Browsing “Vancouver Book Club”

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	Wherein we look at some of the local books that have been published this year and give you some ideas of what to get your book-loving friends and family for Hanukkah, Solstice, Festivus, Christmas, Kwanzaa, or just because it’s a day ending with “y”.
	Don’t forget to support your local independent bookstores!

My Seductive Cuba
by Chen Lizra
Latidos Productions

Okay, we’re making an exception to the “published in 2012″ guideline for the Holiday Lit List because this is such a gorgeous book that really needs more people knowing about it. And in the middle of a grey, sometimes white, and cold Vancouver winter, who wouldn’t want to cuddle down with a book about travelling to Cuba?

Vancouver-based writer, dancer, traveller, and entrepreneur Chen Lizra, has written more than just a travel book; she immerses the reader in the Cuban culture, takes us into the heart of the people and the country, and gives us so much more than what you’d find from Frommer’s or Lonely Planet. Sure it has all the usual sections you expect to find in a guide book (preparing for your trip, getting around, where to eat, stay, and shop) but it is full of anecdotes and personal experiences from her many trips to Cuba. Worried about the stories you hear of scam artists? Lizra relates her stories and gives suggestions on how to avoid or deal with such situations with grace and humour. What to know the best places to hear live music? She’s got you covered.

My favourite section of the book is “Getting the Authentic Cuban Experience” where, in addition to discussing the Cuban language and popular drinks, she takes us into the world of Santería, the belief system that evolved from the Yoruba religion of the West African slaves merging with Roman Catholic and Native American traditions. Lizra gives a very detailed account of a tambor ceremony involving possession by orishas, or spirits, …READ THE REST OF THIS ENTRY>>>

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	Wherein we look at some of the local books that have been published this year and give you some ideas of what to get your book-loving friends and family for Hanukkah, Solstice, Festivus, Christmas, Kwanzaa, or just because it’s a day ending with “y”.
	Don’t forget to support your local independent bookstores!

Escape to Gold Mountain: A Graphic History of the Chinese in North America 
by David H.T. Wong
Arsenal Pulp Press

When Art Spiegelman’s Maus won the Pulitzer Prize in 1992, not only did it “legitimize” the graphic novel among the general public, it made illustrators and cartoonist realize the potential of this book form to do much more than relate the adventures of superheroes in a larger, bound format. It gave them a venue to present history in a more accessible way. Over the years, artists such as Keiji Nakazawa, Joe Sacco, and Marjane Satrapi have created beautiful, gritty, heartfelt work that often deals with difficult situations and periods of history.

Vancouver architect, illustrator and frog enthusiast David H.T. Wong has entered the arena with his first graphic novel Escape to Gold Mountain: A Graphic History of the Chinese in North America. Spanning more than 100 years, it traces the Wong family and their struggles with racism, danger, separation, isolation, and war. It’s not a happy tale, but it’s an important one, one that has touched the lives of so many who live here. …READ THE REST OF THIS ENTRY>>>

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	Wherein we look at some of the local books that have been published this year and give you some ideas of what to get your book-loving friends and family for Hanukkah, Solstice, Festivus, Christmas, Kwanzaa, or just because it’s a day ending with “y”.
	Don’t forget to support your local independent bookstores!

Vancouver has an abundance of riches when it comes to the poetry scene, and this year saw a incredible amount of books being published. We’ve already suggested Catherine Owen’s Trobairitz, and earlier this year we reviewed Impact: The Titanic Poems, Billeh Nickerson’s wonderful collection of glimpses into the life and death of the legendary ocean liner, and talked about YVR by W.H. New being chosen for the City of Vancouver Book Award.

Below is just a selection of other books by local poets that were released this year.

The gorgeous cover of Daniela Elza’s the weight of dew (Mother Tongue Publishing), featuring a photograph by Robin Susanto, gives an indication of what you’ll find between the covers. These poems are not only a treat for their language and the imagery they invoke, but also for their actual visual aspect. The emphasis on the space between words forces the reader to pause and savour what is presented, rolling the language around in mouth and mind. The words fall and sit with the lightness of dew, landing on the consciousness as a dragonfly might, but lingering much longer.

Elizabeth Bachinsky, whose God of Missed Connections was one of three works adapted for the Electric Company’s Initiation Trilogy at this year’s Writers Fest, takes a bit of a risk with her latest book I Don’t Feel So Good (BookThug). Rolling a die and using her journals and hand-written notes from the past 25 years as source material, she has created a collection of new “found” poems. …READ THE REST OF THIS ENTRY>>>

	Read All Over celebrates the bookworm in all of us, showcasing readers in Vancouver and the books they love most.
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	Taryn Boyd works for the Literary Press Group, a non-profit organization that supports independent Canadian literary publishers. She has recently switched roles from sales rep (placing titles from indie presses in bookstores) to working as the Education and Engagement Coordinator. Taryn lives near the Vancouver airport in a little throwback neighbourhood called Burkeville (which is technically in Richmond!), and she spends all her time with her hound dog, Watson.

