Literary Aspirations
For years, Alberta’s book publishing industry has ranked amongst Canada’s smallest, resulting in an exodus of writers and editors, let alone potential revenues. Now, an upstart Calgary publisher seeks to prove there really is no place like home
by Naomi K. Lewis
 Good to a Fault Marina Endicott After causing a car accident that hospitalizes a wayward family’s mother, Clara Purdy takes in the children and grandmother. Is she motivated by guilt, goodness or a secret agenda? The resulting drama made this novel a 2008 Scotiabank Giller Prize finalist |
 Mother Superior Saleema Nawaz Upon rewarding “My Three Girls,” one of the short stories of Nawaz’s first book, with the $10,000 Writers’ Trust of Canada/McClelland & Stewart Journey Prize, the jury gushed high praise. “This tightly written piece accomplishes the impressive feat of condensing a novel’s worth of sorrows and joys into a few pages. |
 Pathologies Susan Olding Kingston’s Susan Olding uses an uncommon literary format to its full potential. Says Nino Ricci, winner of the 2008 Governor General’s award for fiction: “These essays are much more than essays, tracing the path from our pathologies to our deepest mysteries and fears and our most cherished hopes. |
 It’s Hard Being Queen Jeanette Lynes “Who can explain the accidents of birth?” Lynes asks in her fourth collection of poems. The answer, of course, is no one, but it’s still worth trying, as these biographical poems do, examining, celebrating and lamenting the life of cultural icon Dusty Springfield |
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