Of all the books, I thought Not Wanted on the Voyage deserved the prize. In my own opinion, it was the most flawless selection in the group. It went one step beyond the average run of the mill novel. I’m not entirely disappointed with the King Leary win though. I thought the ending fell a little flat, but beyond that it was a great read and I’m happy for the author. I was a little surprised that Icefields didn’t make it to the final round, but it was leading the popular vote last I looked. I found Lisa Moore’s arguments rather strident and not a little inconsistent: she wants to “grow” (think of that word being uplifted by choirs of angels) but she dislikes when a book has any kind of obvious message or agenda. I think her choice of From the Fifteenth District is a clear indication that she doesn’t really have an understanding of the Canada Reads contest. As for Hopkinson’s book, I found it annoying how Jemini kept saying that she was sorry that “Canada wasn’t ready” for Brown Girl in the Ring — in fact, that attitude is rather insulting to me as a reader. I’m sure Canada was as ready to like Brown Girl as King Leary. It just wasn’t as well written a book.

I hope that we get some real classic CanLit on the list next year though.

My plans for next year: to buy all the books, to read them quickly, to journal each one here as I read it, to send them all out as bookrings. I just wish they did it more often!

From the back cover:
“The rich and privileged have fled the city, barricaded it behind roadblocks, and left it to crumble. The inner city has had to rediscover old ways—farming, barter, herb lore. But now the monied need a harvest of bodies, and so they prey upon the helpless of the streets. With nowhere to turn, a young woman must open herself to ancient truths, eternal powers, the tragic mystery surrounding her mother and grandmother.
She must bargain with gods, and give birth to new legends.”

Other useful links:
Nalo Hopkinson writes about working on Brown Girl in the Ring
a video of the Boney M. version of the ring game song

My thoughts:
It was an ok book (especially for a first-time author writing the whole thing in two months) but it wasn’t a masterpiece by any means. I’ll be interested to see why Jemeni chose it over all the hundreds (thousands really) of Canadian books she could have championed. The rationale for the dystopian state of Toronto is quite far-fetched: I can’t believe that the federal or provincial governments would fail to provide enough funds for the general maintenance of the city and just block it off while life goes on as normal outside. To me, that part was more incredible than the zombies and spirits!

Apart from that, I did really have fun with the Caribbean dialect and enjoyed the story itself, though I imagine the more horrific parts would be difficult to read for someone with more sensitivity to depictions of violence.