Patriotic pleasures
Pat St. Germain picks a handful of titles for our times.
The Pull of the Stars Emma Donoghue Harpercollins Canada
A global pandemic, an election year marked by political strife and tiny glimmers of hope for the future: Sounds like a fast-fiction formula tailored for our surreal times. But it’s purely serendipitous that prolific Irish-canadian writer Emma Donoghue completed the final edits on her latest novel in March, a few days before authorities declared COVID -19 a pandemic. Inspired by the centenary of the 1918 flu pandemic and coloured by first-hand experience delivering a premature baby, the story is set in a hospital maternity ward in Donoghue’s hometown of Dublin, Ireland, in 1918. Over three days, the fates of three women — nurse Julia Power, volunteer Bridie Sweeney and political activist doctor Kathleen Lynn — intertwine as they care for quarantined women whose lives and pregnancies are at risk.
Growing Young: How Friendship, Optimism and Kindness
Can Help You Live to 100 Marta Zaraska
Penguin Random House
Polish-canadian science journalist Marta Zaraska has spent a chunk of her career exploring issues related to food, health and longevity. The birth of her daughter sparked new interest in nutrition and exercise, and she has studied or tested every organic/keto/cleansing trend in the modern diet book. Critics ate up her previous book, Meathooked, which explores our history as carnivores. And you have to love the ideas she puts forth in her new book. It seems that while diet and exercise are important, man cannot live on gluten-free bread alone — at least not if he plans to live to a ripe old age. Nurturing relationships with friends and family, volunteering for good causes and being kind are among the habits that increase our lifespan and happiness. The Manhattan Project Ken Hunt
University of Calgary Press
Climate change, COVID -19, systemic racism — with so many woes taking up headspace in 2020, the potential for nuclear annihilation has probably moved to your mental back burner. Thanks to poet Ken Hunt, it’s top of mind in this collection of visceral works tracing humanity’s horrifying history with nuclear power. It’s not light reading, but there are helpful explanations and notes in the final section titled, appropriately, Fallout.
The Woman Before Wallis:
A Novel of Windsors, Vanderbilts, and Royal Scandal Bryn Turnbull Harpercollins Canada
It seems King Edward VIII always had a thing for racy Americans. As the Prince of Wales, he had an affair with Thelma Morgan Furness, who had an unwanted claim to fame. Thelma was twin sister to Gloria Vanderbilt, who waged a public battle in 1934 for custody of her daughter — the second Gloria Vanderbilt, who grew up to be a fashion designer and mom to CNN host Anderson Cooper. Anyhoo, after a five-year affair with the prince, Thelma returned to the U.S. to support her sister during the custody trial, leaving him with her dear, darling friend Wallis Simpson. The rest is history. And now, it’s also a welcome summer distraction, having inspired a juicy bit of historical fiction.