An Equal Music by Vikram Seth

There’s an unfortunate phenomenon in which authors sometimes fall victim to their own success. For some, that means they stop pushing themselves and coast off of a formula that works. For Vikram Seth, it means he has slipped into Joseph Hellerism. It may be apocryphal, but Joseph Heller purportedly was asked how he’d respond to critics who say he’s never written a book better than Catch 22 and he purportedly responded, “I’d respond by saying that no one has written a book better than Catch 22.” Seth’s epic romance A Suitable Boy, clocking in at 1474 pages, is hard to live up to—it has such a rich cast of characters and is beautifully woven with multiple storylines. An Equal Music is also a love story of sorts, and it’s fine but it is unable to reach the same heights as his previous work.

The novel is about a quartet of musicians and follows, in part, their career. I quite liked witnessing the dynamics between Piers, Helen, Billy, and Michael (our protagonist and narrator) as they are offered important performances and a recording contract for Bach’s The Art of the Fugue. I also appreciated their superfan that follows them around, their lush agent, Erica, and the bigwig Ysobel that offers them a record contract. Even more engaging to me is that, early in the text, Michael’s girlfriend (and violin student) Virginie puts him on to an obscure work that he didn’t realize existed—a recording of Beethoven’s string quartet in C. minor, Op. 104. I seem to love the idea of ‘lost media’ in books, and watching Michael track down this lost piece was engaging.

The symbolism of that record also serves a functional purpose for the book. Michael unearths something that he thought was lost. On the same day, he’s on one bus passing by another and sees a woman he hasn’t seen in ten years on the opposite side. Ten years prior, they had a romantic relationship, but their careers went in different directions and there’s clear tension and regret over not seeing that relationship through. So, Michael reaches out and tries to get in touch with her on the same day he has found that long lost record. The record disappears from the story for a time and later resurfaces (this word choice is perhaps in poor taste) at the climax when it is flung into a lake and sinks for all time.

The trouble of the novel is the love story at its core. Readers will all have different interpretations, I’m sure, but to me I found Michael profoundly unlikable as a romantic lead. First of all, the fact that he is sleeping with his younger pupil is distasteful in itself, but he also does not treat Virginie very well. On the phone, he’s terse; he’s evasive and belittles her, and he stops engaging with her intimately. The fact is, he’s not in love with her and tells her as much. Worse, he cheats on her. When he and Julia encounter one another, they resume a romance, and she too is unfaithful to her partner. I have a hard time getting behind their romance because Michael is pushy with her and doesn’t respect her boundaries. He repeatedly does not listen to her when Julia says no. Time and time again he insists on intruding in her life, and it felt more desperate than passionate.

Perhaps I could let the obsessiveness and infidelity slide if there were enough moments to show the light they bring out in each other, but there doesn’t feel to me enough tenderness to justify the relationship. The relationship is entirely clouded by a brooding tone; the situation seems impossible—not in an erotic or fun impossible, but in a depressing impossible. I interpret the situation as Michael wanting a fresh start while Julia is looking for the perfect ending. Michael wants to relive their time ten years prior and refuses to let go of the past. Meanwhile, Julia is at the end of her musical career and it appears to me like she’s trying to settle the score (!) before she retires from playing piano. The disconnect between them sets up for a disastrous bond.

Later in the book, there’s a great scene in which Julia’s husband invites Michael to a party at their home. The invitation and the party itself are riddled with potential innuendos. It creates an atmosphere of suspicion: does he know? I would have liked that scene to go on for longer, actually; lingering in that ambiguity creates a great tension for the story that has otherwise read as a bit repetitive. Michael sits in the discomfort, narrating in a series of questions about whether Julia’s husband has found them out and what the consequences might be. In my view, Seth pulls the ripcord a bit too soon and Julia reveals that yes, he knows, no she doesn’t know how, yes she can tell from his face. 

To Seth’s credit, as unlikable as Michael is, Julia remains a sympathetic character. The secret at the core of her character is that she is going deaf. (Note to self: finally get around to watching the movie Sound of Metal). She knows that things are ending for her, and so her connection with Michael is mournful. She plays music with him as a quintet knowing that it will be the last time she will perform with others, and Michael cannot accept it. There’s an awkwardness surrounding her deafness, a secret that Michael finds himself forced to share (he’s the worst!—how dare he betray her confidence like that? Revealing her secret could ruin her!).

In fact, most of the characters are fleshed out pretty beautifully. They feel distinct. Authentic. When I think about the classics of literary fiction, particularly in the British tradition, I think of novels populated with unique and memorable characters. Seth seems to capitalize on that approach. The members of the quartet all have their affectations and interests, but Michael also engages with a broad range of colourful characters. Mrs. Formby, for example, is a family friend and former teacher to Michael whose spirit really shines. Her generosity leads to her promoting his career and loaning him (essentially for life), his prized violin. Seth’s knack for populating his books with real people is one of the highlights of the text.

