Liminal By Jordan Tannahill House of Anansi Press, $22.95 Destabilizing from its opening pages, Liminal by Jordan Tannahill places readers firmly between life and death, fact and fiction, consciousness and unconsciousness. A quasi-fictional version of the author’s own life, the main character, Jordan, finds his mother in bed. Unsure if she is dead or asleep, […]

Floating City  By Kerri Sakamoto Knopf Canada, $29.95 Floating City by Kerri Sakamoto—who was nominated for a Governor General’s Literary Award for The Electrical Field—gives a voice to Japanese-Canadians during post-WWII. Loosely inspired by Richard Buckminster Fuller and Shoji Sadao’s plans for Project Toronto, Sakomoto takes readers on Frankie’s journey from the coasts of B.C. […]

It’s 2015, and the light come up on a dark stage at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre in New York City. Two young women stand on opposite sides of an empty mirror frame. As one waves her arms in the air creating shapes to convey her curious thoughts, the other begins to sing, giving those signed […]

Dear Current Occupant By Chelene Knight Book*hug, $20.00 In her memoir Dear Current Occupant, writer Chelene Knight asks, “Is home a place we were, a place we are, a place we want to be, or is it simply a state of being?” Using poetry, essay, flash nonfiction, and photography, Knight weaves what she refers to […]

Alexia Galloway-Alainga pushes in a pair of earbuds to tune out the clatter of cutlery and coffee cups hitting cafeteria tables at Ottawa’s Carleton University. She looks straight into her smartphone camera, wearing a slight smile, and begins speaking: Sanngijuq, she says slowly, the last syllable coming from the back of her throat. The Inuktitut […]

What unique perspective do women bring to the arts? This is the question west-coast filmmakers Ian MacKenzie and Nicole Sorochan want their audience to think about, especially within the realm of female DJs with their transmedia project, Amplify Her. Through a documentary-style, feature-length film, a graphic novel, and a motion comic series, Amplify Her tells […]

Last summer, freelance journalist Katie Jensen shared her 2016 net income with the Twittersphere. “If we knew exactly how much Canadian freelancers, columnists, copywriters, broadcasters, and journalists made,” she wrote, “how revelatory would that be?” This question resonates with the precariously employed, who don’t benefit from certain protections linked to full-time, permanent jobs. Many have […]

Nova Scotians’ bigotry is softer and quieter than its white supremacist cousins in headline-grabbing places like Charlottesville, Virginia—but it’s no less devastating. Late last year, the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) released its 2017 Report Card on Child and Family Poverty in Atlantic Canada’s most populated province. In a single table the CCPA manages […]

I say your name and I do grieve. All names dredge the deep, but they fail to take heed and sprout. Hereabouts, mustard seed got choked by conglomerate needs rendered too economic. Scrub grass debriefs our fields. Old Dutch farmers sing about crop yield and claim to have never yielded, but wrote wills to sons […]

Dear art thieves, Yes, that’s what you are. No, I don’t care that you just really liked my work. No, I don’t care that I didn’t use a watermark. It’s my design, you took it, you didn’t get my consent. You’re an art thief. I know we live in a time where millions of delicious […]

The Amateurs By Liz Harmer Knopf Canada, $32.95 In The Amateurs, the first novel by Liz Harmer, a space travel device called “Port” has been created by PINA, the world’s largest tech company. Urged by nostalgia and longing, consumers are quick to use the portal to revisit their youth or to explore their futures; however, […]