by Darin Kennedy There are quite a few songs that spoke to me on a deep, visceral level, but never quite to the extent that music spoke to Darin Kennedy, who wrote a book as a result. And, I definitely can’t compete with Anthony Faircloth in Kennedy’s story, The Mussorgsky Riddle. I mean, he set…
Read more
by Rich Terfry When I first heard that Terfry would be publishing his memoir about half a year ago, I could hardly contain my excitement. I love his music, and it was always a joy to read his numerous stories he shared on Facebook ––some of which appear to have made their way into Wicked…
Read more
by Patrick deWitt Some books don’t really live up to the hype surrounding them. The two that spring to mind here are The Alchemist and Good Omens, both of which were repeatedly recommended to me and seemingly universally praised, but I thought were just okay, at best. With multiple awards won, being in the finals…
Read more
by John Green I have a bad habit of occasionally reading stories in a way that I suspect the author would hate. In the case of The Fault in Our Stars, it started when I gave Hazel, the protagonist, an Essex accent and continued when Augustus, her love interest, became a young Brad Pitt. (Young,…
Read more
by Tracey Lindberg I occasionally struggle getting into a story. In the case of Trainspotting and A Clockwork Orange, it had to do with the unfamiliar dialects. (Trainspotting improved once I was able hear the Scottish accent in my mind, whereas the great writing in A Clockwork Orange made the meanings of the made-up slang…
Read more
by Robert A. Heinlein A smarter man than I once said that, while it is perfectly reasonable to dismiss a book due to its terrible beginning, a strong start doesn’t preclude a terrible transformation. (The original quote actually dealt with videogames, but it fits Starship Troopers so well that I couldn’t help myself here.) The…
Read more
by Heather O’Neill A short story collection is an interesting outlet for an author to experiment with her craft. Given that the sequestered narratives have so little time to show and tell, it gives an author ample leeway to branch out to different styles and dramas. Even if a tale sort of falls flat––and, many…
Read more
by Steven Brust If, when reading, I catch a lot of errors in editing, it really takes me out of the story. I can get back to it, but it completely ruins my concentration when I see that someone happens to be eating “Eastern-style desert (sic) pancakes”––you know, the ones you eat after dinner––or talking…
Read more
by Steven Brust Sometimes a sequel comes across favourably when compared to the original. Yendi is most definitely a case of this, improving on what made Jhereg good, while learning from––and fixing many of––the problems of the original, while trying some new things in the process. I’m going to be comparing the two quite a…
Read more
by Jane Urquhart It feels like quite some time since a book came along and both delighted me and terrified me through its superb writing, making me glad that high art still exists in contemporary Canadian literature, though worried that I’m nowhere near creating anything comparable in quality. It should go without saying, then––but I’ll…
Read more