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Funeral Songs for Dying Girls by Cherie Dimaline My rating: 5 of 5 stars It’s difficult to write this review without creating spoilers so I advocate caution if choosing to read ahead. I love the way that Dimaline portrays Winifred as a protagonist who is almost watching her life from the sidelines until she meets […]

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The Colony by Audrey Magee My rating: 5 of 5 stars This book was so wonderfully written. Magee’s style of dialogue somehow emphasizes the lilt of this Irish dialect and the tension between the characters. Other critiques have said it’s about art and war but I think it’s about voice — young James and the […]

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Recently I had the opportunity to hear Brandi Morin speak in recognition of Canada’s national day of Truth and Reconciliation. Brandi expertly spliced together news reels that she had covered about the Indigenous stories across the globe of their struggle for recognition and reparation. She finished her talk by reminding us that the Indigenous struggle […]

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Coming Họmẹ by Tu Vuong My rating: 4 of 5 stars When I read poetry, I try to let it sort of wash over me like rain, because to capture all of the nuance in meaning at once isn’t possible at the first read. I admire Tu’s ambition of trying to create an arc to […]

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Talking to Canadians by Rick Mercer My rating: 4 of 5 stars It’s a healthy romp back into the history of Canadian drama and television and politics. I enjoyed reliving my own personal history with these topics through his parallel life — it turns out we’re almost the same age so his references to music […]

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The Centaur’s Wife by Amanda Leduc My rating: 4 of 5 stars This book must have been like a difficult birth as it was so ethereally emotional for me to read, that I can’t begin to understand what it would have been like to write. I find it really hard to read anything dystopian in […]

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Whoever said that teachers don’t work in the summer, doesn’t get it. Summer is when I reflect and wallow in the shortcomings of the work that I’ve done and if I reached my intended goals with students. This year I was blessed with a glorious creative writing class that was entirely online and yet ….my […]

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The Wild by Owen Laukkanen My rating: 4 of 5 stars There’s something about this book that makes me think I’ve read it before. We don’t get deep into main character Dawn’s history before she’s thrown into The Wild, a camp to rehabilitate young people into conforming with society’s standards. Dawn’s story is a familiar […]

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Zara Hossain Is Here by Sabina Khan My rating: 4 of 5 stars I really liked this book. I found that Zara’s story was compelling as it was told in first person (without any competing voices) and it flowed through to its conclusion in a present tense, chronological order. I think it would be a […]

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Don’t Breathe a Word by Jordyn Taylor My rating: 5 of 5 stars I really enjoyed this book! The pace was fine at the beginning, but when Erik entered Eva’s story, I couldn’t put it down. It reads like a grown-up Trixie Belden — sneaking around a private school, having teen morals tested in two […]

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Blood Like Magic by Liselle Sambury My rating: 5 of 5 stars Having read some really strong female BIPOC fantasy lately, Tomi Adeyemi Cherie Dimaline Jael Richardson I was immediately skeptical about how much I would enjoy this, but I loved it. It was filled with diverse characters and real settings in Toronto without being […]

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