes place in many locations but the various settings still feel very comfortable. Could you tell us a little about your process for developing the novel's settings?

The settings all originated organically from the story. But early on, I loved the idea of Everett taking a train trip with the baby, so it was fun to follow them all the way across Canada. And I suppose it was a good way to capture the vastness and beauty of the continent in the writing as well, especially since it contrasts so starkly with the world we are creating, one stripped of all this vast beauty. Oh, and I must point out that there were two mentions of Thunder Bay in Greenwood! One in the future section, when Jake is describing all the places that have become popular destinations now that much of the US is uninhabitable. And the second when Everett is riding past Port Arthur and Fort William, and recalls the events of his childhood. In fact, I’m going to try to sneak some Thunder Bay content into everything I write from now on! It’s one of those little writerly delights, to insert a place into literature a place that always felt so un-literary when you were growing up there. It’s a weird kind of rebellion. 

While doing the research for Greenwood did you make any little discoveries that particularly grabbed you? Was there anything you learned that really held on and led you in a direction personally that perhaps the book didn't actually make use of as much?

So many discoveries! In fact, these discoveries are always the danger of research, which can become like the Island of the Lotus-eaters, where you’ll become stuck for a very long time, if you aren’t careful. But reading about the history of Canadian logging was deeply interesting to me, as well as the current science around the mechanisms of tree communication, which is just utterly fascinating, and still feels like the most exciting area of scientific discovery right now. I guess this was a theme of the book, that everything is extremely complicated when it is examined closely. And this complexity of all things can be impossibly beautiful when we take the time to honour and examine it. As for discarded research, I will admit that I did a bunch of research on stamp collection, for some reason, as well as the harvesting of all kinds of wild mushrooms. Both of which may come in handy someday, however, whether in my writing life or my personal life. So I won’t declare those as failures quite yet.

What are you currently working on? Is there another book set for publication from you soon that our readers can get excited about?

I’ve been doing lots of publicity type things, as well as working with some great folks on the limited series TV adaptation of Greenwood, which has been fun. And I have a draft of a new novel that’s currently kicking around on my computer. It’s about a different fictional island in BC, and it seems to be going okay. No clue when I’ll finish though. I’ve only realized recently that writing Greenwood took a great deal out of me, and along with the obvious pandemic-related lethargy, I’ve been going through a bit of a recharge phase. The older I get, the more I realize how important rest is to this process.

What advice would you give to aspiring authors on the craft of writing and for those who are trying to navigate the publishing world?

Here’s a smattering of advice: write about what’s most important to you; write without knowing the answer to the questions you’re asking, and make sure you don’t answer them by accident; write with generosity for your characters, but without mercy for the unnecessary words that will inevitably bog down your sentences. And most of all: write the kind of book you want to read. It’s a cliché, but it’s true.

What is your “must-read” book recommendation and what book has had the most impact and influence on your writing?

Housekeeping by Marilynn Robinson is my favorite book of all time. It captures ideas of home and nature and family and siblinghood and mental illness with such humanity and naked wisdom, I don’t think I’ll ever understand how she did it. To me it’s a perfect encapsulation of the great alchemy that is fiction. I read it every year, and I’m always left thinking: how could words—the same dull words that we see cascading past us on our screens every single day—possibly do this?