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Category Archives for In Matrix 78
Exit Wounds and The Complete Peanuts, 1963 to 1964
Exit Wounds
by Rutu Modan
Drawn & Quarterly, 2007
The Complete Peanuts, 1963 to 1964
by Charles Schulz
Fantagraphics, 2007
Read by Joe Ollmann
I first discovered the work of Rutu Modan in Drawn & Quarterly Volume 5. In the story Jamilti, she told the story of an average, bickering, engaged couple, whose day out buying wedding dresses and making wedding preparations [...]
Six Ways to Sunday by Christian McPherson
Nightwood Editions, 2007
Read by Laura Roberts
“Dirty pool halls, greasy restaurants, suburban skateboarder showdowns, and dangerous drug dens—some things in life just aren’t very subtle,” begins the back cover blurb for Christian McPherson’s collection of short stories, Six Ways to Sunday. True enough, these stories are about the gritty parts of Canadian cities that most of [...]
Basement Tapes by Andrew Faulkner, Nicholas Lea and Marcus McCann
The Onion Union, 2007
Available at www.theonionunion.com
read by Jesse Patrick Ferguson
In Basement Tapes, three bright young poets have created a wry and surprisingly uniform collection—that is, uniform tonally and stylistically, not in terms of the relative success of each poem. The collection works within the constraints of a “call-and-answer” framework, with each poem borrowing from another [...]
Avatar by Sharon Harris
Mercury Press, 2006
Read by Jenny Sampirisi
“I love you.”
The word love in poetry is often noosed with cynicism. Love brings with it an expectation of sentimentality that is (or has become) too abstract and sarcastic to be considered sincere. But what is that if not a poetic challenge? In Avatar Sharon Harris examines the world of [...]
The Atheist’s Bible by Shalom Camenietzki
Thistledown Press, 2006
Read by Aaron Tucker
Despite the title, The Atheist’s Bible is a compilation of stories that is deeply indebted to faith. While Judaism leaks into every story and guides each character, direct religiosity itself is at the fringes of the work. This collection instead puts a great deal of belief in the modern fable [...]
Tyrannosaurus Rex Versus The Corduroy Kid by Simon Armitage
House of Anansi, 2007
Read by Aaron Tucker
There is a joy in Tyrannosaurus Rex Versus The Corduroy Kid that readers will be hard pressed to find in many other books of poetry. Armitage employs a child-like wit and innocence through the images and tone of his poems, which allows each piece a whimsical playfulness reminiscent of [...]
The Milk Chicken Bomb by Andrew Wedderburn
Coach House Books, 2007
Read by Maria Giuliani
If the name Marvin sounds like it could belong to a geeky, nerdy little boy, you can safely assume that a town called Marvin would be a geeky, nerdy little town. It is in this small Albertan town that The Milk Chicken Bomb exists.
Bottle Rocket Hearts by Zoe Whittall
Cormorant Books, 2007
Read by Kelly Ward
Eve is nineteen, but has yet to experience much outside her sheltered family home in Dorval. She knows she’s different from the typical suburban kids she’s surrounded with; she doesn’t see herself reflected in the straight, white edges of cookie-cutter homes and shopping malls. So when she makes the move [...]
Vermeer’s Light by George Bowering
Talonbooks, 2006
Read by Jakub Stachurski
I haven’t the right to comment on Vermeer’s Light, a compendium of George Bowering’s work of the past twelve years. How does one critique a man who, having published over forty works in verse and prose, remains an imaginative force, his trademark humour and painful honesty intact, his present generosity with [...]