Listen to “Make It Home Tonight”off the new album Orchestra for the Moon. Jenn Grant always wanted to be a singer-songwriter, even while she suffered through 10 years of stage fright. “I was preparing to face the fact that I would just have babies and stay home and sing them lullabies,” she says of that […]
longreads
Posted inArts + Music
Badtime stories
Heather O’Neill puts down the phone. It rings again. On this morning, an offer from Los Angeles to buy the film rights to the Montreal author’s first novel, Lullabies for Little Criminals. “At first I was “No, no, no, no, no, I’ll never do it,’ but they’re so persuasive.” O’Neill’s laughter draws out like taffy […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Harbour Solutions stinks
There have been other ideas for dealing with the raw sewage flowing into the harbour—diverting it to Dartmouth’s lakes, for example, or the 1988 plan to burn it on McNabs Island and thus cover the city in a toxic mercury smog. Compared to those, Harbour Solutions is a forward-thinking work of genius. But only compared […]
Posted inArts + Music
Elementary
George Steeves calls his house the photo bunker. It’s well hidden, deep on a looping crescent in an old Clayton Park neighbourhood—it was the end of town when Steeves moved there in 1973—where bungalows protectively stretch out like arms linking in solidarity. The photo bunker is built on angles and soft watery colours. It’s tidy, […]
Posted inArts + Music
As seen on TV
Glasgow doesn’t reveal itself immediately. Pulling off the 104 at Westville Road, you have to drive about five minutes until you meet Stellarton Road, then it’s another left, keep driving past the strip malls and the obligatory Tim Horton’s until you meet George Street. And then you see it. The little bridge that crosses the […]
Posted inLifestyle
Fast forward
In 2004, we fled from the golden arches after Morgan Spurlock spewed McChunks over the side of his car in the documentary Supersize Me. Dutifully, we purchased Eric Schlosser’s book Fast Food Nation—or watched the movie—a no-holds-barred examination of why French fries taste so damn good (of course it’s the chemicals. Duh). “Oh, how terrible,” […]
Posted inArts + Music
The wonderful world of Woodrow.
It’s one week before Graeme Patterson’s exhibition Woodrow opens at the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia and there’s fresh paint on the walls. A black sky and twinkling stars float above a yellow field, suggesting the moon’s glow on a warm prairie night. Piano-sized wooden crates, scattered along the edges of the room, reveal nine […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Living positive
There’s this pamphlet. It’s called HIV and Mental Health. And there are two happy white people on the inside back cover riding a red tandem bicycle. They’re coasting along a sunny downtown street. And they are smiling; they are glowing, like they’re in an ad for milk or toothpaste. The woman, on the back of […]
Posted inArts + Music
Until morning
I remember standing there, staring at the back of him. His slouched shoulders, the irregular shape of his head. Marco was always at the kitchen window, after supper when he got back from the gym. He’d come in and plunk his kit bag down on top of me, the smell of barbells and wet socks, […]
Posted inLifestyle
Home version
Wet white bombs fell from the trees, making craters in the soft snow below. The sun heated up the icy wires, sending glassy chunks to the pavement, fragmenting with sharp reports. Linda and Bill Borkus sat silent in their minivan idling on the street. A very large shard hit the ground with a stiff slap. […]
Posted inArts + Music
Finders, keepers
“The lights should come on in a minute or two,” came a loud but unamplified voice from the far end of the arrivals hall. Allie sighed and kicked the baggage carousel, the rubber toe of her boot bouncing back at her. “Unbelievable,” Marcus said. He was not the type to deal well with this sort […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
The Santa Industry
I experienced my first Christmas hangover when I was seven years old. It had nothing to do with alcohol. It’s the feeling I got after I’d opened all my presents and sat surrounded by them, knowing I should be ecstatic but instead feeling hollow with disappointment. The mood seemed totally unreasonable and my sense of […]