Monthly Archives: January 2018

Sauma, Luiza. Flesh Bone and Water. Scribners New York 2017. F;1/18. I would call this story successfully sentimental. It’s the first novel by this young writer, who grew up in Brazil and was educated and still lives in London. Its … Continue reading →

O’Donnell, Lawrence. Playing With Fire. Penguin, New York, 2017. NF;1/18. You didn’t have to be an American to have been affected by US political events of the late 1960s, any more than you have to be one now to feel … Continue reading →

January 2018 (see also March 2018) This was our first time at this Kits bistro and we were very impressed with the cuisine. It’s a space that used to be called Kits Daily, on West 2nd just off Burrard, and looking … Continue reading →

O’Connell, Mark. To Be a Machine. Doubleday New York, 2017. NF;1/18. This book by an English literature PhD from Ireland is about transhumanism. Trans-what? you may ask. It’s the current ideology that human beings can and eventually will, through one … Continue reading →

  January 2017 This place just north of the newly-gentrifying mid-Main corridor has apparently been taken over by young family members from the original chef of years gone by. It’s accessible, colloquial, classy, and sexy all at once. We had … Continue reading →

Barry, Sebastian. Days Without End. Penguin, New York, 2016. F; 1/18. I’ve hit a vein of Irish writers lately, and I’m sure that country can claim literary gold out of proportion to is population: Joyce, Yeats, Shaw, Goldsmith, Swift, others. … Continue reading →

January 2018 This little place reminded me of the MacKenzie Room, perched on a corner in a similar neighbourhood. Approaching it, I walked on the road briefly to avoid a homeless person’s elaborate structure on the sidewalk. Luigi is pitched … Continue reading →

Alcott, Kathleen. Infinite Home. Penguin Random House New York, 2015. F;12/17. I read a short piece by this young author in an issue of Tin House (Volume 19, Number 1) and liked her candid style. In place of the arch … Continue reading →

March 2017 Not by its name a place you would choose to have lunch. The Nervous Café. Or bipolar, or psychotic, or depressed. No, this place is psychologically clean as a whistle: unaffected Italian happiness in the middle of Toronto, … Continue reading →