IONA WHISHAW

Whishaw, Iona. LETHAL LESSON, A SORROWFUL SANCTUARY, and A DECEPTIVE DEVOTION. 

One great tip from a book club reader. I read the first volume of this series, A KILLER IN KING'S COVE, set near Nelson, BC, a couple of months ago. Lane Winslow is a retired British spy trying to recover from her work during WW II and the demise of a deceitful relationship by emigrating to Canada. She buys an old house across the lake from Nelson in 1946 and attempts to settle in amidst an array of wacky neighbours, one family of American immigrants, the rest mostly British, some who emigrated pre- or post-WW I. 

After an early wrongful arrest, Lane develops a relationship with local police inspector, Frederick Darling, and his #2 man, Ames.

In LETHAL LESSON, the plot stems from an unsolved hit and run, the disappearance of the local teacher, and Lane's few weeks covering the school until the new term and a new teacher can arrive.

In A SORROWFUL SANCTUARY, a missing local man's case crosses with the murder of a John Doe who is finally identified as a former refugee attempting to escape from the Nazis and recently disturbed at what he sees as the rise of Naziism in BC. 

In A DECEPTIVE DEVOTION, Lane harbours an old Russian lady looking for a lost brother whose arrival overlaps with the mysterious murder of a hunter. Lane's old handlers in England come back into play as does the "Commie scare" and the hunting of Soviet spies in Canada.

How I love this series. #1 It is Canadian. #2 It is set in BC. #3 It includes people very like my own grandmother who emigrated to Canada, settled in Kaslo just up the lake from Nelson, in 1912. #4 Lane's telephone, a crank, a horn-shaped speaker on the wall, an earpiece shaped like a Christmas bell ornament, is identical to the one on my grandmother's ranch in Kettle Valley which I knew from the age of 3. #5  Lane is a determinedly independent woman who struggles with the gender expectations of her era. For example, having been raised with servants, she has never learned to cook. #6 Darling is as enlightened as one could hope for for the times but mostly because he has an inkling what work Lane survived during the war. 

MONSTERS

Robertson, David A. MONSTERS. Highwater, 2018.

Five years ago I read the first of this Reckoner Trilogy series, STRANGERS. I'm watching for the third and final. 

I've also read Robertson's graphic novel, BETTY: The Helen Betty Osborne Story, and his children's book, WHEN WE WERE ALONE.

I know Robertson is a great writer and an interesting man. Also, that his father was from Norway House and head of BUNTEP, the Brandon University Northern Teacher Education? Program, established in the 1970s to train local people to teach in reserve schools. An especially successful program. Thus, my main interest in Robertson's work is because it is often set in Norway House, or on a reserve very like Norway House, with character names using many local family names. Such a bonus for students in the north looking in vain to see themselves and their neighbours represented.

In this YA novel, MONSTERS, the protagonist, Cole Harper, has returned from 
"exile" in Winnipeg to the reserve to find out details about his father's mysterious death. Cole suffers from anxiety and takes medication for it. Reading about his anxiety created feelings of anxiety in me. Convincing. Characters include best friends Brady and Eva, Eva's boyfriend Michael, and Cole's new possible, Pam. A main character is the all-powerful imaginary Choch who sometimes manifests as a basketball coach, and Jayne, a dead girl. The bad guys are local politicians and unscrupulous corporations performing unauthorized experiments on the residents of the Wounded Sky Reserve.

So, there's fantasy and a bit, a fair bit of horror, along with more familiar themes of an outsider trying to connect, an adolescent trying to hook up, and a natural northern setting which is perceived as both nurturing and threatening. 

EMBERS: One Ojibway's MEDITATIONS

 Wagamese, Richard. EMBERS: One Ojibway's Meditations. Douglas and McIntyre, 2016. 

This is a  meditation, a compilation of Wagamese's Instagram post, published posthumously. 

During my recent move, March, 2026, I culled one half of my library and since then I've been haunted by only a handful of titles that I have missed and will attempt to replace. EMBERS was the first, although I do believe that I may have given my original copy to a beloved friend. The next to look for, perhaps at the Rotary book sale, is a coffee-table book about the construction of the great cathedrals of Europe. This may be more difficult to replace.

I Dared to Dream

Nozamani, Ghazaleh. I Dared to Dream. 2026. 

I loved this book and learned a great deal about how women struggle in other parts of the world. In this case, Iran. I wrote about it in my Substack One Lonely Writer, "Hold Fast to Your Dreams". 

THE HEART OF THE ANCIENT WOOD

Charles G.D. Roberts. THE HEART OF THE ANCIENT WOOD. Reprint, Formac, 2007. First published 1900. Another of the bundle from the Bookman sale bin. Chosen because I recognized the writer as a famous Victorian era Canadian poet and because the setting of this novel is in the woods of New Brunswick where my maternal relatives moved from--to Red River in 1869 and then to BC in 1891, after the railroad put an end to their shipping business. 

Written more than 125 years ago yet many themes are still relevant. The mother's wish to escape the hurtful gossip in the settlements. The fey child, talking to, living with the wild creatures. The dangers of vegetarianism. The conflict between hunter and environmentalist/conservationist. The emotional disruptions of adolescence. How out of tragedy some good can come. I really want to believe that the animals, with enough time, can become attuned to which humans are likely to harm them. There is a fair bit of ascribing human emotions to wild creatures. But I'm glad I read it.

THIS HUMAN DAY

 David Helwig. THIS HUMAN DAY. Oberon, 2000.

Poems, many nature-observant, learning a new home, PEI i believe. And others about Montreal. Bought this in a bundle from the Bookman sale bin because I once had coffee with the late Kingston writer, set up by a mutual friend, formerly one of his KP students. We did not hit it off. 

