6 Books for National Translation Month

Fragile Like a Bomb by Catherine Fred Lavarenne, translated from French by Natalia Hero (Baraka Books/QC Fiction)

Stéphanie, a Montréal writer, is recruited by a left-wing provincial party to run in their upcoming elections. After a surprise victory she is, despite her inexperience, appointed Québec’s Minister of Culture. As she navigates her new role, a wave of #MeToo denunciations erupts in the literary world. Stéphanie begins to make connections between her own experiences and those of the survivors daring to speak out. Fragile Like a Bomb is a powerful, illuminating novel that reveals how men’s violence against women is both intimate and institutional, shaping everything from personal memory to public culture.

The Case of the Caprice of Lost Time by Rune Christiansen, translated from Norwegian by Kari Dickson (Book*hug Press)

Two months following her mother’s death, Norma travels alone to visit her father, Torsten, with whom she has had a strained relationship since her parents divorced. Recently separated herself, Norma is at a crossroads in life and desperate to get away for a while. She views the chance to visit Torsten on the island where he now lives, in the family’s idyllic old summer home, as a much-needed retreat.

From the moment Norma steps off the ferry, a series of mysterious things begin to happen. She interprets each of these strange happenings as a sign and begins looking for answers to better understand herself and how her life has unfolded. With her beloved mother gone, only her emotionally distant father can provide them—unless the truth lies within herself.

The Colour of Time, or the Incredible Story of Mary Gallagher by Eric Dupont, translated from French by Peter McCambridge (Véhicule Press)

Sightings of the ghost of Mary Gallagher, who was murdered, are reported every six years in Montreal, three days after Quebec’s Saint-Jean-Baptiste holiday…

From the thrills and spills of the Expo 67 World’s Fair to the brothels, taverns, and trained bears of Mary Gallagher’s 19th century Griffintown district of Montreal, The Colour of Time is a larger-than-life saga. One of the hallmarks of Eric Dupont’s writing is the juxtaposition of the supernatural and real worlds—his trademark magical realism. This fabulous trip through time by the author of the bestselling Songs for the Cold of Heart is proof positive that history is no match for destiny, and that all of the future exists in the past.

Asbestos by Sébastien Dulude, translated from French by Pablo Strauss (Coach House Books)

An explosive 1980s coming-of-age story in a hardscrabble Quebec mining town.

Thetford Mines, an asbestos-mining town in Quebec, summer 1986. Nine-year-old Steve Dubois and ten-year-old Poulie revel in the joys of friendship, roaming free on their BMXs, building forts, reading Tintins, filling their disaster scrapbook, sharing escapades on the high slag heaps and landscapes that are part forest, part lunar. The two inseparable friends spend their days in idleness and innocence. But 1986 is a year rife with tragedy, from the Space Shuttle Challenger explosion to one closer to home, one that will rock Thetford Mines, and Steve, to the core. Five years later, we find Steve consumed by his obsession: to recreate his vanished paradise.

Songs in a Time of Confinement by Rashmy, translated from Tamil by Nedra Rodrigo (trace press)

Rashmy writes poetry in a Tamil unique to the East Coast of Sri Lanka, embedded in its ecologies and heavily influenced by its folklore, centuries of trade, and echoes of Qur’anic cadence. His work is both archive and testimony, making him one of the most significant contemporary poets of in the Tamil language.

In Songs in a Time of Confinement, Rashmy reveals the pandemic to be a time of recollection for survivors of other catastrophes like war and exile. Counting time through a hundred and one poems, the poet unravels memories of homeland, love, desire, war, faith, hauntings, and isolation – recalling youthful passions and separations, confinement during wartime, and the uncertainties of sudden and uncontrollable change.

Dear Chekhov by Michel Tremblay, translated from French by Linda Gaboriau (Talonbooks)

A table set outside in beautiful fall weather. A turkey roasting in the oven. Everything seems set for a festive family dinner—except that the playwright wants to rewrite his play. 

In Dear Chekhov, the renowned Michel Tremblay (re)examines an old unfinished script, a tribute to the legendary author of The Cherry Orchard and The Seagull. Will the play stand up in performance? The question obsesses the narrator, Tremblay’s alter ego Jean-Marc. And then there is Benoit, the author-brother, who settles his accounts with a detestable young critic, the current flame of their sister. This Great Actress has given her career a boost by working with a trendy millennial director, trashing Chekhov (and their mother’s memory) in the process. Dear Chekhov presents Michel Tremblay in total control of his art, holding a mirror up to the theatre in an irresistible “Chekhovian reflection of what we are.”