The Exile’s Papers by Wayne Clifford Part three of what will eventually become a four part, 800 sonnet magnum opus for Clifford, The Exile’s Papers: The Dirt’s Passion is Flesh Sorrow deftly makes use of the sonnet (with creatively crafted form as demonstrated through nested parenthesis in That small lie about the soul) to paint [...]
A friend of mine brought to my attention the Frankenstein Horror Series, published in the early 1970′s by Popular Library, last week and it has been a really interesting little series to read about. This post from the Groovy Age of Horror website is by far the best review of the series and has great [...]
It’s that time of year again when five great Canadian books (backed by 5 renown Canadians) do battle debate style for the Canada Reads title. This year’s twist, the books are all non-fiction: The Game by: Ken Dryden Defended by: Alan Thicke On a Cold Road by: Dave Bidini Defended by: Stacey McKenzie Prisoner of [...]
The Porcupine’s Quill has just released a wonderful new edition of Alice in Wonderland lavishly illustrated with wood engravings by George Walker and with a new introduction by Alberto Manguel. Following in the tradition of the Chesire Cat Press edition published nearly 25 years ago by Bill Poole, George Walker and Joseph Brabant (one of [...]
The latest installment of the Essential Poets Series from the Porcupine’s Quill delivers in same manner as its predecessors. An elegant selection of poems from Outram’s extensive career provides the unfamiliar with a succinct glimpse of this great Canadian poet’s vision and versatility, while giving followers of his a warming selection deftly drawn from three decades of [...]
A new book written by the Kelmscott scholarly duo, William and Sylvia Peterson, will be available from Oak Knoll Books in April and looks to be a must for any Kelmscott enthusiast. The Kelmscott Chaucer: A Census is an amazingly indepth look at Morris’ masterpiece, tracking down and analysing the history as many of the 425 [...]
Memoirs of a Bookshop Girl is a wonderful little chapbook written by Heather E. Thomson, one of the friendly faces often found behind the counter at Patrick McGahern Books. I picked up a copy of the chapbook last weekend (from Heather herself, who was gracious enough to sign it for me), and a few days later read it in [...]
Von Allan’s latest graphic novel, Stargazer, will be launched at Perfect Books (258A Elgin St., Ottawa) this Sunday, Nov. 7th at 4pm. Stargazer is a wonderful all-ages fantasy graphic novel that sees a young girl, Marni, and her two friends go on a wild adventure to an alien world through the magic of a mysterious Artifact [...]
At the Small Press Fair on the weekend I managed to pick up a few copies of Apt. 9 Press’ new titles. After months of working on the material, Cameron Anstee has put together an excellent descriptive bibliography of local Ottawa poet William Hawkins’ published work dating all the way back to the 60s. Complete with reproduction broadside [...]
Have just recently read a number of books from the Porcupine’s Quill spring catalogue, I was very impressed with what they’ve had to offer so far in 2010. The reprinting of James Reaney’s Suit of Nettles, with wonderful accompanying wood engravings by Jim Westergard, was a nice touch after offering up a great selection of Reaney’s [...]