Amanda Perry

Nov 19, 2023 | reviewcanada.ca | Francine Pelletier |Amanda Perry

Earlier this year, Quebec’s National Assembly unanimously adopted a motion declaring the province no more racist than anywhere else. It was a strange move, as though politicians were magicians whose words sufficed to make theirs “among the most open and welcoming nations in the world.” Of course, this attempt to shield the population from slander was really a defence of state policy.

Jun 22, 2023 | reviewcanada.ca | Amanda Perry

The day after 2,400 homes in Fort McMurray burned down in a forest fire, I was at a wine and cheese reception in New York City. A fellow graduate student, from Toronto, brought up the news. “It seems like karma for climate change, doesn’t it?” I wanted to slap her. I’ve never been to Fort McMurray, the city of 68,000 people in the largest of Alberta’s oil sands regions. For someone born and raised in Edmonton, this is a neutral fact.

Mar 14, 2023 | reviewcanada.ca | Marie-Claire Blais |Amanda Perry

Augustino ou l’illumination Les Éditions du Boréal 96 pages, softcover and ebook At first glance, Augustino ou l’illumination (Augustino or illumination) is a melancholy finale to Marie-Claire Blais’s oeuvre. The slim volume contains seventy pages left behind by the Quebec writer, who died suddenly on November 30, 2021. Yet, even in fragmentary form, the text testifies to the fact that Blais’s career was never going to wrap up neatly.