On the topic of the violin, what I found disappointing in the story structure is its ending. Throughout the book, Michael and Julia’s relationship sits in the foreground and there are any number of moments that I think warrant a permanent dissolution of their affair. When it finally happens for real, it feels weirdly unearned—not a genuine climax, but simple period at the end of a sentence. Even throwing the record into the lake feels understated. The denouement goes in an entirely different direction; with about forty pages to go, the story is no longer primarily about Michael’s romantic endeavour. Instead, we see him quit the quartet and mill about purposelessly. We also find out that Mrs. Formby has died and has left Michael her violin. In life, she had told Michael that he would need to return it so that she could rearrange her assets and give funds to her nephew. Michael accepted that the time was coming, and is surprised to find out she had a change of heart before her death. Her nephew then reaches out, threatening a lawsuit. This bit of drama is short-lived and as a result gives the ending an unfocused quality. The conflict is an echo of the novel’s main theme: the pain of loss, the joy of recovery, the deepening pain of once again losing that which we thought was returned. The obscure record, Julia, the violin: they each follow a similar pattern. To that end, the violin lawsuit piece makes sense, but it feels like a whimper at the end of the movement rather than a crescendo. It feels like the characters don’t really learn anything, but get to enjoy their stasis. Michael, at the end of the novel, has not committed to returning to the quartet and goes back and forth on whether to go to Julia’s performance of The Art of the Fugue. He simply cannot stay away from the beautiful music—and music is a clear stand-in for Julia and vice versa.

As you’ve likely noted, there are clear parallels between the characters’ emotional states and the other elements of the text. The descriptions of the instrumentation, for example, often mimic the depressive streaks of the characters. The description of the violin and how it is touched mimics the way Michael feels, too. There are lush descriptions of both sound and visuals; partly, Seth seems to highlight the visuals when Julia is losing her hearing, which is a nice touch. There’s a clear craftsmanship to the work; the novel is quite proficient in that respect.

An Equal Music is generally good, but if you’re like me you’re going to have to accept that the main character is unlikable. It’s a love story that makes more sense as a cerebral exercise rather than one of the heart. The bond between the lovers seems to me more about their contexts and life circumstances than genuine affectionate moments, so it doesn’t quite land for me in that respect. I still like Vikram Seth’s writing and his ability to economically flesh out characters is a true talent. Now that I’ve read Seth’s three published novels, I’m going to have to convert to his poetry or wait for the encore: A Suitable Girl —a sequel thirty three years in the making (so far).

In the intermission, happy reading!

Starting Somewhere: Community Organizing for Socially Awkward People Who've Had Enough by Roderick Douglass

It’s easy to feel defeated. The same fights have been happening for years. The world seems to keep getting worse. I think it’s pretty draining to see how limited the long-term change has been, especially when we reflect on the level of public discourse in the last decade. What can we do? How do we carry forward? It’s the need to address these questions that compels me to practical guides like Roderick Douglass’ Starting Somewhere: Community Organizing for Socially Awkward People.

Before diving into the review, I have two notes. One is that the book leans way more heavily on the community organizing piece and there’s very little by way of actually coaching socially awkward people to get involved. The other caution is that, in researching the author for the text, I encountered some controversy. There are some claims from roughly two years ago that the author is not supportive to queer Black folk and he maybe went missing for a while? The details are hazy and I haven’t been able to parse it out yet.

The book is a contemporary look at creating change within communities. The book moves through a few different phases and modes. Partly, it’s a manifesto of beliefs; partly, it’s a history of some activist movements in the United States and contemporary instances of, for example, police brutality; partly, it’s a personal memoir and reflection. Of course, it also sometimes reads like a listicle of rules for organizing.

The book starts off with an account of the author’s criminal past, running a CoinStar scam because the machines, at the time, all used the same keys. Douglass makes the case that this is a rebellion against capitalism. The anecdote is an engaging one to start the text.

From there, the book goes through some principles and practicalities for organizing community movements. Then, the text goes into some specific tactics for agitating. The book finally builds towards some discussion of common principles and values for guiding the work. I would say that the text gives more practical and applicable tips than some of the more philosophical social justice books I’ve read, which is a welcome change, even if I don’t entirely agree with the efficacy or viability of some strategies for myself.

One of the things I really appreciated about the book is the way Douglass frames how organizations should form and operate. Essentially, everyone needs to start small and go to community events. There’s an optimistic bent about going to community events that aren’t necessarily political in nature but that aim to address community needs—maybe it’s a fundraiser for building a new park, or maybe it’s a tree planting event, or maybe it’s a film screening followed by a discussion. These all become framed as places where people can find political affinities. Douglass discourages people from starting new groups—at least without starting by looking to see if any similar groups exist. The groups should all target particular community needs and address those first. Maybe the ultimate goal is to dismantle racism, but maybe the first step is just to replace racist graffiti on a particular wall downtown. Douglass also frames community organizations as fluid and dissolvable. That’s a really refreshing approach; I often feel like I need to be part of something eternal and everlasting, but Douglass suggests that the whole point of community groups is to do a job and then either update themselves or disband. It makes the whole idea of social justice seem much more manageable.

