Literary and fantastical. Stories from the history of an empire that never was. Slow, vaguely dream-like, in quite a distinctive voice. Very much told in the form of storytelling, in the sense that it is as if they are being told orally by storytellers. Not high fantasy, which you might stereotypically expect when the words …
A multi-author collection edited by three of the core members of Black Lives Matter – Toronto. Personal essays, dialogues, scholarly essays, poetry, photo essays. Includes accounts of the iconic moments of BLM-TO’s founding and early years of action, but ranges far beyond in its exploration of Blackness and Black struggle in Canada today. I’m a …
Thank-you to Renae, Michael, and Leah of the Mount Royal Anti-Racism Coaltion for the interview just now about faculty-based anti-racism work at their university in Alberta! Listen for it on Talking Radical Radio in the coming weeks.
Shannon Hardy and Bridget Graham live in Halifax and work as doulas. They are also, respectively, the coordinator and the director of volunteers of Abortion Support Services Atlantic, a volunteer-run group that exists to provide support to people in Atlantic Canada who are trying to get an abortion. Scott Neigh interviews them about the barriers that people face …
YA contemporary. The book’s protagonist – who is Black, queer, and trans – is navigating all the stress and drama of adolescence at an arts-focused high school in Manhattan that his dad can hardly afford when an anonymous someone plasters pre-transition images hacked from his phone (accompanied by his deadname) all over the foyer of …
Thanks to Medeana and Wing of Support Our Students Alberta for the interview just now about their work in support of students and public education in Alberta! Listen for it in the next few weeks on Talking Radical Radio.
Susan Campbell and Angie Lynch are both social workers who work for community legal clinics in Ontario. Scott Neigh interviews them about Just Recovery Ontario, a campaign pushing for a recovery from the pandemic that would fix the many injustices and shortfalls in our social safety net that COVID-19 has made so evident. By this point, most of us …
Literary fiction. I really like Brand’s writing but, for whatever reason, it has been quite a few years since I last read any, so I was very happy to sink my teeth into this one. The narrator describes three love affairs that take place as she attempts to finish her doctoral dissertation. As someone who …
Science fiction and fantasy, all at once. As a cover blurb from a prominent genre author puts it, “Lesbian necromancers explore a haunted gothic palace in space!” Which on the one hand neatly captures some of the book’s key elements, but on the other hand doesn’t really capture its essence. I of course went into …
Carole Tootill and Joshua Wright are residents of British Columbia who are heavily involved in forest protection activism. Scott Neigh interviews them about the Fairy Creek blockades, which are protecting some of the last big-tree, old-growth forest on Vancouver Island from clear-cut logging. Tootill grew up in B.C., and first got involved in environmental and forest protection issues …