Congratulations go to Eric Wilkinson, winner of last week's contest for a copy of The Dusty Bookcase. Eric's name was drawn from those who correctly guessed that Lust Planet – and not Airport Nurse, Arctic Nurse, Backstage Nurse, Bermuda Nurse, Front Office Nurse, Hotel Nurse, Night Club Nurse or even Operating Room Nurse – was the W.E.D. Ross book read for my next Canadian Notes & Queries Dusty Bookcase column.
Ross's second and final work of erotica, how could I resist? Sure, his first, The Case of the Naked Diver tempted, but Lust Planet promised a combination of erotica and science fiction!
I give something of the column away in writing that it may be the last W.E.D. Ross book I ever read.
The issue featuring my review – number 101! – will be coming out in the New Year. In the meantime, enjoy this cover image of the 1963 first edition of Ross's pseudonymously published Backstage Nurse. I find it strangely compelling.
Part of this past weekend was spent writing a new Dusty Bookcase column for the next issue of Canadian Notes & Queries. This time out I'm reviewing a book by W.E.D. Ross, Canada's most prolific novelist. The man is known to have written at least 358 novels, most of which were published under pseudonyms like Rose Dana, Rose Williams, Ruth Dorset, Olin Ross, and Jane Rossiter. As "Marilyn Ross" he penned thirty-two Dark Shadows tie-ins, including:
The book I reviewed for CNQ is not Barabas, Quentin and Dr. Jekyll's Son, but it is one of W.E.D. Ross novels below.
In the spirit of the season, I'm giving away a copy of my new book, The Dusty Bookcase, to a lucky person who guesses correctly the title that is the subject of my next column. Send me the title via email – the address is in my Blogger profile – and, if correct, I'll enter your name in a draw. The contest closes Sunday at midnight. The winner will be announced next Monday.
Grandma's Little Darling Stephen R. George New York: Zebra, 1990 320 pages
Horror hasn't much figured here, yet the genre dominated my adolescent reading. James Herbert was my favourite author; there was something in the rhythm to his work – one chapter focusing on horror, the next on sex, then back to horror, then sex – that appealed. One particular passage from his second novel, The Fog, was read over and over. I would blush in revealing which one.
Other novelists of those awkward teenage years included Max Ehrlich (The Reincarnation of Peter Proud), Frank De Felitta (Audrey Rose), Stephen King (Carrie), Colin Wilson (The Space Vampires), Christopher Isherwood (Frankenstein: The True Story), Peter Benchley (Jaws), Richard Woodley (It's Alive), Arthur Herzog (The Swarm), Jeffrey Konvitz (The Sentinel), John Farris (The Fury), John Russo (Night of the Living Dead), David Seltzer (The Omen), and Joseph Howard (Damien: Omen II). I'm tempted to include The Amityville Horror by Jay Anson... but, you know, it's a true story.
The only Canadian horror novel I read, Satan's Bell, was written by Joy Carroll, a woman better known as the co-author of a pink-coloured book of etiquette entitled Mind Your Manners. It was published in 1954 by Harlequin.
We Canadians were slow to capitalize on the horror paperback craze. The first to make repeated stabs was Michael Slade with Headhunter and Ghoul, but these were published in the mid-eighties, by which the market had begun to wane and my interest had vanished. The decade was almost over when Stephen R. George, appeared on the scene. His debut novel, Brain Child, was published in 1989, as were his second (Beasts) and third (Dark Miracle). The following year saw Dark Reunion and Grandma's Little Darling, a novel I bought for its cover illustration. A riff on Arrangement in Grey and Black No. 1 (Whister's Mother), it had me thinking that the novel might be set in nineteenth-century New England or Victorian London.
I was wrong.
Grandma's Little Darling begins twenty-three centuries ago in the Egyptian boudoir of Lamena, trophy wife of wealthy merchant Fasim Konar. Once "the most beautiful woman in Sandakla," she's been overtaken by her daughter Maline. Such is the girl's beauty that it has attracted the eyes of Riamon, a prince from neighbouring Zhima. Lamena cannot deny the signs of aging reflected in her polished silver looking glass.
Deepening lines calling for desperate measures, she visits the wizard Yashim. "I want to become young again," says she. "I want the life my daughter is about to have."
On the condition that he be granted access to Prince Riamon's court – "I long for the company of men." – Yashid casts a spell that will make it so mother and daughter switch bodies. On what would have been her wedding day, Maline awakens in horror to find herself in her mother's body, being caressed by her father.