In terms of tactics, Douglass suggests everyone “lie, cheat, and steal.” He encourages that people lie to police, for example—whether it be about their name, or giving them the wrong directions when they see a teenager running away from them, and even going so far as to perjure yourself in court to let friends off the hook. The part about stealing is quite literal: Douglass goes through 22 tips for shoplifting effectively. I don’t really see myself taking this particular form of action, but I appreciated the cheekiness of making a whole chapter about how to be a better criminal. I’d have to do some more research to see how reliable the advice is. 

In another chapter, Douglass goes into the details for effective community organizing with clear, practical suggestions. The text is nothing if not accessible. There’s a number of ideas regarding everything from how to structure your meeting agendas, how to select meeting spaces, who to hire for supporting crowd control, where to get money from, and so on and so forth. The chapter reads largely like a checklist and I can imagine it being used as such.

The latter part of the book gets more philosophical in nature. There’s a relatively lengthy discussion of voting as a tactic. I have to admit I take some issue with his line of argumentation, but I can appreciate it nonetheless. His argument is that voting provides legitimacy to a system that is fundamentally unjust; all politicians, in Douglass’ view, are fascist. I understand not wanting to provide legitimacy to the system, particularly in a two-party system. Douglass disagrees with the idea of voting as harm reduction, but I just have such a hard time believing that there’s no difference between, say, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. Certainly, there are issues with Harris’ lack of care for the genocide of Palestinians—not that Trump cares, either. I just don’t believe that, had Harris been elected, Elon Musk and Doge would have been a thing or that our public discourse would be so openly racist, or that ICE would have been sent into major cities like a private militia. Voting isn’t going to change the system, and I hate the idea of providing legitimacy to it, but at the same time I can’t let go of the idea of harm reduction voting.

The ending of the book also goes into some more broad principles for organizing. For instance, about who to accept money from (or not), and how to manage the safety of members in groups. Douglass discusses the idea of crowdfunding and how to allocate funds directly to those most impacted. He also offers alternatives to raising money and focusing on tangible goods. He presents skepticism around NGOs and suggests that any group that has extra funds saved up is suspect: all money should be spent immediately on the projects the group has at hand (except, perhaps, legal fees). There’s then a whole section about the role of men within the movement and how becoming better partners and taking care of children can also free up space for their partners to lead revolutionary movements. Douglass discusses the necessity of holding men accountable for their actions when former abusers cannot be pulled from the movement entirely. I think reality gets messier, but Douglass’ optimism is fundamental to sustaining ourselves.

Overall, the book is an accessible outline for community organizing with its fair share of tips and anecdotes for how to effectively engage in community action. I appreciate its overall project: we are firmly rooted in the idea of praxis here, not too philosophical to be actionable. It seems like a worthwhile primer for people looking to get started in their communities. I’m sure there are some tips that you’d be able to apply in your own efforts.

Happy reading and happy engaging!

Whetstone by Lorna Crozier

There is a brand of quiet poetry that appeals to and influences me in my own work. To that end, I’ve returned to Lorna Crozier’s work, specifically her collection Whetstone. As with any similar collection, some of the poems resonated and others did not. It’s more about occupying the same psychic space and allowing yourself to be guided along.

The titular poem stands out as one of the highlights for me, particularly because of its vivid first lines: “The stone that sharpens stars, / their slow slice across the sky” (13). Jan Zwicky’s essay about resonance in poetry has proven enduring in the way I think about poems. Resonance often seems to use juxtaposition as a medium for finding connection, and following this idea of a stone sharpening stars in the sky, Crozier says, “it must have mingled with the gravel / on the road I run. Now its light / has reached my eyes” (13). I can see a parallel between the smattering of stars across a night sky and the stream of stones that form the gravel, every once in a while one standing out. There’s also an odd inversion here, though, because typically we’d think of the light from stars’ light taking years to reach our eyes, but the pronoun here refers to the whetstone. It intimates the slow labour of sharpening but at the same time, the stone is placing a demand on the speaker: “What does it want from me? / To be moved into another / galaxy of knives?” (13). Alternatively, the stone could be making a call “to be looked upon and left / where it has found me?” (13). The stone is given agency, while the speaker is being called towards agency. Or, perhaps there’s no difference between them: “Maybe it’s just a stone // among other stones, desireless / and unafflicted” (13). As with other poems in this mode, a small phenomenon is then extended into something much larger, more cosmic. The narrator reflects: “Does it know I am // dulled by God? / His negligence, / his under-use” (13). I think the poem, at its core, is a matter of agency and responsiveness, and ultimately the choice to either act or not act.

