Strange, macabre stories delight

Free Press literary editor picks noteworthy Canadian fiction and non-fiction titles to watch for this fall

For many book lovers, summer means relaxing at the beach, in the backyard or at the cottage with fun, warm-weather page-turners — easy-going romance novels, gripping thrillers or even a dishy biography.

And some may long for the summer months to slow down, fall books season always offers up some of the most compelling reads for bookworms.

Here are 10 works of fiction and 10 non-fiction titles from Canadian authors slated to be published in the coming months — from Olympians to separatists, draft dodgers, plutocrats, prime ministers, bird-men and beyond, the characters in these forthcoming titles run the gamut.

FICTIONEliza Sunshine

Sunshine Fund guarantees a little magic in the summer

To this day, I still remember the morning polar plunges into Moose Lake — a cold shock to the system meant to wake campers up before the sun hit its peak.

Throughout my youth, my siblings and I attended Camps with Meaning, an organization that at the time offered three Mennonite bible camps at Camp Moose Lake, Camp Koinonia, and Camp Assiniboina. I spent many summers at Camp Moose Lake as well as an annual weekend trip with my high school, Westgate Mennonite Collegiate.

I have fond memories of swimming in the lake, picking up a bow and arrow for archery practice, sitting in the cafeteria with all of my friends waiting to devour home-cooked meals, as well as camp-wide games of Manhunt where bouts of giggling echoed around the property.

My parents were able to send all three of us to camp, including my brothers Jonah and Samuel, due to the camp being subsidized by the Mennonite Church. Without the financial assistance, it would have been a strain on my family to support three children going to summer camp on a yearly basis.

Frustration mounts as drug raids sweep problems out of downtown, into West End

West End business owners say their neighbourhood has been under siege for months, and some believe downtown police drug sweeps have made things worse by pushing more street disorder in their direction — and pushing customers away.

Doctor speaks out, raises alarm over gas plant expansion plans

A retired doctor is raising red flags on Manitoba Hydro’s proposed gas plant expansion in Brandon and the health-related consequences of climate change.

Strange, macabre stories delight

Homebodies is the first short-story collection by Calgary poet/fiction writer Amy LeBlanc. The title of the opening story, Twisted, could be joined with that of the last one, Body Fluid Spill Kit, to describe the 16 stories dealing with death in many guises, blood, burials, scars, wounds, dead animals and invasive medical procedures involving needles and drips.

Throughout the first two sets of stories the Cerulean fever hovers in the background, like COVID. The story-as-interview, Transcription, is a tense, insidious summing up of the contagion, as both anonymous interviewer and subject play a cat-and-mouse game about how the fever affected their lives. Like all the stories in this book of seemingly ordinary people caught in the mess of their families’ histories, the two reflect the stink of death which haunts many of the stories.

Two of the best, Bruised Plums and Body Fluid Spill Kit, are beautiful, scary ghost stories. In the former, Plum is (maybe) receiving calls from her dead grandmother (it should be noted grandmothers don’t come off well in LeBlanc’s stories, not that aunts or grandfathers do any better).

Alone in her grandmother’s creepy townhouse, Plum remembers grandma’s obsession with noises in the night. She recalls a childhood experience involving her grandmother’s calling out — but perhaps it was a dream. The cellphone lights up and quivers; her head fills with static. When grandmother is finally buried all should end, shouldn’t it? But the lights flicker and what seems clear to Plum becomes unclear. It is to LeBlanc’s strength that one story’s scariness and edge of inviting horror can slip so easily into another.

ER wait times have hit all-time highs in Winnipeg and are impacting nearly all aspects of hospital operations

On most days at Health Sciences Centre’s adult emergency department, all 58 treatment beds are filled with sick patients. Another dozen or so brought in by ambulance line the hallways on stretchers, with only one nurse to look after them.

Out in the waiting room, about 30 or 40 people — sometimes more — are slouched in chairs in pain or discomfort, waiting hours to see a doctor. Most have been assessed by a triage nurse, but many will have to wait 10 to 20 hours to be examined by a physician because there’s no room for them in the treatment area.

Some patients leave because they can no longer tolerate the excruciating wait, only to return days later, sicker than they were before.

Welcome to the emergency department at Manitoba’s largest hospital, where some of the highest-acuity patients seek medical care but now face delays that were unimaginable a few years ago.