Prince Riamon is pleased because his new wife, though clearly a virgin, exhibits "expertise in the bedchamber." True, every once in awhile he wonders about his young wife's mature ways... but, you know, "expertise in the bedchamber." Besides, the prince is exhausted.
Lamena’s downfall comes when she betrays Yashim. Concerned that the wizard will blab, she has him banished from the court. As might be predicted, this causes Yashim to do the very thing she sought to prevent. The wizard tells Riamon that his bride’s body is occupied by his mother-in-law, adding that Lamena is now able to leap from body to body.
The two search the palace, ending up in the common room of all the prince’s wives. There they find Maline – or the body of Maline – foaming at the mouth. Lamena has moved on!
“Wizard, you have brought evil to this place, and you shall pay for it,” says the prince. To be safe, he has his other wives taken to the courtyard, where they are soaked in pitch and set alight. Having fled to the body of a newborn girl, Lamena hears their screams.
This is all part of a prologue lasting less than six pages. It’s a lot to take in, though readers are afforded more than enough chance to catch their breaths in the sluggish pages that follow.
The first chapter skips to fin du millénaire – the last one – and the Minneapolis Children’s Home, where we’re introduced to twelve-year-old Nora Harris, the girl depicted on the cover in Ruth Bader Ginsburg garb. Four years earlier, her parents and only sibling were killed. She’s had a rough go of it ever since. Social worker Cheryl Gibson has been doing her best to place the girl with couples interested in adoption, but nothing has quite worked out. Nora is about to begin her seventh placement in suburban Minneapolis. She’s told this is her last chance, so the pressure is on. Prospective parents the Johnsons are okay, and their son, Buddy, proves a pal, but Grandma – everyone calls her Grandma – looks to be a challenge.
Recently widowed, Grandma has suffered a stroke or something that has left her not quite right. What really happened is that Lamena has taken over her body… and now has her sights set on Nora!
"BE AFRAID, NORA… BE VERY AFRAID!"
Because I no longer read horror novels, and don’t remember much of those tackled in my teens, my criticisms may be unfair:
Prologue aside, the first half of the novel is slow and repetitious; the horrific is pretty much limited to old lady smells;
Lemena aside, the characters – Nora Harris, Dr Gibson, the Millers, and the Johnsons – are as unique as their surnames;
Cheryl’s live-in boyfriend just happens to be the editor of Unnatural Journal, a newsletter devoted to the paranormal.
Because I'm all about being fair, credit is due the author in setting the climax in the shopping court of Minneapolis’s IDS Centre (which looks to be a special kind of hell).
There's also a bit of a twist ending. George gives a few too many hints in advance, but it is interesting. The most intriguing part of the novel comes mid-point with the revelation that Lemena had been found out a century earlier – resulting in the murders attributed to Jack the Ripper.
Seems a brilliant idea for a novel. Has it been written?
As I say, I no longer read horror novels.
Favourite passage:
She kept thinking of Nora. Of the girl, trapped inside that old woman’s body. Of the thing inside Nora’s body.
Oh, God, what a story.
Even if others did not believe her, she could not leave the situation as it was. She owed it to Nora to do something.
The question was what?
Bonus:
Object and Access: A cheap mass market paperback with raised gold foil. Sadly, the cover illustration is uncredited.
Library and Archives Canada has a copy, but that's it as far as our libraries are concerned. Those looking to purchase a copy will find five listed for sale online beginning at US$7.50. The second cheapest is listed at US$11.52. The remaining three copies range in price from US$52.43 to US$134.45. Needless to say, condition is not a factor.
Reviewed in this week in Publishers Weekly, a book for readers "who would like to acquaint themselves with Canadian literature outside the canon, as well as those who will enjoy a highly idiosyncratic and striking selection of the lesser known."
Read the review here!
It doesn't seem right to describe the new issue of Canadian Notes & Queries as special – every issue is special – but this one, the one hundredth issue, marks a remarkable milestone. That it did so in its fiftieth year is both a reflection of an often precarious past and its stability this past decade under publisher Dan Wells.
I came on board with my first Dusty Bookcase column in issue 81 (Spring 2010). My subject back then was The Miracle Man, the very first book I'd ever read by Frank L. Packard. This time around, the column takes the form of an investigative update on thriller writer and passer of forged cheques Kenneth Orvis (a/k/a Kenneth LeMieux). His is not exactly a household name, though regular readers may remember my reviews of his debut, Hickory House (1956), and Cry Hallelujah! (1970), his greatest flop.