Crozier’s mode here feels so similar to Jan Zwicky; I notice her guidance is documented in the acknowledgements of Whetstone. This influence also emerges in the meditations on nature. The book is largely wintery, and “Prayers of Snow” sets that tone, which reads, in part, as follows:

Snow is a lesson in forgetting, a lesson in gravity,
a long loose sentence spiralling to the end of thought.
It prays to the young god robed in white, his ascent
a blizzard returning to the sky. (11)

As I suggested, there’s a kind of cosmic quality imbued to the natural phenomenon. The laws of the universe (gravity) are embodied by a particular, observable phenomenon (snow). Having tangible images like this really gives readers something to latch onto. Imagining snow as a kind of language is also delightful; the snow streams down as a “long loose sentence” and the odd inversion of a blizzard returning to the sky is a nice touch. The poem then reads as a kind of prayer and ultimately the snow “closes the gap / between drought and plenty, belief and blasphemy, / the ear and silence” (11). The idea of snow being something that joins disparate phenomena together feels true. Consider the way that an endless stretch of white snow erases distinct features and makes everything into one canvas. Snow becomes “a migration of birds / without eyes, without feet, who settle white in branches / on breasts and wings. When you stride through snow / in dreams of waking, you are a star-walker. / It prays to the soft fall of your books” (11). I like the way the snow prays to the world around it and the distinction between snow and other things fades: snow and birds are the same. The idea of being a “star-walker” every time you walk through snow also gives the poem its cosmic quality and makes sense with the idea of snow being star-like in its shape.

There are other poems that have a similar motif: a totalizing phenomenon that reveals connection. In the poem “Solitude,” for example, Crozier describes “Sometimes the dark’s so dark / nothing can move through it” (38). She specifies that the wind and the geese can’t move through it, despite how an hour ago they “charcoaled their journey from star to star” (38). I love noun-verbs, and “charcoaled” here feels evocative. Again, there’s a motif of stars that stand as nodes in a network of connection. The poem then continues to describe in second person that “you love the lake at night / because water keeps its distance / yet carries sound, crackled and clear, from the farthest shore” (38). Again, there’s these spaces that are vast and empty but serve as bridges of connection to the farthest shores. Crozier again gets more precise: “the hard notes of a party / drift through the screen from cabins / on the southern spit” (38). If you’ve ever sat by water in the darkness, you know these two emptinesses that connect: “You said / nothing moves through this dark. / But music does, and voices, / and you go on” (38).

One more poem I’d like to comment on is “The Physics of the Rose.” The poem opens with an epigraph about the electron and us living in different worlds. In describing the rose, Crozier says “each petal [is] an eyelid, blood-fused, over what / invisible eyes!” (24). The idea of an eyelid sealed shut by blood is both beautiful and horrific. Continuing to describe the rose, “fold after fold, its silence so enclosed / it seems a kind of speaking, light’s muted // hallelujah brought inside” (24). Crozier reads into silences and finds their voice. She looks into the quiet phenomena and imbues them with a voice, just as these roses speak in the silence of their folds. Later in the short poem, she describes it as “the antithesis of absence, / of stillness, its red fist unfurling / this, this and this, a daring to be open / so immoderate you want to say outrageous, / you want to say ridiculous, but can’t” (24). The idea of the rose being the antithesis of absence is a compelling phrase and emulates Crozier’s philosophy. Despite the silence, the rose speaks. Despite this, there’s a dark tone that gets couched in pretty imagery. Crozier describes the rose as “shocking as a heart cut out and set in glass” (24). The gruesome undertone draws attention to that which is otherwise quiet. The final lines of the poem then invert our expectations: suddenly we are the one being watched. She writes, “Clothed or not, you stand naked in its eyes. / Small and unadorned, / without a lover” (24). We are no longer the observer; the brilliant presence of the rose is observing us…I suppose when you stare into the rose long enough the rose stares back?

Throughout the collection, there were a number of poems I liked, a few that I loved, and a few I failed to linger on. It’s a good collection and, as with all poetry, the more time I spent thinking through it the more I was able to see what Crozier’s mission might be. It’s worth reading and I’ll stand by my philosophy that poems are best read as part of a full collection. The more time you spend with a voice, the more you’re able to hear its nuances.

Happy reading!

Empire of Normality: Neurodiversity and Capitalism by Robert Chapman

  Take a moment to recall everything you know about René Descartes. “I think therefore I am” and all that. Did his means of death make your list? That he was poisoned by a Catholic priest who laced the communion wafer with arsenic? …What?! This is one of the surprising details that emerges in Robert Chapman’s impressive historical analysis Empire of Normality: Neurodiversity and Capitalism.

This nonfiction text essentially posits the thesis that the rise of capitalism created a normalizing framework that produces out-groups of disability that it subsequently exploits for its own wealth-generated ends. The book then champions the idea of reshaping society in a way that is more accessible for the neurodiversity inherent in our society. Ultimately, when we consider “disability,” or discuss ill mental health, the questions are: on what grounds? according to whom? They give the example of autism, which is seen as a disability because the world is not structured to respond to it. The fault lies with our structures, not the individuals who have been excluded from them.

The argument of the book is persuasive in its own right, but what I thought was most fascinating about the text were the historical parallels and the extraordinarily clear articulation of the central points.

In this history, Chapman describes the relationship of people in feudal society to work and disability. The thesis here is that people with disabilities were accommodated in the early days of feudalism—if you had mobility issues, you were given work in the home like sewing, while if you had difficulty in thinking clearly you might still be able to complete the menial tasks of farm life. The conception is probably a little idyllic, but nonetheless effectively establishes that each person had their place irrespective of disabilities.

