Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.
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All Lit Up is NINE!
We gave ourselves a little glow up to celebrate turning nine! Take a tour of our new site to discover books, litspaces, and fresh content.
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Poetry in Motion: David Martin + Kink Bands
For his sophomore collection Kink Bands (NeWest Press), poet David Martin explores the intersection between geology and language. Today he reads “Eroded Travel” from the book, on location in Bragg Creek Provincial Park.
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Under the Cover: The Sound of a Rainbow
Author and former high-school principal Sharon Frayne shares with us how the teen protagonist of her YA novel The Sound of a Rainbow (Latitude 46 Publishing) was inspired by a talented, but troubled former student, and how she hopes her book is a supportive reminder to teens today.
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Where in Canada: Hands Like Trees
From the crowded marketplaces of Calcutta to a passenger train hugging a Nepalese mountainside to the Brampton, Ontario suburbs in the dead of winter, Sabyasachi Nag’s Hands Like Trees (Ronsdale Press) gives each place its fair due in this sumptuous linked collection of stories, all following various members of the Sen family of Shulut, India.…
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ALU Summer Book Club: Follow-up Reads After Yaga
We’re keeping All Lit Up Summer Book Club vibes going with four follow-up reads to Kat Sandler’s Yaga (Playwrights Canada Press). Check out our picks for more witchy goodness, drama, and sleuthing for your TBRs.
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Poetry in Motion: Sadie McCarney + Your Therapist Says It’s Magical Thinking
The bold, Lisa Frank-esque cover of Sadie McCarney’s sophomore poetry collection Your Therapist Says It’s Magical Thinking (ECW Press) encases an introspective look into living with mental illness and her queer identity, specifically asexuality. She reads two poems from the collection for today’s Poetry in Motion.
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Reflections from the Contributors of Where They Stood
A collaborative anthology by young Black writers and the Black Community Resource Centre,Where They Stood (Linda Leith Publishing) showcases the evolution of the Black Anglo community in Montreal. The collection features essays by nine writers exploring the rich histories of immigrants, labourers, and activists who built the cultural, social and political community that exists to…
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Adventurize Your Summer: An Interview with Chris Pannell
Today we chat with award-winning poet Chris Pannell about his latest work, Adventurize Your Summer! (Wolsak and Wynn)—a collection of poems that contemplates travel, art, and humanity—and how his love/hate relationship with cruise vessels inspired the poem “The Captain’s Voice.” Read our short interview with Chris and a poem from his collection, below.
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Character Study: Lost Dogs
The darkly funny, character-driven debut novel Lost Dogs (Cormorant Books) would totally work as a feature film – and we’re glad its author, Lucie Pagé, agrees! Lucie donned our casting director’s cap to choose actors for characters Becca, Caroline, Katherine, and others, plus a director who could definitely bring their various stories home.
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ALU Summer Book Club: Yaga Staff Discussion
This week ALU book club broke out the snacks and met to discuss Kat Sandler’s Yaga (Playwrights Canada Press), our August book club pick. We shared thoughts on the whip-smart dialogue (seriously consider a play for your next book club for the dialogue alone!), representations of women, the Twin Peaks-ish vibe of the story, and more. Read…
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Under the Cover: A community of development workers in We Meant Well
As a Sustainable Development Consultant for various UN agencies, Erum Shazia Hasan was inspired to write her debut novel We Meant Well (ECW Press) after working in Haiti, and noticing a community of fellow development workers that was seldom mentioned in fiction. She discusses her experiences and how they tie back to the protagonist of We Meant Well, below.
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Read This, Then That: Debut Poetry
Grief, displacement, and survival are central themes in the works of these two debut poetry collections: Mirabel’s The Vanishing Act (& the Miracle After) (Guernica Editions) and Laila Malik’s archipelago (Book*hug Press) wade through loss and longing with completely unique expression.
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Quoted: Homebodies
Writer and poet Amy LeBlanc heads up her first collection of short stories, Homebodies (Great Plains Press) with an epigraph from none other than Emily Dickinson. Amy walks us through the quotation and why its evocation of hauntings-sans-houses is so fitting for her slightly uncanny, deeply human set of stories.
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ALU Summer Book Club: Interview with Kat Sandler
This week of ALU Summer Book Club we chat with author Kat Sandler of the irresistibly readable play Yaga (Playwrights Canada Press) about her take on the infamous Baba Yaga as “a villain and a protagonist,” how she loves creating complex female characters—especially older ones who are often invisible—and her approach to writing comedy.
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Read an Excerpt from The Full-Moon Whaling Chronicles
The highly anticipated follow-up to Forgotten Work, Jason Guriel’s The Full-Moon Whaling Chronicles (Biblioasis) is an imaginative verse novel set in the nearish future. Told in rhyming couplets, the story is an off-the-charts adventure ride with werewolf whalers and cult YA authors that the Toronto Star describes as “a dreamy mystery […] that’s going to…
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