I've also contributed an essay, "For All Its Faults," which has been described by historian Christopher Moore as an evisceration of the killing of the New Canadian Library. In this unpleasant task I was supported by Daniel Donaldson's razor sharp editorial cartoon.
On a related note – two, actually – my daughter Astrid provides an editorial cartoon to "Hints and Allegations," a chapter from Elaine Dewar's GG-nominated The Handover, the shameful story of how it was our country's greatest publisher was given away to a foreign multinational.
Also featured is Andreae Callanan's "The Xenotext's Woman Problem," winner of this year's CanLit Crit Essay Contest. Nick Mount writes on CanLit's beginnings, Anna Porter shares memories of McClelland & Stewart as it was in the 'seventies, and Jim Polk looks at fifty years of the House of Anansi. In "Will Anyone Care?" Mark Sampson lays bare his obsession to preserving his work. The issue is rounded out by contributions from Seth, Pierre Nepveu (translated by Donald Winkler), Robert Wringham, Mary H. Auerbach Rykov, Mark Bourrie, Kamal Al-Solaylee, Jason Dickson, David Huebert, David Mason, J.C. Sutcliffe, Rohan Maitzen, André Forget, Alex Good, Bruce Whiteman, Stephen Fowler.
More information can be found here at the CNQ website. And this link will take you to the subscription page, which will bring you issues 101, 102, and 103.
On the centenary of the Second Battle of Passchendaele, verse by John Douglas Logan, 85th Battalion, Nova Scotia Highlanders, from his second volume, The New Apocalypse and Other Poems of Days and Deeds in France (Halifax: T.C. Allen, 1917):
In anticipation of All Hallow's Eve, five favourite Stephen R. George covers, beginning with 1989's Nightscape. As with all other George titles it was published by Kensington Publishing's Zebra imprint.
I get the impression that children don't have an easy time of it in the author's fiction. I could be wrong. I'm only a few pages into my first Stephen R. George, a book bought for its cover... which is not featured here. You'll have to wait. Torment.
1989
1989
1991
1994
A bonus:
Creature nel cervello [Brain Child]
Milan: Mondadori, 1991
Black Feather Benge Atlee New York: Scribners, 1939 345 pages
The weapons Britain is supplying to its Arab allies are somehow ending up in the hands of Eastern European fascists and the Foreign Office is not amused. One man, Gerald Burke, is called upon to put a stop to it. An Oxford-educated archeologist-turned-adventurer, Burke seems a good choice; he knows the region, has a good number of contacts, and hails from rural Nova Scotia (Chignecto, it is implied). What's more, Burke comes with Abdula el Zoghri, a manservant who has a talent for getting out of tight spots.
After accepting the assignment, our hero returns to his Bloomsbury Square flat to find a warning in the form of a black feather, quill-upwards, protruding from the brass plaque bearing his name. The fact that they're onto him doesn't deter Burke from his mission. Burke makes for Marseilles, and is booking passage to Salonika when a pretty Russian girl literally falls into his arms. He knows she's a spy, Zoghri knows she's a spy, and yet they're happy to play along.
So begins my review of Black Feather, the lone novel by war hero and sometime pulp writer Harold Benge Atlee (1890-1978). You can read the entire piece here – gratis – at the Canadian Notes & Queries site.
Access: Five Canadian university libraries have copies, but not Dalhousie, at which he studied and later served as Professor and Chair of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology. Our public libraries – Library and Archives Canada included – fail entirely
The Scribners edition is the only edition. It enjoyed a single printing. Only three copies are listed for sale online – US$30 to US$50 – none of which feature the dust jacket.
Steven W. Beattie's piece on Ricochet in the brand new Quill & Quire is available free online. Some guy named Busby is interviewed. You can read it here.
I'll be speaking about Ricochet Books at Bouchercon 2017 as part of the 20 on the 20 Spotlight Sessions this coming Saturday. Please drop by and say hello if you get a chance. Always nice to put a face to a name.
For this Thanksgiving weekend, verse from Canada's beloved Poet Laureate of the Home. First published in 1932, "Thankful for What?" was named New York Times Outstanding Poem of the Year. She received twenty American dollars.
Thankful for What?
Not for the mighty world, O Lord, tonight,
Nations and kingdoms in their fearful might —
Let me be glad the kettle gently sings,
Let me be thankful just for the little things.
Thankful for simple food and supper spread,
Thankful for shelter and a warm, clean bed,
For little joyful feet that gladly run
To welcome me when my day's work is done.