Chapman then proceeds to explore the transition into a more capitalist and exclusionary mode. Returning to Descartes, for example, we see a concise and precise discussion of the philosopher’s contributions to conceptions of identity. Chapman outlines how Descartes initiated a conception of the human body which is mechanistic. (Chapman makes reference to Descartes’ interest in creating an automaton version of his daughter, though this anecdote appears to be debunked.) In any case, Descartes saw the body as animated not by a soul but by its own machinery. This emerges alongside increasing mechanization of work (and therefore the workforce). When the human body is nothing special, it becomes a machine that can be exploited for the ends of capitalism. 

The problem then becomes one of standardization. Again, the historical backdrop is pretty interesting. They describe how statistics emerged as a discipline from astronomers and astrologers trying to account for the variable appearance of astral bodies. They were searching for regularity and predictability. With the emergence of statistics as a field of study, it also led to the idea of standardization. It became a quest for the average. Capitalist logics adopted the idealism of the ‘average’ in order to increase its profitability: you produce products that appeal to the ‘average’ person. Some people argue that capitalism breeds innovation, but really it breeds the most easily sellable products on a mass-scale, meaning that the consumers which deviate from a conception of the ‘average’ user of product are left out of capitalism’s priorities. Capitalism looked for the ‘average’ needs of consumers and used statistics to render brains and consumers ‘normal’ in their consumption. This becomes even worse following Fordism and the standardized production process.

The trajectory Chapman sets out has a kind of clarity in its logic, and the byproduct is that capitalism creates in-groups and out-groups. The in-groups are people who are neurotypical and able to operate within capitalism’s structures—that is, until they burnout and enter the out-group neurodivergent class. The neurodivergent class is created as an outgroup that needs to access wellness through consumption. Capitalism wins its producers and consumers.

I appreciated that Chapman includes a chapter that addresses the nuances of mental illness. Seeing that capitalism benefits from broadening its conception of disability to create an excluded class, the temptation is to dismiss the psychiatry movement. Chapman, though, reserves a chapter for arguing against the anti-psychiatry movement. I have my own difficulties with the psychiatry movement; Foucault’s critique of the Power-Knowledge that informs the DSM always stuck with me. It does appear that psychiatry aims to normalize the human experience, which feels problematic. But, ignoring the real and authentic suffering of people with mental health concerns seems nearly as problematic as allowing capitalism to exploit them.

One interesting anecdote is Chapman’s account of the alliance between queer folk and the antipsychiatry movement. As many of you surely know, the DSM originally included homosexuality as a mental disorder and we see how antipsychiatry’s objection to the DSM formed an alliance with queer people who might otherwise want to access mental health supports but who object to the DSM’s construction of disorder. When the APA voted to remove homosexuality from the DSM, it should feel like a win, but it opened the question of how mental illness is distinct from other non normative ways of being. It created a conception of the psychiatry industry as arbitrary.

Chapman also looks at the intersection of race and neurodiversity. They provide some historical notes about how antislavery movements and civil rights movements have long been at the forefront of disability advocacy. I’m confident that an entire book could be written on the intersection of disability and antiracism advocacy; Chapman offers a brief but welcome glimpse into that story. There’s also a fair amount of commentary on the development of eugenics movements—even within supposedly liberal spaces—and different philosophies towards treating psychological afflictions (or ‘problems in living’). 

Ultimately, Chapman finds a balance between a questioning of neuronormativity while still holding space for the genuine afflictions in peoples’ lives, especially those that have been exacerbated by capitalism (cf. Mark Fisher re: depression within capitalist structures). As the world becomes more reified, the notion is that minds also must become more reified. Championing neurodiversity means that we recognize a philosophy towards society: different kinds of minds are suited to different kinds of tasks.

The book was really insightful into the historical context for neurodiversity and presents a persuasive argument for the connection between the standardization of capitalism and the production of out-groups (potentially stretching the definition of mental health so far as to render everyone disabled and thus consumers within the capitalist models). I really appreciated how thoughtful Chapman is in his approach and how applicable the text feels for engaging in advocacy both against capitalism and in favour of a neurologically diverse population.

Happy reading!

Stone Serpent by Tristan Dineen

  Before I start this review, I’ve got a few disclaimers I need to acknowledge. The author of the book and I are friends and I’ll primarily be focusing on my highlights for the text. Additionally, my review is based on a pre-publication manuscript that I was editing so the author, Tristan Dineen, may very well have adjusted the final copy. With those disclaimers done, we can begin on Dineen’s latest fantasy novel: Stone Serpent.

Not that I’m an expert, but I think that a few core elements that make fantasy novels successful are world-building and character development. On both fronts, I think Stone Serpent works. Right from the prologue, Dineen demonstrates a strength in setting the scene with effective imagery (a little later the “dull green hump of Weya-Nama wore a broken crown of ruins”), and the conflict between slavers and a supernatural snake-man sets up some expectations for the world’s magic. There’s a pretty gruesome moment that establishes the tone of the book—and the potential of the book’s evil forces—and serves as a compelling entrypoint to the conflict.

