Kelly G Baron

Nov 19, 2023 | reviewcanada.ca | Katherena Vermette |Kelly G Baron

Katherena Vermette returns with The Circle, the final instalment of her Stranger trilogy. With twenty-one points of view, each in focus only once in the book, it’s easy to make a prediction: The Circle won’t achieve the commercial success of The Break, Vermette’s novel from 2016, or even that of The Strangers, from 2021. But for readers who love a text in a unique form, one that actively works to defy genre divides, this is Vermette’s most exciting novel to date.

Jun 21, 2023 | reviewcanada.ca | Marta Balcewicz |Kelly G Baron

Marta Balcewicz’s debut novel, Big Shadow, begins with Judy, the seventeen-year-old narrator, describing her curious summer job before starting university: she has been entrusted by her cousin Christopher and his friend Alex to “watch the passing clouds.” She spends her days noticing how they “set themselves apart, by becoming shapes that had nothing to do with one another: wedding veils, curdled milk, trails of horse droppings perfectly spaced out.” And she carries a notebook in which to...