All reviews and commentary-related to my Canadiana Reading Challenge 2010 will be posted on the blog’s main feed, which you can subscribe to here. All of that content will also be archived on this page, along with a continually updated list of what I’ve read so far. For details on the challenge, read my original post here. I’ll also post links to what I’m currently reading below (and what I plan on reading next, subject to change based on my mood and my library hold list), so feel free to read along and discuss with me!
Authors and publishing houses: Want me to review your Canadian books? E-mail me at suzie.gardner@gmail.com to arrange to send me a copy!
Canadiana Reading Challenge 2010 list (links to reviews where applicable)
1. Lemon by Cordelia Strube
2. Topsy-Turvy Town by Luc Melanson
3. All My Friends are Superheroes by Andrew Kaufman (review to come)
4. Good to a Fault by Marina Endicott
5. Whale Music by Paul Quarrington
6. The Vinyl Princess by Yvonne Prinz
7. Important Artifacts and Personal Property from the Collection of Lenore Doolan and Harold Morris, Including Books, Street Fashion, and Jewelry by Leanne Shapton
8. What Boys Like and Other Stories by Amy Jones
9. Scott Pilgrim’s Finest Hour by Bryan Lee O’Malley
Scott Pilgrim’s Finest Hour by Bryan Lee O’Malley
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Although not my favourite book in this series, Scott Pilgrim’s Finest Hour was a pretty solid conclusion and was fairly emotionally satisfying. For me, the most interesting part of this series is the characters and the pop culture/Toronto references. A good chunk of this book delved too strongly into the sci-fi/comic world for my tastes, but it did pull itself back on track with wrapping up the emotional arcs of the characters at the end. The ending was, however, rather predictable and didn’t throw as many surprising punches as I would have liked, but alas. Still a really fun series as a whole that I’d love to read in close succession again one day.
View all my reviews >>
Tags:book·Canadian·Goodreads·graphic novel·review·Scott Pilgrim·Scott Pilgrim's Finest Hour
Lemon is the kind of book that punches you in the gut and rips your heart out simultaneously. In a good way. Yes, that is possible.
I didn’t really know what to expect when I started reading Lemon, my first foray into Cordelia Strube’s oeuvre, even though Lemon is her eighth novel. The plot seemed like one I’d read before, yet it intrigued me nonetheless: misfit teenage girl with the odds stacked against her attempts to get out of high school in one piece. But upon reading the first few chapters, I quickly realized that Lemon herself was a far more complex and interesting character than any plot summary could have explained to me. Lemon buries herself in classic literature while complaining about the weak women within these tales. Lemon spends her spare time volunteering at a local hospital and creating a strong sisterly relationship with a young girl with cancer. Lemon truly doesn’t want to fit into the oversexed, overviolenced world of adulthood and doesn’t understand why her peers are so desperate to age themselves. And when you see the world through Lemon’s eyes, you’ll wonder why you were once so anxious to grow up, too.
Strube does a fantastic job of writing in the voice of a teenage misfit as she deals with difficult issues ranging from gang violence, to rape, to cancer, to dysfunctional families. While a few scenes are undeniably disturbing and painful to witness, the opportunity Strube gives us to view our world through a fresh new lens makes this book an incredibly worthwhile read. Lemon will punch you in the gut and rip your heart out, and yet somehow, you’ll be a better person because of it.
Links:
Buy Lemon on Amazon.ca
Check out more reviews of Lemon on Goodreads
Tags:cordelia strube·lemon
Three days into my Canadiana Reading Challenge and my Goodreads account tells me that I already have 239 Canadian books to choose from in my to-read list. Wow! I’ll try to work my way through that list as best I can, and I’m always open to more suggestions of what else I should read!
Now, I wonder: How many of my Canadian to-read books are short story collections? I just read about The Short Story Reading Challenge run by Kate of Kate’s Book Blog and, being a lover of the genre, figure that I might as well add another challenge to my existing one! To help make the challenge accessible for all, Kate’s provided potential participants with a range of different options on how to complete the challenge, and I’m planning on going with options 3 & 4:
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Tags:reading challenges·short stories·The Short Story Reading Challenge
What's more Can Lit than moose bookends?
For the first time in a long, long time, I’m making a new year’s resolution. And due to my love of reading and writing (as well as due to having a wonderful blog which I never get around to updating), I’m going to roll those loves together into a resolution that will be entertaining, will be educational, and, perhaps most importantly, will be something I can actually stick to through ’til the end of 2010. So, without further ado, my reading challenge resolution for 2010:
Read Canadian.
Okay, so maybe that was a bit of a long lead up for a rather simple challenge. There is only one key rule to my reading challenge this year, and that is that all the books I personally choose to read* must be written by a Canadian or have significant Canadian content. From Canadian classics I’ve never gotten around to reading,** to small-press gems from indie presses across the country, I want to show my love for all things Canadian, as well as gain further knowledge of the diversity of our nation’s written works. I’m a patriotic girl and a book-loving girl, so I figure I might as well combine the two for good rather than evil, right?***
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Tags:read Canadian·rules·suggestions welcome
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