The Incomparable Atuk by Mordecai Richler

This was my first experience with Mordecai Richler's work, and I'm still undecided on whether I will read him again. The book was funny, yes, and sharp in its satire. It also managed to poke fun at a lot of targets in a very short page count. However, I'm not really sure if this is my thing.

The Incomparable Atuk is the story of an Inuit (the book says Eskimo, but it's from the 1960s - I feel like Eskimo is not a thing we should still be saying...?) who is brought to Toronto as a poet/curiousity, and quickly adapts to the cutthroat world of the Toronto art scene so that soon he is playing the very folks who tried to play him. The narrative style is very blunt, with no extraneous description whatsoever, and moves rapidly through a large cast of characters, most of whom I'm sure are based on real people of that time (and place).

The novel pulls no punches, bordering on being a South Park-style "equal opportunity offender" in its skewering of both the unscrupulous capitalists intent on benefitting from Atuk's presumed naivete and exotic appeal, and the good-hearted liberals equally committed to "saving" Atuk from being exploited. It's refreshing to see a character from a traditionally marginalized group shown as fully capable of being as cold-hearted and manipulative as his white counterparts, because it forces the reader to examine our own assumptions about people from other cultures and specifically indigenous people, who we often subconsciously categorize as naive or less developed than ourselves (ourselves in this instance being white people).

I also really enjoyed the commentary on the pressure to constantly monetize and market one's skill set. This comes out well in the dinner party near the end of the book, in which Richler expertly captures the irony of being paid to talk about the over-commercialization of the arts.

This book is very Canadian and above all, very Toronto. It could not be set anywhere else. Even though it was set fifty years ago, the whole "scene" is captured very well - the dinner party in particular, and the final couple chapters, definitely highlight Canada's cultural ambiguity, the love-hate relationship with the US, the madness of nationalism, and in particular Toronto's place in it. Toronto kind of wants to be the New York of Canada, I think, and in terms of being a cultural hub and a centre for government, education and culture, it comes close. But the combination of insecurity and arrogance is too big for a place that is, let's face it, a lot smaller (in many ways) than NYC. Richler captures so perfectly the pettiness of Toronto, the utter douchebaggery that can sometimes characterize it.

There was a lot about the book that rubbed me the wrong way, though. The female characters are kind of appalling, and a throwaway gag about Atuk's relatives apparently gang-raping a woman is shocking in its nonchalance. And as much as it is a reasonable and unusually well-developed critique of racism, there are moments of unabashed racism in it. In fact, I'm not convinced that we are not supposed to come to the conclusion that the Inuit people are just savages - white folks are just worse. Which...is that racist? I don't know.

The style was also not my favourite thing. I like descriptive novels, and this was not that. In fact, I could see this working quite well as a play or a movie. I also like some heart, and this book has no heart. It does not love its characters, and it does not dwell on positive relationships. It was hard for me, as an incurably emotional person, to get through without having somewhere to invest my emotions.

So, while I recognize this was a good book, it is not really the book for me. I give it three CN Towers out of five.

Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures by Vincent Lam

This book was quite difficult for me, because it is about doctors, and I have a problem with obsessive ruminations specifically about veins. So while I'm cool to get needles, thinking about (or seeing) what needles actually do affects me very strongly. Normally, I wouldn't have finished reading this book, with its graphic - albeit necessary - descriptions of medical procedures, but it was really, really good. So I read it. But I'm warning you, if you're at all squeamish (particularly about blood and body stuff), this will be a difficult read.

It is a great book. It has an interesting format, sort of part novel, part short stories. Each story is an entity in itself, and could probably exist alone, but the stories follow the same characters through the process of getting into medical school, and then their careers as doctors and their relationships with each other. And they are fascinating.

You know when you read a book, and you think, the author must be a doctor since he writes doctors so well? Or he must have had a relationship like this, because he writes it so well? Well I had that reaction to every single part of this book, including the pregnant woman (I'm pretty sure the author has never been pregnant, although who knows) and both sides of the romantic relationship between Fitzgerald and Ming. Lam has a rare gift for clear, personal writing across genders, backgrounds and emotional states. His characters are very real.

