Sisters of the Ice: The True Story of How St. Roch and North Star of Herschel Island Protected Canadian Arctic Sovereignty by R. Bruce Macdonald Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2021 $19.95 / 9781550179286 Reviewed by Hector Williams * Nearly six decades ago I worked in Canada’s North with various government agencies like the CBC Northern…
Read more 1160 Canadian arctic guardians
All That Monk Business by Barry Kennedy Surrey: Now Or Never Publishing, 2021 $19.95 / 9781989689202 Reviewed by Theo Dombrowski * A novel can’t be everything to everyone, but some novels can be many things to many people. All That Monk Business, by actor, comedian, and writer Barry Kennedy, is one of these. It’s not…
Read more 1154 The elusive shape of life
Improbable Journeys: From Crossing the Himalayas on Horseback to a Career in Obstetrics and Gynaecology by Dr. Bernard A.O. Binns and Ron Smith Oakville, ON: Rock’s Mills Press, 2020 $29.95 / 9781772441932 Reviewed by John Kenwright * Editor’s note: Occasionally we run two reviews of the same book at The Ormsby Review. May Q. Wong…
Read more 1152 A career in postwar medicine
Leading at the Edge: True Tales From Canadian Police in Peacebuilding and Peacekeeping Missions Around the World by Ben J.S. Maure Vancouver: Ben Maure, 2020 $29.95 / 9780995034303 Reviewed by May Q. Wong * The Canadian military has, since 1954, participated in missions that support peace and stability around the world. In fact, it has…
Read more 1146 Mission to Quetzaltenango
Food Floor: My Woodward’s Days by Margaret Cadwaladr Langley: Madrona Books & Publishing, 2020 $15.95 / 9871999546519 Reviewed by Mary Gale Smith * Margaret Cadwaladr has created a little book of stories that will be of interest to anyone who worked at Woodward’s or in a grocery store, or who buys groceries. It is a…
Read more 1136 Dollar forty-nine day, Woodward’s
Vancouver for Beginners by Alex Leslie Toronto: Book*hug, 2019 $18.00 / 9781771665346 Reviewed by Jessica Poon * It’s easier to think of Vancouver as paradise when you don’t live there. I spoke to a Californian today on the phone who positively rhapsodized about Vancouver being a world-class city. “I’ve visited nineteen times,” he said, eager…
Read more 1132 Vancouver for professionals
ESSAY: Stanley Park: The Mirror and the Mask by Jordan Johnston * Stanley Park is a mirror that reflects the desires of those who look in it. On a map, this bright green peninsula stands apart from the city centre, as if held at arm’s length. Vancouver, like any other city, has poverty, and crime,…
Read more 1128 Stanley Park reflections
Beep Beep Bubbie by Bonnie Sherr Klein (text) and Élisabeth Eudes-Pascal Vancouver: Tradewind Books, 2020 $19.95 / 9781926890234 Reviewed by Elizabeth Bassett Editor’s note: The West Coast Book Prize Society announced on April 8, 2021, that Beep Beep Bubbie by Bonnie Sherr Klein (text) and Élisabeth Eudes-Pascal (Tradewind Books) has been shortlisted for the Christie Harris…
Read more 1101 Through Vancouver by scooter
Outside In: A Political Memoir by Libby Davies Toronto: Between The Lines, 2019 $26.95 / 9781771134453 Reviewed by Alex Netherton * Libby Davies’ Outside In is an extraordinary political memoir that chronicles and reflects upon her life and political career first as an urban activist and then eventually as the Deputy Leader of the NDP…
Read more 1096 A master of urban politics
ESSAY: The Militant Mothers: Civil Disobedience in Raymur Housing Project by Meg Stainsby * The 1971 actions of the “Militant Mothers of Raymur” was one of the first direct action campaigns in Vancouver history. The successful, swift campaign ran from early January through late March. It has been documented and celebrated in newspaper and radio…
Read more 1093 The militant mothers of Raymur
Battleground Grandview: An Activist’s Memoir of the Grandview Community Plan, 2011-2016 by Jak King Vancouver, The Drive Press, 2020 $25.00 / 9780986778209 Reviewed by Jennifer Chutter * Planning for housing in Vancouver is a contentious issue due to conflicting ideas of where increased density should take place, what styles of housing are needed, and who…
Read more 1091 In praise of city neighbourhoods
No Ordinary Seaman: A Memoir by Gary H. Karlsen Victoria: First Choice Books, 2018 $22.95 / 9781775266907 Reviewed by Eric W. Sager * There are many paths into adulthood. One way is to leave home and go to sea. It is an old path, followed by many young men (and women too) through the ages,…
Read more 1084 The education of a seafarer
Lonely Planet Vancouver and Victoria (8th edition) by John Lee & Brendan Sainsbury London: Carlton, 2020 $21.99 (US) / 9781787013612 Reviewed by Lauren Harding * Every time I open the familiar blue cover of a Lonely Planet book, I feel a wave of warm nostalgia. I came of age at the time nearly twenty years…
Read more 1081 A pre-pandemic Lonely Planet
Covid 19: Living the Blues by Teresa Stolarskyj * Dear friends, In the days before Covid-19, indeed, for many years before it, I held residency on Saturday afternoons at Vancouver’s Railway Club. Immersing into the blues and rock n’ roll for a few hours a week, as regulars and newcomers alike took turns on the…
Read more Letters from the Pandemic 26: Living the Blues
MEMOIR: The Sonics at The Grooveyard: My Loud Baptism of Fire by Grahame Ware * On reviewing Aaron Chapman’s Vancouver After Dark (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2019), I was flooded with memories of my youth and the venues where I first learned the power and pull of nightclubs. My realization of this, my baptism of fire moment,…
Read more 1066 The Sonics at the Grooveyard