List for the Canadian Read Challenge

Ten books left to read for the Canadian Book Read Challenge eh? I’ve decided to read books I already own. My list (which I reserve the right to change)

1. Blackstrap Hawco – by Kenneth J. Harvey (reading right now)
2. Three Day Road – Joseph Boyden (I’m also reading this one – I’ve just ditched it temporarily for the Harvey)
3. Soucouyant – David Chariandy
4. The Origin of the Species – Nino Ricci
5. Oryx and Crake – Margaret Atwood (I keep putting this one off for some reason)
6. The Entropy of Aaron Rosclatt – James Sandham (Early Reviewers book from Library Thing)
7. The Uses and Abuses of History – Margaret MacMillan
8. The Other Side of the Bridge – Mary Lawson
9. The Reckoning of Boston Jim – Claire Mulligan
10. A Complicated Kindness – Miriam Toews
11. The City of Words – Alberto Manguel

I know I have eleven listed, but that’ll give me a little bit of wiggle room.

Canadian Book Challenge Eh?

I just joined the Canadian book challenge. It was a sort-of New Year’s resolution to read the pile of Canadian books that are accumulating on my shelves. The start date – July 1 2008 – adds an extra edge to the challenge but I think I can do it.

So far I’ve read

By the Time You’ve Read This I’ll Be Dead by Giles Blunt – This is my fourth Blunt, but not my favorite. I was disappointed with this book. It started well, but I really didn’t enjoy the mystery and I don’t think it worked particularly well. Despite that, I was impressed with Blunt’s description of Cardinel’s grief. I just think Blunt could have done more with the material.

Blue Girl by Charles de Lint – I read a de Lint every year or so, he’s written lots, because even though fairy stories push my button I like his urban fantasy/music ‘thing.’ This one is a YA novel, less focused on characters is developed in his adult novels, although some are mentioned, and interestingly dark. A reviewer Library Thing mentioned that Imogene was just a bit too perfect, and I’d agree with that, but that was also part of the charm of the book.

De Niro’s Game by Rawi Hage – by far the best book I read this year, and I’ve read some pretty spectacular books. I was also lucky enough to hear him read in Winnipeg after he won the IMPAC. Stream of conscious, more poetic then prosaic, biblical in language (he’s a professed atheist but raised Christian in Palestine who speaks to the power of the biblical language). I think I need to read it again to provide a review that can match the book, but it’s tight and he never lets his readers, or himself, off the hook. Even the switch from Beruit to Paris is handled beautifully.