When the novel starts in earnest, we shift perspective to a young boy, Ta, on the occasion of a local ceremony. Once again, Dineen establishes our understanding of the world, their beliefs, their practices. I appreciated the focused scope in this section; it felt like a nice introduction to the world and the novel explores the broader scope of the world more gradually. It felt inviting and, in my opinion, the more immersive for it.

Ta stands out as one of text’s most memorable characters. He’s a brash young guy whose idealism drives his reckless actions. He longs to be a hero and, later, to claim (if a little preemptively) his destiny in the form of his ancestor’s sword. He reads somewhat like a Don Quixote figure, obsessed with stories of adventure and putting his friends at risk to live out the fantasy. Ta’s friend Lu possesses a similar affliction, but in the draft version he reads a little more one-dimensionally—an enthusiastic yes man for Ta’s misadventures. The two together serve as our initial duo that initiate us into the world and whose interest in stories of old parallels those of the reader.

In the gaming world, there’s a trope in a lot of JRPGs where a young boy goes on a seemingly innocuous adventure only to find himself the one remaining person to resist an unfathomable evil force. I like it and it feels nostalgic to me, so to see the pattern playing out in Stone Serpent has an odd satisfaction for me. Dineen transitions beautifully from a lighthearted call to adventure to an ominous and suspenseful register as Ta and Lu approach some ruins. Ta feels himself being called, drawn deeper into the ruins. I’ll avoid spoiling too much, but the dramatic irony where the audience knows that things aren’t right while Ta follows his intuition builds a great sense of dread. There’s a further double-down on the disaster, but again I won’t spoil too much.

The second phase of the book transitions to a group of other characters—Balkash, Naas, and Hong. Dineen again provides some compelling backstory for the characters and helps to establish their milieu. We see the contrasting philosophies of different people in the world and we see the ‘big city’ context and the exploitation of workers and the group quickly runs into trouble, being transported by boat to their execution. The chapter feels bleak and again there’s a great tension as they come to face-to-face with their cruel executioner.

Around this time, things start getting really interesting for my favourite character in the novel, if for no other reason than his philosophical potential. I may not get this description exactly right, but Polliss is a humanoid feline mage who, thanks to a crushable figurine, can teleport out of danger to a destination not entirely of his will. What I find most interesting about the character, though, is the transience of his identity. Polliss essentially serves as a host for the phoenix Baal, a judgmental companion that speaks directly into Polliss’ mind. There’s a lot of opportunity there to explore what it means to be an individual when constantly hosting another consciousness—this becomes even more complex when Polliss is embodied inside another man’s corpse. Essentially, it’s a body not his own, hosting a consciousness of his own, which itself hosts another consciousness not his own. It’s a rich concept that lands really nicely, especially when he’s considered in contrast to the animated statue villains, described as “soulless puppets of stone pulled by invisible strings.” It’s interesting to see the contrast of multiple consciousnesses crammed into one body in contrast to the animated stone, which seems to operate vaguely as one consciousness spread out between many bodies. There’s a lot to work with here in terms of identity, consciousness, and we could even draw parallels with discourses as diverse as psychoanalysis, trans identities, or computer networking.

The novel operates within an apocalyptic mode, where a godlike snake-man is unleashing unheard-of magic. At his introduction, people are transformed into stone and then reanimated as malicious statues hunting the survivors. Beyond that, much of the book actually presents the environment as the primary threat to survival: the natural world is warping and becoming overgrown. As the story progresses, the party expands and each character has a role to play in surviving and saving the world. I was actually hoping for a bit more of Ta throughout the main body of the text (and more episodes with the central villains to explore their motivations) but there’s enough variety and differentiation between the other sets of characters to keep the story moving. That approach is particularly true for chapter 36, where different storylines are woven together in short bursts, making the chapter feel lively and giving the story a satisfying cohesiveness.

The novel has a balance of action sequences and more meditative moments of connection between the characters. In the final act, there are some great developments with the characters’ relationships and that makes the ending of the book all the more devastating. I admit that I either forgot or didn’t realize that Stone Serpent is the opening of a new series, so as I saw the ending creeping closer I felt the dread of irresolution. Even so, the ending of the book is powerful—but not for the reasons I expected. The book’s early lightheartedness, by the end, has clearly transformed to a more somber tone. There are some painful losses and one character proves himself such a spineless bastard that I can’t wait for him to get his comeuppance in the sequel. The emotional investment I felt in that betrayal is an excellent payoff which, upon review, was clearly foreshadowed and all the more satisfying for it. There’s a lot of dread permeating the end of the book and it was both refreshing and frustrating that the ‘good guys’ failed to have the upper hand.

Dineen’s writing, as I’ve alluded to, is nicely structured around the novel’s key moments. There’s a good build-up to the key plot points and the payoffs generally feel earned (there was one early one with Polliss crushing a statue, but something later in the book justified the moment retroactively). Dineen’s use of strong phrases also gives the work its force. Sometimes, they are phrases embedded in paragraphs to build the moment, like “reality held its breath.” Sometimes, there are standalone lines that punctuate the moment by being their own paragraph. In a moment when characters are forced to keep their heads down and row, and then the following paragraph is simply: “the lash would do the rest.” I’ve alluded already to the imagery like a “dense canopy permitting only token seams of light.” There are lots of lines to like that help enrich the overall project.

