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Picks of the Week

  • Harry Dolan: Bad Things Happen

    Harry Dolan: Bad Things Happen
    BAD THINGS HAPPEN is a nifty debut, cleverly told and unfurled from the very first line: "The shovel has to meet certain requirements" on through meeting "the man who calls himself David Loogan." There are reasons for concealment, just as there are reasons the editor of a mystery magazine bearing little resemblance to EQMM or AHMM might bring him into the fold, thus catalyzing a series of murderous events. The twists come quickly and the dialogue is sharp and if it falls apart slightly at the end, no matter - I want to read much more from Dolan from now on.

  • Ian MacKenzie: City of Strangers: A Novel

    Ian MacKenzie: City of Strangers: A Novel
    MacKenzie's debut novel reminded me a lot of Paul Auster's NEW YORK TRILOGY, whether it was intended or not, in terms of his choice of words, the thrust of the narrative and the existential nature of the main character (whose first name, incidentally, is Paul) caught up in a snowballing sequence of strange and violent events in and around New York City. MacKenzie straddles the line between thriller and internal examination of a man's failings, and his ability to do so establishes him as a young writer of serious talent and future.

  • Megan Abbott: Bury Me Deep

    Megan Abbott: Bury Me Deep
    In a word: amazing. In more words: Megan Abbott, who has never delivered anything less than an excellent novel, exceeds expectations and takes a very bold and very necessary step forward both in the quality of the prose, the development of her characters and especially in portraying how obsession seeps into the very soul of people, transforming them into their worst nightmares all too easily. Just read this book. And then tell many others to do so as well.

  • Ninni Holmqvist: The Unit

    Ninni Holmqvist: The Unit
    Understandably, echoes of THE HANDMAID'S TALE are hard to ignore in this dystopic examination of a society where fertility is so high a priority that older, single, marginal women are shut away in secret locales to live out the rest of their lives in seemingly perfect harmony - at least, until the "donations" begin. But Holmqvist's marvelous book doesn't browbeat her thesis into the reader and smartly expands her ideas to look at the plight of all marginalized folk, women and men alike, and how the promise of comforts can be the most horrifying of all. Prepare to be disturbed, but prepare further to think about the ramifications.

  • Paula Froelich: Mercury in Retrograde

    Paula Froelich: Mercury in Retrograde
    This is possibly the most perfect novel for today's economically challenged times. Why? Because it has plenty of glitz and glamor and blind items, as befitting a narrative by the deputy editor of Page Six, but Froelich isn't arch or snarky or acid-tongued in the slightest. Her trio of protagonists land in all manner of embarrassing situations but they aren't played for mean-spirited laughs. The New York here is something of a fantasy-land, but not so far off the mark that it's completely unbelievable. Most of all it's clear Froelich remains sincere and optimistic about her chosen city, and has retained her sense of fun. So no need to check your brain at the door, but sometimes it just needs to chill out and relax.

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May 14, 2008

Bringing Back Benny's Backlist

Canada's crown jewel in PI fiction is Benny Cooperman, the amiable Toronto investigator created by Howard Engel. But both author and protagonist alike have been through some major changes as a result of Engel's stroke, which left him with alexia sine agraphia, an inability to read even though his ability to write was spared. 2005's wonderful THE MEMORY BOOK grew out of Engel's disability, as did his recent memoir THE MAN WHO FORGOT TO READ.

Now comes word, from the National Post's Robert Fulford, that all 12 of the Cooperman novels (including a brand new one, EAST OF SUEZ) are back in print with spiffy new covers:

Far from throwing him off his game, the famous bang on the head that scrambled Benny Cooperman's brains has expanded his reputation. The novels by Howard Engel starring Benny as a soft-boiled private eye are about to become inescapable in bookstores.

Penguin has re-launched the first 11 Cooperman books in paperback with a lively new design and a number emblazoned on the spine of each volume, so that obsessive Cooperman fans can shelve them in order of their creation, from No. 1, The Suicide Murders (1980), to No. 11, Memory Book (2005). This is an exceptional publishing event, something the French might do while promoting someone for a shot at the Nobel. Nobody has done it before, on this scale, for a Canadian.

Benny has established himself as the most insular character inhabiting our national literature. He lives in Grantham, Ontario, a double for Engel's hometown, St. Catharines, Ont., and in the first 11 books he usually travels no farther than 111 kilometres down the highway to Toronto. As for the non-Canadian world, it consists of Miami, nothing else.

But brain injury has changed him. The loss of short-term memory and the loss of his ability to read have mysteriously encouraged a tolerance for foreign countries. In the 12th Cooperman novel, East of Suez (Penguin), he travels to Takot, the fictional capital of fictional Miranam, a one-time French colony. Takot, close to Thailand, is far from the peace, order and good government of Benny's homeland.

Great news, indeed.

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Comments

Having never read any of the Cooperman novels, can anyone tell me whose writing they're roughly comparable to?

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