Canada Reads is the great Canadian book debate! You can watch it on CBC March 27-30. What is the one book that all Canadians should read?
This year’s theme is, “One book to shift your perspective.” I’ve finished all five short-listed books so you can scroll down for a short introduction to this year’s line-up! They are in no particular order.
It’s quite a line-up this year!! Included in the five short-listed books are an autobiographical graphic novel, and four works of fiction. There are two post-apocalyptic stories: one about the collapse of civilisation after a devastating flu pandemic, and one about environmental collapse after humans have wiped out almost all of the trees. And then the fifth is a creepy haunted house thriller which also tackles feminism and class commentary. Buckle up for a wild debate ride!
It is my practise to choose which book I think should win Canada Reads. In thinking about this year’s theme about shifting perspective I have to say that Greenwood gets my vote. It’s a beautifully crafted literary novel to be read and enjoyed, but also is an important book for our time.
‘Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands’ by Kate Beaton
Mattea Roach, the most successful Canadian contestant on Jeopardy!, is the celebrity championing Ducks in the debate. Roach said this about Ducks:
“This book is a window into so many critical conversations about the environment, about Indigenous land rights, about the student debt crisis and about gender relations.”
Ducks is an autobiographical graphic novel that recounts author Kate Beaton’s time spent working in the Alberta oil sands. With the goal of paying off her student loans, Beaton leaves her tight-knit seaside Nova Scotia community and heads west, where she encounters harsh realities, including the everyday trauma that no one discusses.
What I Thought of Ducks:
Beaton not only tells her story, she draws it. I really enjoyed the graphic novel reading experience and found it a fair and thoughtful account of a difficult time in the author’s life. She represents all sides of a number of issues that bring perspective to a setting not many of us will ever be in.
‘Hotline’ by Dimitri Nasrallah
Gurdeep Pandher, a bhangra dancer who lives in an off-grid cabin in the Yukon, is the celebrity championing Hotline in the debate. Pandher said this about Hotline:
“The book explores racism, belonging, loneliness and single parenting, but there’s also hope.”
Hotline is about Muna Heddad, a widow and mother who has left behind a civil war in Lebanon and is living in Montreal in the 1980s. The only work she can find is as a hotline operator at a weight-loss centre where she fields calls from people responding to ads in magazines or on TV. These strangers have so much to say about their challenges, from marriages gone bad to personal inadequacies. Although her life in Canada is filled with invisible barriers, Muna is privy to her clients’ deepest secrets.
What I Thought of Hotline:
This book is a poignant readable story about the issues that face immigrants. The author zeros in on one person’s perspective. Muna displays such spirit and resilience in a situation that she cannot escape and you can’t help rooting for her.
‘Greenwood’ by Michael Christie
Keegan Connor Tracy, an actor from Vancouver, is the celebrity championing Greenwood in the debate. Tracy said this about Greenwood:
“It’s just a stunning, beautiful book — but also it tells the story of a complicated family, something we can all relate to.”
Greenwood starts in the year 2038 when most of the world has suffered from an environmental collapse. There is still a remote island with 1,000-year-old trees and that’s where Jake Greenwood works as a tour guide. The novel goes back in time as more is learned about Jake and her family. Secrets and lies can have an impact for generations.
What I Thought of Greenwood:
This book is ALL about trees, physically and metaphorically. Tree rings are even sketched onto the live edges of the pages–try to read a print copy if you can. But it’s about people too. Trees are rooted in forests, people are rooted in families.
The ingenious nested growth ring structure of this beautifully written literary intergenerational family saga is set against environmental devastation. Though a bit dense at the beginning, the pacing really picks up in the latter half. I loved how the author jumps into the past for backstory and then goes forward again, returning to familiar characters later.
The choices of people (especially in the ending) were a bit disappointing and sad, but perhaps that’s realistic and would generate good discussion for book clubs! By its very nature, maybe there is no happy hopeful ending in eco-fiction (for the trees or for the humans) when the planet is suffering.
Reviewers say this book resembles Overstory by Richard Powers but is much more readable and riveting.
‘Station Eleven’ by Emily St. John Mandel
Michael Greyeyes, Cree actor and director, is the celebrity championing Station Eleven in the debate. Greyeyes said this about Station Eleven:
“Station Eleven is an extraordinary journey into the things that hold us together — into our dreams and the things so dear to us we cannot leave them behind.”
Station Eleven is a dystopian novel that takes place on an Earth undone by disease The story follows the interconnected lives of several characters — actors, artists and those closest to them — before and after the plague. One travels the wasteland performing Shakespearean plays with a troupe, while another attempts to build community at an abandoned airport and another amasses followers for a dangerous cause.
What I Thought of Station Eleven:
This is an elegant literary novel about memory, art, and survival. It is beautifully written and artfully atmospheric. I liked that the novel begins in Toronto, close to where I live. I read this book pre-pandemic, in 2015, and at the time felt sobered by something we now know with renewed clarity–how vulnerable we are and how little control we really have. We have had a glimpse of how quickly the “world as we know it” could become a distant memory. And yet this book displays resilience and is hopeful. For my earlier post on this book, click here.
‘Mexican Gothic’ by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Tasnim Geedi, a Somalian Canadian nursing student, is best known for her ‘BookTok’ presence on Tiktok where she posts on her favourite books. She is the celebrity championing Mexican Gothic in the debate. Geedi said this about Mexican Gothic:
“This is not just a story about dark family secrets but the lingering effects of colonialism.”
Mexican Gothic is a horror novel set in 1950s Mexico. It tells the story of a young woman named Noemí who is called by her cousin to save her from doom in her countryside home, the mysterious and alluring High Place. Noemí doesn’t know much about the house, the region or her cousin’s mysterious new husband, but she’s determined to do whatever it takes to solve this mystery and save her cousin.
What I Thought of Mexican Gothic:
Horror is not my go-to genre, so I don’t have much experience with it, but in the past I have enjoyed the occasional haunted house story and magic realism novel. Maybe it’s the genre, but I found this a boring slow burn with too many dream sequences until the speedy 50 page conclusion which did pick up the pace, but was offensive in content. To me the ending was more ridiculous than scary.
It’s hard for me to explain fully without giving spoilers but the book just wasn’t for me. If the author chose some issues from the setting to reflect social or historical truth, then she handled them gratuitously, rather than sensitively. But perhaps I am expecting too much from gothic horror. The only two things I liked about it were the character of Noemí and the stylish cover. Readers will be interested to note that the author has also co-edited a book called Fungi, a collection of ‘fungal fiction.’
I fail to see how anyone could pick this book as one that every Canadian should read so I look forward to the debate to find out what the celebrity contender has found to promote it!
Joanne's Reading Blog 