I’ve barely scratched the surface of Stone Serpent. There are more characters and more moments than I could possibly cover here—and I wouldn’t want to give away all the key surprises here, anyway.

After all, Tristan Dineen is hosting a launch for the book on June 25th at 7p.m. at Red Brick Cafe in Guelph. You could pick up your copy of Stone Serpent and hopefully take a few moments to engage with its author.

Happy reading!

courbure de la terre par jonas fortier

  My reviews of French poetry books are always the most niche, but at least once a year I try to expand my horizons and practice my second language…so here we go with courbure de la terre par jonas fortier.

courbure de la terre essentially translates to “curvature of the earth.” The title feels appropriate not only because so many of the poems feature round elements, curves along the horizon, but because there’s something about the tone of the poems that also feels soft. fortier is not a writer of hard edges but of gentle invitations. The poet takes on a mode that feels like some early French symbolists, drawing inspiration from things like the moon or rain drops and finding the deeper significance that is sometimes unspeakable.

There’s a layer of irony to me making that statement, though. There’s a sequence of poems in which fortier reflects on writing directly and provides a list of the types of poet he is not, outlining both motivations and processes for writing. He’s not a poet that works in a factory in unimaginable conditions; he’s not the poet that stays up all night and kills himself at twenty three. These tropes of the depressive and the isolated don’t reflect him, so while there are some symbols that are resonant with classic poetry, he still distances himself from their tradition.

I appreciate the art of quiet poems. fortier has a real observational quality in his work, rendering clouds and rain drops into art. The poem sequences are often untitled, and it blurs the line between individual poems and sequences of connected pieces, but the section <<Le sommeil est le neveu de la mort>> contains a piece that feels representative of the precise quality of fortier’s style. The piece reads, in part, as follows:

cette peine-là
est de saison, brume
démanchée contre le ciel
il se met à pleuvoir de minuscules araignées
des étoiles comme nous mais mieux
des gouttelettes encore poudreuses
comme des briques muettes
des flèches d’averse
viennent crever dans nos bras faibles
et nous portons à nos lèvres
des souvenirs d’herbes (54)

The description has that touch of tenderness and devastation that characterizes what I often think about in terms of a “poetic mode.” I particularly appreciate the rain being described like tiny spiders, rendering the droplets somewhat creepy, but also as stars “like us but better.” The line breaks sometimes make the lines read ambiguously, but the poem goes on to describe the droplets like falling arrows or bricks and there’s a heaviness there that counterbalances the softness of the powdery rain drops.

The section <<Vérités permanentes>> has some of my favourite pieces, which extend fortier’s motifs about the sky and clouds. In one piece, the speaker identifies himself and another (<<nous>>) as parallel to clouds, carrying the names of their fathers and the clothes of their mothers and big beards that have grown over time and having bodies like grapes where you can’t see inside. The poem’s volta explores a new angle and fortier explores the future, made of houses with hard planks that speak as you step on them. He talks about the opening of the house, the opening of the future, letting the wind speak through open doors and windows. The poem ends on the idea of the moon guiding people to the house alongside thin, key-like trees. It reads better in French: <<d’arbres minces / comme des clés>> (62). The extended metaphor works beautifully and mimics fortier’s approach: you are being trained as a reader how to listen to space, how to hear messages from your environment. It’s hard to translate here but there’s also an aural quality to the work, where particular sounds echo with a slight difference: dures / dureté, de soi / ce soir, and so on. These give the poem a coherence that feels like it touches on something other-worldly. 

The collection also reflects a fair deal on language itself. The section <<Vérités permanentes>> opens with a reflection on grammar:

il y a un temps
grammatical
qu’on appelle
vérité permanente

je n’en avais jamais entendu parler
jusqu’à ce qu’un Bescherelle
me révèle son nom

c’est arrivé par surprise
comme la lettre d’un ami cher
après des années passées
dans la contemplation
d’un pays lointain

j’ai eu une émotion très positive
bien que si proche de la tristesse
en apprenant que la vérité
peut être temps présent (59)

There’s a nostalgia to the piece that resonated with me, namely the idea of learning grammar from a Bescherelle (French Immersion kids represent!). I like, too, the sense of revelation that studying grammar brings and the reality that opens up. I also appreciate the tenuousness of the border between positive emotions and sadness and the way those converge at moments of clarity.

I can’t pretend that I understood the nuances of each of the poems in this collection. I do feel that the tone read as tender and a little tragic, but reflective and appreciative of the world. I flagged one of the early poems in the collection because I felt I didn’t have the vocabulary to really delve in. As I translated it a little more, the imagery stood out more dramatically: it was about kids “chained to strollers” watching birds and knowing that life is invented by the spirits of our dead, who have become <<essaims d’abeilles>> (24)—that is, swarms of bees. The poem took on a new philosophic intensity and then becomes a reflection on time reflected in the northern hemisphere collapsing like wet butter on the sidewalk. 