I am actually having a hard time putting into words how I feel about this novel. It is very powerful. The stories are frightening in their truthfulness, and their insight into human nature. This is the kind of thing people are talking about when they say "the human condition". That's what this book is about. The human condition, as seen through doctors.

I wish I could do it justice with my review but I'm having a really hard time. Just...read this book. Really, do yourself a favour and read something good. It's this book. Do it.

Five CN Towers out of five.

More by Austin Clarke

This is a dark one. Not totally depressing, of course - there are hopeful and even light moments - but it's not a novel that's going to make you feel great about the world. But I'll tell you what it is: amazing.

More is the story of a woman named Idora who basically shuts herself in her apartment for four days and struggles with the reality of her son's choices, which are leading him on a path to jail and/or an early death. The whole novel is just what is going on in her head during this time.

This is the kind of concept that takes a lot of confidence to pull off. It reminded me a bit of Castaway, which could have been a terrible (or terribly boring) movie were it not for the skills of the people involved, but mostly the strength of the acting - the audience really needed to care about the guy on the island. More is like that - you really have to care about Idora. And I did, desperately, because Austin Clarke is a masterful writer; I would not hesitate to use the term "literary genius". This guy is fucking good, you guys.

Idora lives in a rough neighbourhood called Moss Park, which is a real place but not one that I have any familiarity with beyond a vague sense of where it is located. She is from Barbados, but has lived in Toronto for many years, having moved with her husband who then deserted her to find work in America. Her teenaged son, BJ, is getting involved with a rough crowd, but this thread is not as simplistic as all that. The book skirts around the edge of what BJ is actually involved in, but clearly a lot of it consists of his struggle with his identity as a black son of a single mother in a country/world that doesn't give a shit about black people. He is developing a personal and cultural identity that mirrors Idora's as he wrestles with the myriad difficulties of being a black man in this world.

Idora has a job at the university and a best friend who is white, and constantly juggles the two different worlds she inhabits. I want to talk about all of it - her resentment of her friend's experience of Kensington Market as a white woman; her aching for BJ to belong; her sharp-edged pride at being a citizen of a country that hates her; the complex intersection of race, religion, gender and sexuality behind every line - but you really should experience it for yourself.

Seriously, I can't write any more about it - just do yourself a favour and read this book.

Five CN Towers out of five.

The City Man by Howard Akler

This is a book with a very distinct style, but unlike some other stories with a similar cadence, it is immensely readable. Set in 1934, The City Man is the story of a pickpocket named Mona who becomes an anonymous source on a series of Star articles about the pickpocketing racket (or "the whiz") in Toronto. She becomes romantically entangled with the reporter, Eli Morenz, which leads to lots of trouble for both of them.

At around 150 sparsely populated pages, this is a super quick and easy read, but somehow Akler manages to stuff it full of evocative description and emotional depth. It's not even worth trying to understand the slang, which whizzes by at a mile a minute. I picked up on the meaning of what they were saying most of the time. I love the jazzy underworld talk from that time - I am personally trying to bring "what's the rumpus?" back into play.

I liked how the novel was littered with Eli's newspaper articles, which are short and somewhat quaint. The action is set into motion by the city's centenary celebrations, where the police band and bystanders are hit by the pickpockets in force, leading to the formation of a special "whiz squad" on the police force to catch the "Centenary Mob". The descriptions of Toronto are sparse but excellent; lots of recognizable streets and landmarks are sprinkled through the text.

It was especially cool to read about the role of female pickpockets - Mona does not do the actual picking of the pocket, but she has a more difficult job: framing the mark. She basically uses her body to very gently, very subtly move the mark into position and cause a slight distraction by her touch so that her partner can grab the cash more easily. Pretty sneaky.

This is the sort of book that takes a "less is more" approach to feelings, but it works. Morenz's editor tells him a heartbreaking story about his first scoop, and you never read Morenz's reaction, and the story is never brought up again, but you can imagine how it affected Morenz and you certainly feel it affecting you. There are so many little snippets of things that the characters are never shown struggling with, but it opens up those ideas for you to reflect on after closing the book. It is very effective writing.

I really enjoyed this book - it's a quick read but a deep one, and it will stay with you.

Four CN Towers out of five.