Welcome to Litsy!

I am posting one book per day from my extensive to-be-read collection. No description and providing no reason for wanting to read it, I just do. Some will be old, some will be new. Don‘t judge me - I have a lot of books. Join in if you want!

#ABookADay2023

I listened to the audio. It was slow-moving and I couldn‘t get interested, though the Newfoundland accents and phrases are fun. I missed much of what happened in the book, but I didn‘t really care, either. I‘m not sure how old the kids were when their parents died and not sure how old they were at the end of the book, either. It was a bit ugly as they became teenagers with no one else around, though. Cont in comments...

#Movie2BookRecs @Klou
Prompt: The Golden Compass

Revised #Bookspin list!
1. Everything happens for a reason
2. Farewell to Gabo
3. Hood Feminism
4. Me and White Supremacy
5. Five Little Indians
6. Talk about Race
7. How Much of these Hills
8. Wordslut
9. Chop Suey Nation
10. Bush Runner
11. Redhead by the Side of the Road
12. Open Heart
13. The Innocents
14. The Mountains Sing
15. The New Jim Crow
16. Unsettling Canada
17. Banana
18. H is for Hawk
19. Hidden Life of Trees
20. Swing

A well-written, if complicated, read. This is my first Michael Crummey book and, although parts of this book were difficult to get through, his writing style was so enjoyable that I would definitely read more by him.

Newfoundland for #ReadCanada (4 provinces left to go!)

First of all, I love this cover art. So gorgeous. Good book, too. The sense of place was great. The audio narration was very good.

I started my new cross-stitch and love it so far. How fitting to start my souvenir from Newfoundland while listening to the tagged book set in Newfoundland. #ReadCanada #audiostitching

I think this will be a good chunk of my #20in4 readathon this weekend. I'm feeling ambitious this round! Aiming to finish 4 books and, why not, hit the full 20 hours. We'll see how it goes, looking forward to it!

This was not an easy read (TW in comments) but for all that it was disturbing it was also compelling & beautifully written. The sparse, taut language suited the subject matter perfectly. It deals with 'the issue' in a manner that, while it is still shocking, gives it a feeling of inevitability. And oh, but it's sad. Heartbreakingly so. The ending is all the more powerful for its suddenness & brevity. And despite the bleakness ...cont. in comments

Ah, another lovely cover! Starting this one today. Have given up trying to read in bed (my favourite reading location) as I keep falling asleep face down in my Kindle! So I'm doing some cheeky daytime reading when I really should be doing something else...😜

Poetically written, Crummey delivers a colonial Canadian update on the Garden of Eden and sin. #canadianlit #colonialcanada

My #BookSpinBingo board is about to be cleared. This month has still a couple of days left and those books are all about to be finished 😁

#24b4Monday really motivates me to keep reading! 🎉

@TheAromaofBooks @Andrew65

Book Nr 20 off my #BookSpinBingo board

Brother and sister left alone somewhere on the coast of Newfoundland... - a special historical novel with an to me unforgettable setting.

There's so much in this book that I like reading about: harsh seas, ships, life during the 19th century and very good writing skills.

#24b4Monday time: 11.51 hours

@TheAromaofBooks @Andrew65

I loved the landscape. The story was beautifully written ... of two siblings left to fend for themselves & how they grew into the life they were dealt. There is innocence & sadness & pain set against beautiful country & sea. A strange one .... haunting

#Newfoundland ✅ #ReadCanada

Getting my #ReadCanada books together. I think I have Newfoundland, Saskatchewan, & Ontario here. Thanks Melissa looking forward to this challenge

Ada and Everett are 10 and 12 when their parents and infant sister die, leaving them alone on an isolated cove in northern Newfoundland (I think in the late 1800s). Initially, I loved this, and the writing is beautiful, but the author took the story to a place that made me really unhappy (under spoiler tag below). If I‘d known, I would have skipped this one.

Up next...orphans living in isolation on the Newfoundland coast and the first sign of spring.

The whole family had been sick and I needed a book to pass the hours. At times bleak and agoraphobic in space and time, it goes to some very (predictably) uncomfortable places. Still a very compelling read.

Engrossing coming of age story of orphaned siblings in unusual and harsh circumstances. I can‘t say it was too long, but it strikes me now that it may have been more powerful as a novella. Some of the interludes were a bit of a distraction from the main thrust of the storyline.

This is not going to appeal to everyone and may even be offensive, but I do think it works in the context of the relative innocence.

Opposite atmosphere of my current read.

I read the first short chapter last night and it had all the hallmarks of a novel I may love! I flipped to the back flap and immediately knew why - Crummey is also a poet. Plus he lives in a place where setting/environment is likely to figure prominently in his work. Yea!! This is my first Crummey and I hope the beginning of a beautiful relationship. 😉

I don‘t always read the flaps before diving in.