Another piece I revisited reinforced the idea of the poet as a wanderer. I’m tempted to put him alongside Baudelaire as a flanneur, but I’ll resist easy categorization. Essentially, there’s a poem about wandering but then clinging to certain phenomena, including the increasingly strange—like urine accumulating in ant nests (37). There’s an endless searching and a turning up of the speaker’s eyes to the stars…but we’d call them eggs (37). It’s an odd line to end on, a bit of cheekiness that I feel undermines the self-seriousness of the wandering poet’s approach.

Returning to the section <<Le sommeil est le neveu de la mort>>, there’s a piece that ties these elements together. There’s a roundness to the piece, the observational quality, and the sense of wandering and searching that fortier highlights. The poem has a simplicity to it: it lists different types of droplets—respiration, cuts and injuries, brilliant drops (52). The poet rolls like a dice all while marching on, ready to scale mountains and appreciating the thyme growing at the side of the sidewalk.

I admit I’m not the perfect audience for this book; I appreciate the language, but am not apt enough to appreciate its nuances and possibilities. The poems felt tender and beautiful and quiet, with flashes of the philosophical, which I tend to enjoy. It’s a nice collection and if you’re a reader of French, I’d love to hear you extend the conversation.

Happy reading!

Mornings Without Mii by Mayumi Inaba

  If you’ve ever had a pet, you’ve probably felt gratitude for how they’ve been there for you during any number of significant moments in your life. The memories we form alongside our pets have a special place in us, so it makes sense that Mayumi Inaba grounds her memoir Mornings Without Mii in memories of her cat. It is her life, but through the lens of a beloved pet.

The book is a quiet, meditative reflection on Inaba’s life that reads like an episodic novel. Each section is also punctuated with a poem that parallels her experiences with her cat Mii. The account of finding Mii is heartrending; she finds the cat hanging on a school fence and rescues her from her vulnerable state. She brings the cat to trust her and they have a clear special bond and they ultimately go on walks together.

There’s a sequence that I thought had a really interesting framing. Inaba talks about the dissolution of her marriage. The relationship is clearly coming to an end but it’s anchored in their relationship with the cat. Inaba is trying to find a home but the leases all have specifications against cats. In the end, she finds a place where she can move with her cat to write, but her husband cannot make the move with her. She then reflects on her choice and sees that choosing her cat was a way of making the harder choice to let her marriage end.

As the book progresses, Inaba recounts a few significant neighbours in her life around their interactions with Mii. There’s one memorable sequence in which she remembers Mii running away and the panic of trying to find her—and then finding her with a neighbour and having to reclaim the cat. There’s also a great part where she hires a cat sitter who takes a lot of effort to personalize Mii’s care.

I think that the last third of the book is probably the most powerful; we witness Mii’s declining health and eventual death. For years, Mii declines such that her digestive system no longer functions. We then see a tenderness in Inaba as she tends to Mii, making it a routine to squeeze her bladder to help her urinate and to manually push feces through her system. They have evening walk routines and Inaba it’s clear how deeply she cares for her cat. It’s tragic watching her realize that there is nothing to be done for Mii; I think most pet owners will recognize that feeling—you know it might be time, but can’t bring yourself to do it. Inaba also recollects the memories for which Mii was her ongoing companion and, despite the book being fewer than 200 pages, it feels like an earned tragic walk down memory lane.

As I mentioned, the tone of the book is a quiet, meditative one. There’s a directness and simplicity in the language that serves a dual purpose. On the one hand, it gives the text an accessible quality and presents these nostalgic moments as matters-of-fact. On the other hand, the text’s elliptical quality gives it a weightiness, a mysteriousness. The poems at the end of the chapters are a nice touch; because the relationship with her cat develops alongside her writing career, the pairings have a formal purpose.

Of the poems, one about the loss of Mii and the mornings without her stands out as a highlight. The poem starts with the line “The night split split and never closed” (171). In the latter part of the poem, there’s a series of lines that I think encapsulate grief and loss beautifully:

“Your time in your body receded like the tide
leaving it empty
The dawn sunrise

A single unmoving point in a world on the move
The newspaper came   but there was nothing in it I

    wanted to read.” (171)

I think the line about there not being anything of the note in the newspaper is so true to life. Losing a pet creates a numbness where nothing else feels like it matters. And the fact that this comes at the end of a book about the loss feels like a nice parallel: words get to matter again as Inaba processes the loss of her beloved cat.

The book navigates difficult feelings: there’s a tension between the deep love you have for a pet, but the frustrations of caring for an ailing pet. There’s the grief and regret and doubt of doing what is best for your beloved animal companions. The book is pretty sweet, but at the same time offers its fair share of heartbreak.

If you’re looking for a bit of tenderness or if you’re processing your own pet grief, this book may well be for you. It seems inappropriate to end this review with my usual “happy reading” so instead, I’ll just request that you comment pictures of your little animal pals.