COEXISTENCE

Billy-Ray Belcourt. COEXISTENCE. Penguin, 2024.

A short story collection by a writer passionately defended for his novel A Minor Chorus on CBC Canada Reads in April. Will read that when I can get a copy. (Will also read the winner, A Cure for Drowning, by a local writer.)

I seldom read short story collections. I am not sure why. I did enjoy this one. Why? As the title suggests, glimpses into lives I cannot imagine. I suspect that the politics behind the collection is to correct centuries of erasure of non-binary lives and of an Indigenous POV in fiction. 

The stories that most moved me are: "My Diary", about hooking up with an old flame after twenty years, and "Various People", about Paul's attempting to cope with his mother's impending death. I also found the variety of glimpses into the creative process of different artists interesting. 

PICK A COLOUR

 Souvankham Thammavongsa. PICK A COLOUR. Knoph Canada, 2025.

Winner of last year's Giller Prize. I watched the ceremony and I watched a separate interview with the writer. I love her voice and the thoughtfulness of her responses to questions, her ability to speak about her writing process. I also love the book although it is unusual in several ways. 

It is a novel of character, a first-person stream of consciousness story of one day in the work life of Ning, a former boxer who now owns a manicure salon and lives above her shop. It is very gentle. It is very subtle. It weaves past and present, her former coach and former boss, and the differences now that she is in charge. It is left to the reader to pick up on things as closely as Ning notices and comments. It expects us to continue to live with the mystery. It expects us to see the small differences in Ning's thoughts between opening and closing time. 

I waited for a used copy to arrive at the Bookman. For now, it stays securely on my CanLit shelves. 

LET ME TELL YOU WHAT I MEAN

 Joan Didion. LET ME TELL YOU WHAT I MEAN. Random House, 2021. 

Reprints of previously-published articles from the 60s and 70s. Made me realize how completely I have cut off US culture. Martha Stewart. Tony Richardson, Brit. William Randolph Hearst. Robert Mapplethorpe. Vietnam. Nancy Reagan. I did enjoy the piece about Ernest Hemingway. 

THE PIECES WE KEEP

 Kristina McMorris. THE PIECES WE KEEP. Kensington, 2013.

March book club selection. Again, two separate stories, WW II and 2012?, but they do intersect. One theme, what is "blood memory"? How much of the past lives of our ancestors to we experience, through our dreams or though our dreams?  Vivian, an ambassador's daughter, meets Isaac in London. A German. Shares some facts with him. Later, he follows her back to New York, as part of a group of German spies. Their child and grandchild explore the story 60+ years later. 

My one hesitation: a seven-year-old boy takes a book from the school library, vandalizes the book by cutting out pictures that he somehow sees as being linked to his life. Nazi images, and an electric chair. The mother dismisses the non-scientific explanation. 

I did enjoy reading it. 

INVISIBLE BOY: A Memoir of Self-Discovery

Harrison Mooney. INVISIBLE BOY: A Memoir of Self-Discovery. Patrick Crean / HarperCollins, 2022. 

Borrowed from a book club friend. Local story, a Black child adopted into a fundamentalist White Christian family in Abbotsford, 20 minutes down the road. Mooney is a professional writer which was an unexpected treat to read this often sad and disconcerting story. I kept remembering former students at the age Mooney is describing himself and the reactions often seen in adolescents trying to figure out who they are and who they are meant to be, often without help, and, in this case, with a controlling parent seeming to work against the idea of his "finding himself". He describes his "clown" phase and his "joker" seeking laughs to help himself feel visible. 

I enjoyed the local references, the intersections with my own experience in the Fraser Valley (caught in the anti-abortion protest in Abbotsford, visiting Camp Squeah) and the details of church-hopping and different aspects of fundamentalist culture. I was previously unaware of the horrors of home schooling, using American materials, imposing family ideals. I must have confused it with distance education which at least requires that students follow a curriculum. I felt really bad for the boy so desperate to "earn" his mother's love. There was no such thing as "unconditional" or "reject the behaviour, love the child". The disappointment of searching for the birth parents is palpable. My greatest fear, of memoir written by someone too young to see more than his own POV is still there. A sequel will be welcome, after he has parented his own children.

BAGNE or CRITERIA for HEAVEN

 Rob Mclennan. BAGNE or CRITERIA for HEAVEN. Broken Jaw, 2000.

I was reading his Substack about his mother being a poet in Ottawa and before I finished it, I found this book in the BOOKMAN's sale shelves. Interesting. A long list of poems addressed to fellow Canadian poets. 

SPEAK TO ME OF HOME

 Jeanine Cummins. SPEAK TO ME OF HOME. Henry Holt, 2025.

Book Club selection for February.  Multi-generational saga of Puerta Rico family marrying, moving to Missouri, moving elsewhere, moving home. Interesting themes of the island culture, the innate racism, mixtures of Spanish, mixed, African, Irish, American backgrounds. The existence of racism on the island and in the mid-west. How some generations are unaware of their own snobbery. The idea that we are all both felon and victim in our own stories. The difficulty of admitting our own mistakes. The inequity of private medical insurance denying coverage. The unfairness of Puerta Rico being American territory without any representatives or say in US politics. DNA plays a role in inspiring people to tell the truth.

The Tempest

 William Shakespeare. The Tempest. 

My obsession continues with this play. Reduced my original down to 2500 words, CNF. 

The AMATEUR MARRIAGE

 Anne Tyler. The AMATEUR MARRIAGE.

Book Club selection for January. The story of a couple who married in haste during the war, had three children, found a grandson and brought him home, and finally divorced after 30-some years. Very incompatible. Married for all the wrong reasons. I'm convinced no amount of therapy would have helped. Personally, the immature and mismatched couple just made me angry.