The Regiment

Farley Mowat chronicles the history, mobilization and actions of the Hastings and Prince Edward Regiment during World War Two. It's a different kind of war history from that of Malone's books in that Mowat has a much more lyrical style, and is much more personal with the members of the Regiment, while writing from the third person - it is not an autobiography by any means.

I read this one exceedingly quickly, as it was due back at the library, and I could not renew it because someone else wanted to read it.

So, it was much more readable than Malone's two books, but of a completely different style so I wouldn' t be too keen on comparing the two. In any event, the only critique I might level at the book is that the misery of war is rather minimized - it reads as a bit of a light story, with only a few instances of combat tragedy - and even those don't jolt or stand out from the narrative in an attention-getting device.

I shouldn't criticize too sharply - Mowat was there, I wasn't; and if he captured the experience of the Hasty Pees, only the Hasty Pees could tell. It is definitely worth reading, though.

A Portrait of War 1939-1943

Just prior to Remembrance Day I picked up some war history books from the library, and the first one I finished was Richard S. Malone's "A Portrait of War". The book details his involvement in Canada's participation in WWII, from an interestingly personal point of view, as opposed to the normal stories told based on troop movements, military actions, and political overtones. Malone was a newspaperman, and early in the war was tapped to work on the Defense Minister's staff, and eventually was involved in nearly every major Canadian activity. The book can read a bit like an exercise in name dropping - referring to General Montgomery as "Monty", in the context of a series of interactions the author had with the General; however, Malone's presentation serves to capture a sense of the personal, and this serves to provide an enriching background to the various events.

Malone's involvement included participating in the initial efforts to move Canada from a peacetime to a war footing, planning portions of invasions, facilitating meetings and the exchange of information between Canadian, British and eventually American war offices, and arranging press operations in Sicily and Italy (which included the inauguration of the Canadian military newspaper, the Maple Leaf.

It is not a fast read, and at times can get a little laborious, but it is a well written book overall that richly recounts a perilous time in history.

George Trosley-CARtoonist

George Trosley-CARtoonist looks pretty cool. Haven't had much time to look through it, but I will do so later.

The Slave and the Free (Walk to the End of the World and Motherlines)

This is one of the wierder sci-fi-fantasy books I've read. Before I get into that, this volume contains the first two books of a four-book series written by Suzy McKee Charnas over something like thirty years. Not a prolific pace for an author, and interesting since sci-fi (I know I'm probably mixing up genres a bit here, but never mind that, okay?) authors seem to be able to churn out books one after the other a bit like a sausage factory.

So that piqued my interest - perhaps this will be an extremely writerly book, which I think would be interesting in the genre. Okay, full disclosure - I just grabbed the book off the shelf in the library because it looked interesting, and it wasn't til later that I found out the rest of the stuff.

I'm still not sure if I like reading this series. Set formulaically after an apocalypse known as The Wasting, leftover and survivor humans are eking out a grimmish existance, with a rather bizarre set of customs and mores. In the first book, consider a patriarchal society embodying everything inequality of the sexes in the extreme. In the second, consider a matriarchal society - with no men. Read the book to find out how they procreate - as the process was hinted at I hoped against fleeting hope that it would not be so... It was.

So the social order of Charnas' vision isn't really to my taste. I suppose that would have something to do with her aims in writing the book - thirty years, the first book first published in 1974 - which strikes me as coinciding far too neatly with the cycles in radical feminism. (At the end of the second book, it's starting to sound like things aren't going to go too well for any male character that might appear in the third book. I hope the library has it.) Back on track: It's almost a Swiftian trope, but I will reserve judgement until I finish the series.

I would have to say that I am appreciating the vision and development of the books. The first one was a quick, interesting read; the second I found a little harder to get through. It could have been the subject matter, it may have been the writing. In any event, my interest is aroused enough to say "Bring on the next book," which I'll do next time I'm at the library.

Still... very wierd book.

Latitudes of Melt

Joan Clark's novel really is amazing, in my opinion. A loose synopsis: in 1912 a baby is found on an ice pan off the coast of Newfoundland and is brought into a small community of fishermen and their families. She's a little different, but she gets along, finds love, marries, and so on. Late in the book, and thus later in her life, she has had children, and they range through their lives, until her granddaughter happens to extricate her past from the wisps of history, discovering who the baby was, and where she comes from.

That short summary does incredible violence to Clark's story. The descriptions of characters, environments and situations were arresting - I didn't really want the book to end. This was a really good book, one I'm glad to have read.

The Seeds of Time

Kay Kenyon's first novel is pretty darn impressive. Humans have come up with "Time Diving" technology, which allows them to travel through time and space, with certain constraints, of course. Naturally, the ability to use this technology must have a need associated, and that need is the search for biological speciments from other time/spaces to rejuvenate the Earth's biosphere, with has been utterly degraded by human depredation. Along with the dwindling life potential on the planet, social organization has evolved (or devolved, as it's pretty clear that the structures are not all that pleasant) such that "Sick" people are routinely rounded up and put in camps to live out their miserable days, accompanied by homosexuals and mentally challenged people - basically a eugenic echo of social engineering. A pretty miserable place.

The central character, Clio Finn has escaped the mess on Earth and is a "Dive pilot" - she is one of the few who are uniquely capable of maintaining consciousness (and the contents of their stomachs) as they dive through time/space.

Adventures abound, they find a planet in time that has an almost ideal source of plant life, loyalties are strained and realigned, tough decisions are made, the Laws of Time are toyed with... it's really quite a well done story, particularly in terms of a nuanced take on the old science-fiction standby of time travel.

A quick read, but an enjoyable one.

Heartbreaks Along the Road

Roch Carrier's book is a big book, with a lot going on inside. I suppose it could be best called a satire of life in Quebec, probably just before the Quiet Revolution. The principal foci are social, political, and religious life, which, when I think about it, constitutes life in general in that era. The omnipresent corruption of "the Right Party", led by "Le Chef" touches pretty much every one of the myriad characters in the fictional village of Saint-Toussaint-des-Saints. Come election time, everyone who votes for the Right Party gets a "strippa road" or some other petty favour; anyone who votes for or otherwise supports the "communist Opposition" can expect to be a pariah from the electoral largesse. Tragedy abounds, comedy lurks in the oddest of places (a deep-fried saint, among others), and all through the tale reverberates with the spirit of the era.

The story is not as bleak as Last Days of Montreal, but ranges further and is more subtle in its critique. This book took me longer to read than normal, and I'm glad for it. A very good book.