What I've Been Reading & Buying

My goodness! It's mid-March already. CanadaReads has come and mostly gone for 2011. After my dismay with the process this year, I decided to explore more of the 'alternative' Canadian book lists.

Among my wanderings on-line, I found a mention of a review article, "Criminous Minds: A new wave of crime writers are exploring the darkest corners of Canadian society" by Richard Poplak, in the March 2011 issue of The Walrus (now on-line). I bought the magazine and read this. Most of the books he mentions I've read, but not Breaking Lorca by Giles Blunt. I knew I'd looked at it, but since it was clearly not a 'mystery', I'd passed it up. Since I happened to be at Vancouver Public Library (VPL) in downtown Vancouver the next day, and a copy happened to be on the shelf, I took it home to read. This should teach me not to pay too much attention to descriptions (and genres). This is a haunting novel - and even a psychological mystery. I've been thinking about some of its characters ever since.

I recommend Poplak's article if you are interested in learning more about Canadian 'mystery' authors. You might also keep an eye on the Crime Writers of Canada website and on the Mystery Maven Canada blog too. The Mystery Maven is Linda Wike, former owner of Ottawa's Prime Crime Mystery Books and now a mystery author herself.

Among the other mysteries I picked up at VPL was Urn Burial, another quirky, and often outrageous, 1920s Phryne Fisher mystery novel by Kerry Greenwood set in Australia. Yes, the urns were cremation urns! And such great quotes were included - at least from a genealogist's point of view.

Another book I've just finished from VPL was Witches' Rings by Kerstin Ekman (translated from Swedish by Linda Schenck). Ekman is now probably best known here in Canada as the author of Blackwater, a mystery, but Witches' Rings is the first of four novels about Swedish life, mainly from the point of view of women, from the 1870s on. Grand read! I can't wait to read the rest, but since I don't read Swedish, I must read the English versions. And VPL seems only to have one more - at least it's the second book. I'll haunt Abebooks.com for the others. Thank you to the VPL librarian who set Witches Rings out on the Main Floor display shelves recently.

And on another genres altogether:

On one of my forays this month into a 'big box' store, I noticed a recommendation by a staff member for Canadian author Elizabeth Smart's By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept, first published in 1945, which I read in the '60s. I was, I must admit, somewhat amazed to see it on
the shelf again. Ah, unbridled love, could we live without it at least once? Couldn't stop smiling!

What did I buy that day though? Elizabeth Moon's Oath of Fealty, now in paperback. We've waited what, 20 years?, for this. (If you're new to her writing, be sure to read The Deed of Paksenarrion, a trilogy, first.)

And the other day? All on sale - I Want Candy by Kim Wong Keltner, The Underside of Stones by George Szanto (I've already read his novel, The Condesa of M.) and Cory Doctorow's Makers. More about those another time.