Sniff testing the new library book...

This story of two children orphaned and alone trying to survive on the coast of Newfoundland left me a little conflicted. The writing was gorgeous and the story both sad and a testament to a will to survive. The story, however, left me a bit bored at times. The author‘s main objective seemed to be a description of the sexual tension between the siblings, but he was vague on it most of the time. Unfortunately, the rest just felt like filler. 3.5⭐️

I've tagged my favourite Canadian novel of 2019 for this post about my 2019 #readingstats. 36% of the books I read were written by #CanadianAuthors.

Best book of the year! Such a good story, very well written!

A coming of age story set 100+ years ago on the coast of Newfoundland. It‘s breathtaking and heartbreaking. Despite what the province of Ontario says about the value of education, this book proves how valuable it is ❤️I‘d be dead

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

The story of two orphaned siblings fighting for survival on the wild coast of Newfoundland. The plot is secondary to the 'extraordinary' relationship that develops between brother and sister.
Crummey writes beautifully of landscape, conveying in an economical and yet poetic style, the vastness and the drama of the local coastline.
A surprisingly terse ending is the only dent to an otherwise fascinating survival / coming-of-age story.

The countdown to Christmas just got real!

The Innocents is an example of great storytelling. The real star of this novel, is the inhospitable Newfoundland Coast. Crummey brings this desolate environment to life, and it looms large in every moment; a force which perpetually threatens to overwhelm the innocence of Ada and Everedd. This novel isn‘t for the faint-hearted. It‘s challenging, and at times gruesomely direct but it‘s also absorbing.

😭 #indiebuddyreads

A gal tries e-Reading on a prehistoric iPad for book club #indiebuddyreads

#bookmail - I also got The Secrets We Kept but the cover was very damaged. Currently missing the days when Amazon didn‘t make you send the book back and told you to keep it.

Starting today 🎉

I've tagged my favourite book of October but it was hard to choose one from among the 15 5-star reads of last month. My biggest surprise when I looked back on my stats is that I only read one graphic novel. Not sure how that happened. 🤷‍♀️

I only picked this up because I'm going to attempt to read the #gillerprize short list but what a great book! I couldn't stop thinking about it between settings and, for someone with a terrible memory, I think this story is going to stay with me. Hoping the rest of the shortlist is just as good!

Notes on language that I kept while reading. ie Now the once. Dwy. Landwash. Bare-legged tea. Skerries. Douted. Rames. God‘s reeving nails. Bully boat. Wherry. Red jacks. Slobby ice. Buskins. Whitecoat. Kedger. Cuddy. Hello the house. Thewy. Raillery. Mauby. Tammy gown. Faffering. Qualmy. Keep your daddles clear of that pot. Roke. By the light of rotoil burning in a slutlamp. Moil. Mollyfodge. Bawn. Yaffles. Brin sack. Too bockity. I‘m best kind.

Ada & Evered* are children, 9 & 11, when their baby sister & parents die of illness. The two manage mostly on their own for several years in an isolated Newfoundland cove in the early 19th century. Cinematic descriptions, lots of archaic vernacular, the seasonal rhythms, and the immersion into both the outer & inner lives of this pair of siblings as they grow into adolescence—all of these made for a bewitching & meditative tale. *note Biblical ref

I‘ve only read two of the shortlisted titles so far, but I‘m already hoping that Michael Crummey will be the winner. https://scotiabankgillerprize.ca/2019-finalists/

As far as Ada could tell a mother‘s role was incidental at best, her body a passive vessel for the passing wildflower that was a child. The Virgin Mary had gotten her feet wet out picking berries and so fell pregnant with Jesus. It was a condition women caught like a fever or a cold, something that resulted from their own weakness or impudence. Something vaguely shameful.

Sarah Best was half-asleep with her mouth to the newborn‘s downy crown and she glanced across at Ada without raising her head. “What should we call her?”
It hadn‘t occurred to Ada that a name was bestowed on a person and not something you were born with. The lack made the infant seem almost as naked and pitiable as when she first landed in Mary Oram‘s lap.

“He‘s got all the grace of a cow aboard of a dory,” another said. “The gangly old stilts on him. He‘ll never shit a seaman‘s turd, that one.”

They picked the flesh from the conner‘s thorny backbone. It was just enough food to make them feel how hungry they were.

She could talk the bark off a tree, their father said, a note of awed disbelief in his voice.

Classic Crummey - this is a quiet kind of novel but there's a feeling of urgency too. Between a 3.5 and a 4 star read for me.

Getting a bunch of #CanLit reading in! Look there is that slight hint of Fall with the fallen leaf by the book. 🍂 Giller Prize Longlist is announced on Tuesday too!!