Thankful for friends who share my woe or mirth,
Glad for the warm, sweet fragrance of the earth,
For golden pools of sunlight on the floor,
For love that sheds its peace about my door.
For little friendly days that slip away,
With only meals and bed, and work and play,
A rocking-chair and kindly firelight —
For little things let me be glad tonight.
This evening I'll be hosting the ninth annual plaque dedication at Montreal's Writers' Chapel, honouring novelist and short story writer Hugh Hood. Sarah Hood, the author's daughter will speak, as will Andre Furlani.
As in the past, this is a free event and will be followed by a wine and cheese reception.
The Writers' Chapel St Jax Montréal 1439 St Catherine Street West (Bishops Street entrance) Tuesday, October 3rd at 6:00 pm
A collection of short stories united by a common theme, Revenge! was one of Robert Barr's best received books. This anonymous review from the 26 November 1896 issue of Public Opinion is typical:
Under the comprehensive title of "Revenge," Robert Barr collects a score of the wildest flights of his imagination, which land us in all sorts of places. Horrors dire lie cheek by jowl with the broadest of farces. All tastes are suited save those the readers who wish to derive moral benefit from their literary pabulum, for there is not a scrap of moral to be extracted, although one can be invented to fit almost anywhere.
The first American edition, with illustrations by Lancelot Speed, Stanley Wood, and G.G. Manton, is a thing of beauty. I wanted a copy for years, I searched for a copy for years, and in the end settled for this crummy print on demand thing from Dodo Press. I'm glad I did because Revenge! was not only this summer's favourite read, but it renewed my interest in its author.
Barr was a better stylist than his contemporary Grant Allen, whom I describe in my new book (plug) as Victorian Canada's greatest novelist, but I'd long believed Barr lagged far behind his rival in weaving a good yarn.
I was wrong.
The stories in Revenge! are "wonderfully clever" – I quote Douglas Sladen (Literary Review, 23 October 1896) – the suspense, black humour, and twists remind me of nothing so much as Tales of the Unexpected, which so captivated as a kid.
Revenge! has twenty stories, all of which would've fit well in Roald Dahl's series. The first, "An Alpine Divorce," is one of Barr's most anthologized, which is not to say it is well-known. Because we never read it in school, what follows will likely spoil things.
As the title suggests, "An Alpine Divorce" concerns marital discord. It begins:
In some natures there are no half-tones; nothing
but raw primary colours. John Bodman was a man
who was always at one extreme or the other. This
probably would have mattered little had he not married a wife whose nature was an exact duplicate of
his own.
With all divorces one must pick a side. I chose to be with Mrs Bodman (she has no Christian name), but as the tale progressed she fell out of favour.
Things are set in motion when John Bodman books a holiday in the Swiss Alps. Saying nothing, his wife sets about preparing for the journey. At some point – the narrator is unsure as to just when – John gets the idea that a nearby picturesque outlook would be the perfect place to dispose of his wife. They'll hike there together – Mrs Bodman always insists on accompanying him everywhere – and he'll simply push her over the outlook's crumbling wall.
Set out they do, in a scene that affords the reader the first and only glimpse of their married life. As the couple approach their destination, the wife pauses. "John," she asks,
"don't you think that if you had been kinder to me at
first, things might have been different?":
"It seems to me," he answered, not looking at her,
"that it is rather late in the day for discussing that
question."
"I have much to regret," she said quaveringly.
"Have you nothing?"
"No," he answered."
"Very well," replied his wife, with the usual hardness returning to her voice. "I was merely giving
you a chance. Remember that."
Her husband looked at her suspiciously.
"What do you mean?" he asked, "giving me
a chance? I want no chance nor anything else
from you. A man accepts nothing from one he
hates. My feeling towards you is, I imagine, no
secret to you. We are tied together, and you have
done your best to make the bondage insupportable."
"Yes," she answered, with her eyes on the ground,
"we are tied together, we are tied together!"
Mrs Bodman becomes increasingly agitated:
"Why do you walk about like a wild animal?" he
cried. "Come here and sit down beside me, and be
still."
She faced him with a light he had never before
seen in her eyes — a light of insanity and of hatred.
"I walk like a wild animal," she said, " because I am
one. You spoke a moment ago of your hatred of me;
but you are a man, and your hatred is nothing to
mine. Bad as you are, much as you wish to break
the bond which ties us together, there are still things
which I know you would not stoop to. I know there
is no thought of murder in your heart, but there is in
mine. I will show you, John Bodman, how much I
hate you."