What are you currently reading? Your thoughts on it?
I just finished Flipturn by Paula Eisenstein (Mansfield Press). It’s a novel written entirely in short, sometimes poetric, paragraphs. I thought it was a convincing peek into a young woman’s psyche. The narrator is just beginning to explore and experiment with her ability to articulate her experiences in a really complex social situation, and she’s constantly negotiating her place and her value in comparison with everyone around her. I really appreciated the narrator’s voice.

How do you like your books served up best – audio books, graphic novels, used paperbacks, library loaner, e-reader?
Oh, definitely good ol’ paperback. Whenever I read a hardcover book I feel like I should be sitting straight up in a wingback armchair, sipping tea and making notes. And I prefer to lounge in my pjs and slurp wine while I read. I usually buy a book or two when I visit independent bookstores, which I do regularly for my job. I’ve convinced myself that spending money on books doesn’t really count. I have no problem dropping $100 on books, but I balk at spending money on clothes. I remember where I buy my books, too: the Penguin classic clothbound edition of Sense and Sensibility (designed by Coralie Bickford Smith) at Cadboro Bay Books; February by Lisa Moore and One Native Life by Richard Wagamese at Laughing Oyster Bookshop, Rosa Jordan’s Far From Botany Bay at Coho Books; Annabel by Kathleen Winter at Bolen Books; When the Other is Me by Emma LaRocque and The Sisters Brothers at Blackberry Books; Love and the Mess We’re In by Stephen Marche from 32 Books at the latest WOTS festival; Michael Crummey’s Galore at the Bookery on Signal Hill (in St. John’s); Lakeland and Dog Boy at Ardea Books and Art. The Outlander (Gil Adamson) and the Zero Mile Diet at Galiano Island Books. Etc. I don’t own an e-reader. I actually don’t really know how to work gadgets into my everyday life. For example, I have an iPhone, but I don’t have one app that I use on a regular basis. Every time my friend has her iPhone out, I’m like, “Wow, what is that neat little program thing?” Her: “This is an iPhone application. You can buy them in the App store. Right on your phone.”

…READ THE REST OF THIS ENTRY>>>

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	Wherein we look at some of the local books that have been published this year and give you some ideas of what to get your book-loving friends and family for Hanukkah, Solstice, Festivus, Christmas, Kwanzaa, or just because it’s a day ending with “y”.
	Don’t forget to support your local independent bookstores!

Sussex Drive
by Linda Svendsen
Random House

An ultra-conservative Christian Prime Minister. A female African-Quebecois Governor General. The prorogation of parliament.

If you think this sounds like the latest nonfiction expose coming out of Ottawa, you’d be wrong. Sussex Drive is Vancouver writer Linda Svendsen’s satirical novel that presents a (slightly) alternate history of the Canadian political scene. Set in 2008-2009, it follows the goings on in our nations capitol,from the viewpoints of the two most powerful women in the country: Becky Legatt, the extremely politically savvy wife of Canada’s PM, trying all she can to keep her lifestyle and her current address while her autocratic husband is barely holding on with his minority government; and Lise Lavoie, the astute Governor General, who wants to do what is right for the Canadian people, and not be just a figurehead doing the bidding of the Prime Minister. …READ THE REST OF THIS ENTRY>>>

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	Wherein we look at some of the local books that have been published this year and give you some ideas of what to get your book-loving friends and family for Hanukkah, Solstice, Festivus, Christmas, Kwanzaa, or just because it’s a day ending with “y”.
	Don’t forget to support your local independent bookstores!

Indian Horse
by Richard Wagamese
Douglas & McIntyre

A few weeks ago the 5 finalists for Canada Reads 2013 were announced, with this next iteration having a twist: each book represents a different geographical area of Canada. After reading  seven of the top 10 chosen by Canada Reads fans in B.C. and Yukon, Olympic gold-medal wrestler Carol Huynh chose Richard Wagamese’s Indian Horse as her contender. It seems very Canadian that for 2 years running there has been a book about hockey in the Canada Reads competition.

Indian Horse is the story of Saul Indian Horse,  a northern Ojibway. He is also a residential school survivor, a former hockey superstar, and an alcoholic. When we first meet him he’s been at The New Dawn Centre for a month, after six weeks in a hospital. “The longest I’ve been without a drink for years, so I guess there’s some use to it,” he admits.

Finding it difficult to tell his story in the sharing circle at the treatment facility, Saul gets permission to write it down instead, taking us on his journey of remembrance and revelation.

Indian Horse is Wagamese’s twelfth book and in it, as with his previous work, he examines the themes of abuse, displacement, and cultural alienation. He doesn’t gloss over the experiences of residential school survivors (and non-survivors) but neither does he dwell on the details.  There is also, however, a lot of joy when Saul is immersed in his means of escape, hockey. Saul’s description of how he feels when he watches and plays the game is something that many Canadians can identify with, and for a while it unites the reader with Saul, ignoring their differences and celebrating a commonality.

There’s bound to be at least one literary hockey fan on your gift list who is hankering after something to help fill the void created by the current lockout. Indian Horse will take them to a place where the game exists in its purest form.

You can read our interview with Wagamese, who used to call Vancouver home, HERE.

Click to read our previous Holiday Lit List suggestions.