The Canada Reads nominees have been announced! Canada Reads is an annual event where 5 celebrities (from all professions) are give 5 books to champion--they debate, vote each other off, and then Canada is encouraged to read the remaining one.
Last year featured home decorating guru Debbie Travis leading the trash talk on the first ever graphic novel ever nominated, even though she hadn't finished it! She's "out" for me. Out forever.*
The winner was a comic political book which my dad and I read.
For the first time, this year, they're looking at non-fiction books (debate to begin in February). I'm looking at the nominations, and I'm already disappointed by one. Prisoner of Tehran is about a woman who was a political prisoner in Iran, after the Revolution, but it's considered some former prisoners have criticized it as containing many false elements. So I'm out.
I would rather read Something Fierce about a young woman expatriate who goes back to Argentina to fight in the underground. Which as far as I know isn't fake. In.
The Tiger is about a tiger on a killing "spree" in Siberia, and the detective efforts to track it down. Could be the best book on the planet and I'm not gonna read it. Not unless the tiger wins. Out forever.
On a Cold Road is the diary of a band member from a Canadian rock band, touring. "Storied arenas one tour and bars wallpapered with photos of forgotten bands the next. Zit-speckled fans begging for a guitar pick and angry drunks chucking twenty-sixers and pint glasses." Sounds good! Bet it'll get voted out first. Unless the defenders decide to go after the Siberian tiger, since there doesn't seem to be a Canadian connection to it.
And finally, Ken Dryden's The Game, which is a classic insider account of hockey. Will probably win, but I could care less about hockey so I'm out.
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* Among my friend Gilby's gang there are three ratings. You can be "in" for something, or "out" for something, or the dreaded "out forever."
3 comments:
If the tiger wins let me know and I might read it. ;)
I just checked the description on Goodreads, and it sounds to me as though the tiger's been framed. So my hope is that the tiger will be cleared and will go on to live happily ever after, while the human doing all the killings will be stopped in his tracks. I'd read that book.
My money's on the hockey book, just 'cos this is Canada, and we supposed to be hockey mad!
P.S. I hope the tiger makes it.
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