Whitney Moran

“You’re simply two people groping to find meaning when there’s little to none.” Sadly, this quote from Stacey May Fowles’ second novel aptly sums up my feelings on Infidelity. As a fan of Fear of Fighting (2008), I admit my expectations were high, and while Fowles does manage to cover meaningful terrain—about the lengths people […]

We are truly living in the era of the domestic thriller. I can’t very well talk about The Silent Wife without comparing it to the (also) bestselling Gone Girl, both for the (sort of) shared subject–victimized wife becomes murderous villain; adulterous husband gets his due–as well as the he-said/she-said format. It works well in both […]

An epic technological thriller set in the not-distant-at-all future, The Circle is named after a Facebook-meets-Google (though the author claims no relation) hands-in-every-pie computer company in Silicon Valley that has completely monopolized the e-sphere. Set completely on “campus,” this novel has a slow buildup but a reader-is-wiser eeriness from the get go. We follow newbie […]

“If only the heart had antennae to tap/out the way to the safest places.” Cadeau’s sophomore poetry collection is, as her name suggests, a little gift. A poet whose hushed phrases read with a fluidity and clarity approaching effortlessness, she instills in each poem in a sense of dark whimsy, a gentle crumbling of those […]

It’s one of the most basic and enduring arguments of our time: creationism versus Darwinism; intelligent design versus evolution. In Lauren Grodstein’s newest novel, it is precisely this argument that is taken up, over and over, from the perspectives of its protagonist, a professor of ethics in biology who offers a popular (though highly contested) […]

This spring the Friends of the Halifax Common released a collection of all-new poetry inspired by and in tribute to the 250th anniversary of Halifax’s iconic green space(s). With a detailed introduction of “the common” as a concept born in 11th-century Britain through to the modern, local iteration, the collection speaks to its enclosed poets’ […]

The marriage of form and content has never been healthier than in this darkly humourous rewriting of biblical and mythological parables. Rage of Poseidon brings a 21st-century perspective to iconic stories, from a first-person account of Athena’s drunken escapades to a three-frame retelling of Leda and the Swan to a single-frame that begins “So Jesus […]

The only book in which you’ll find composite images of Betty Crocker next to a definition of “crotch.” Jezebel, a self-identified “ladyblog” is easily the most popular and accessible (young) women’s general interest website online. While web content is driven mainly by pop culture, news and hilarious and/or thought-provoking personal essays through a feminist lens, […]

This little gem of a book is, in the way that only Mexican, Central and South American literature can be, as dark and gritty as it is poetic; as fanciful as it is starkly realist. Using the deck of the Mexican Bingo-style card game, Lotería, as its visual and contextual muse, a family saga is […]

“We are widows. We are mothers. Above all, we are the women of our beautiful country, and we will endure.” This book, before you even open it, is amazing for two reasons. It heralds dual return of Newfoundland’s completely overlooked wordsmith Nicole Lundrigan, and phoenix publishing house Douglas and McIntyre. The story, ultimately about endurance […]