The man nervously clutched the stone beside him,
and gave a guilty start as she mentioned murder.
"Yes," she continued, "I have told all my friends
in England that I believed you intended to murder
me in Switzerland."
"Good God!" he cried. "How could you say such
a thing?"
"I say it to show how much I hate you — how much
I am prepared to give for revenge. I have warned the
people at the hotel, and when we left two men followed
us. The proprietor tried to persuade me not to accompany you. In a few moments those two men will
come in sight of the Outlook. Tell them, if you think
they will believe you, that it was an accident."
The mad woman tore from the front of her dress
shreds of lace and scattered them around.
Bodman started up to his feet, crying, "What are
you about?" But before he could move toward her
she precipitated herself over the wall, and went shrieking and whirling down the awful abyss.
Bloody hell! What an ending!
Now, I warned you I was going to spoil things. I did so because I wanted to give a sense of why Revenge! is worthy of attention. A collection of well-crafted, imaginative, disturbing, entertaining tales, it is the best Victoria's Canada offered. There are nineteen more tales – some better, some worse, most on equal footing.
Give it a read. Do not wait for next summer; it is a book for all seasons. I'm betting Roald Dahl would agree.
A query: The 14 November 1896 Atheneum has it that "An Alpine Divorce" was likely suggested by an "'over-true' tale of some years since." Does anyone have an idea as to the incident the reviewer is referencing? A second query: "An Alpine Divorce" is one of two Revenge! stories to feature suicide, and murder features in most, but not all are touched by death. An example of this last is "The Bromley Gibberts' Story," which Sladen likens to a roman à clef, adding "it is hard not to think that the alphabetical resemblance of the hero's name to that of a well-known novelist of the day is entirely accidental, or that the resemblance of the name Shorely to that of one of the cleverest and most popular of our editors is purely fortuitous."
I have no idea just who he's on about. Do you?
Object and Access: A trade-size paperback. I paid US$10.99 for my copy.
Of all the print on demand vultures, Dodo has the nicest cover – that's James Tissot's July: Specimen of a Portrait (1878). The strangest positions Robert Barr as a pulp writer, and reimagines Mrs Bodman as a woman who knows how to handle a gun.
The 1896 Stokes first edition I searched for isn't horribly expensive, but it exceeds my current budget. Copies begin at US$65 and, for no good reason, reach US$500. "Tastefully stamped with silver and colors," says the ad in the November 1896 edition of the Pocket Magazine. I've seen copies on yellow, red, green, and tan boards, with no indication as to which, if any, is the true first. A yellow copy of the Stokes edition can be read online here – gratis – at the Internet Archive.
An English edition was published the same year by Chatto & Windus.
Held by nine Canadian university libraries. All our public libraries fail.
I'll be in Montreal next week for what looks to be an eventful thirty-eight hours. On the Tuesday, October 3rd, I'll be hosting the ninth annual plaque dedication at the Writers' Chapel. This year we'll be honouring Hugh Hood, author of Flying a Red Kite, The Camera Always Lies, and thirty other books. Andre Furlani and Sarah Hood will speak. As in the past, this is a free event and will be followed by a wine and cheese reception.
The Writers' Chapel St Jax Montréal 1439 St Catherine Street West (Bishops Street entrance) Tuesday, October 3rd at 6:00 pm
The next day, Wednesday, sees the launch of my new book, The Dusty Bookcase, at the legendary Word bookstore. I'll be speaking briefly and will at some point hold up a copy of what I now know to be the very first Canadian novel I ever read. Please do consider dropping by to say "hello." I'm told there will be ever more wine and cheese!
A writer, ghostwriter, écrivain public, literary historian and bibliophile, I'm the author of Character Parts: Who's Really Who in CanLit (Knopf, 2003), and A Gentleman of Pleasure: One Life of John Glassco, Poet, Translator, Memoirist and Pornographer (McGill-Queen's UP, 2011; shortlisted for the Gabrielle Roy Prize). I've edited over a dozen books, including The Heart Accepts It All: Selected Letters of John Glassco (Véhicule, 2013) and George Fetherling's The Writing Life: Journals 1975-2005 (McGill-Queen's UP, 2013). I currently serve as series editor for Ricochet Books and am a contributing editor for Canadian Notes & Queries. My most recent book is The Dusty Bookcase (Biblioasis, 2017), a collection of revised and expanded reviews first published here and elsewhere.
