Cast Out

2018-12-21 20:29:00

"A poignant and unexpectedly witty narrative about a woman trying to free herself from dark horror." Kenneth Radu reviews Jennifer Quist's The Apocalypse of Morgan Turner. 

Leigh Kinch-Pedrosa reviews Smells Like Stars

2018-10-04 20:29:00

D. Nandi Odhiambo's new novel is "a swirling, dizzying, drama full of complex characters and high stakes."

Lu Xun's Voice in Translation, II

2018-09-23 20:29:00

This second piece by Chinese author Lu Xun translated by LLP author Jennifer Quist is work carried out as part of her post-graduate work at the University of Alberta. The first piece appears here.

Lu Xun's Voice in Translation, I

2018-09-04 20:29:00

LLP author Jennifer Quist's post-graduate work at the University of Alberta includes translations from the Chinese. These include two pieces by Lu Xun, one published below. The second appears here. [Photo: Linda Leith]

About a boy

2018-09-04 20:29:00

Leila Marshy's Q&A with Montreal author and journalist Frédérick Lavoie, author of For Want of a Fir Tree: Ukraine Undone (LLP, 2018) 

Grondin's Nincheri inspires curiosity and renewed interest

2018-08-19 20:29:00

Contributing editor Leigh Kinch-Pedrosa reviews Mélanie Grondin's The Art and Passion of Guido Nincheri.

"Glimmers of Elena Ferrante’s softer side."

2018-05-14 20:29:00

Contributing editor Leigh Kinch-Pedrosa reviews The Pink House, the new collection by Montreal writer Licia Canton. 

Writing a first novel "is like being a little singer-songwriter opening for the Beatles."

2018-03-20 20:29:00

Dynamic Montrealer Leila Marshy has been part of the scene for many years, but now she's come out with her first novel, The Philistine (LLP 2018), and everyone's sitting up and taking notice. 

"Morgan and her family came to me when I was watching a police press conference on television."

2018-03-11 20:29:00

Linda Leith in conversation with Jennifer Quist, whose third novel, The Apocalypse of Morgan Turner, is published this month. LLP is the publisher not only of this new novel, but also of its award-winning precedessors, Love Letters of the Angels of Death (2013) and Sistering (2015).

Excerpt from "Cecil Foster's Sleep on, Beloved," by H. Nigel Thomas

2018-03-08 20:29:00

This excerpt from H. Nigel Thomas's essay on Afro-Caribbean immigrant existence in Toronto was originally published in Confluences 2: Essays on the New Canadian Literature, edited by Nurjehan Aziz. It appears on Salon .ll. by kind permission of Mawenzi House.

Q & A with novelist Phillip Ernest, part II

2018-02-16 20:29:00

Phillip Ernest elaborates on his life in Toronto, the city to which he fled at the age of fifteen, on his first university studies there when he was thirty, and on the writing of the Sanskrit vampire story entited The Vetala that LLP publishes on March 10th.

Part II of a two-part Q & A. Part I is here.

Q & A with novelist Phillip Ernest, part I

2018-02-11 20:29:00

Phillip Ernest is a Canadian writer with an extraordinary personal history, as even the briefest version of his bio suggests: Born in 1970, Phillip Ernest grew up in New Liskeard, Ontario. Fleeing home at fifteen, he lived on Toronto’s skid row until he was twenty-eight. He learned Sanskrit from the book Teach Yourself Sanskrit, and later earned a BA in South Asian Studies from the University of Toronto and a PhD in Sanskrit from Cambridge University. The Vetala (LLP, 2018) is his first novel. This is Part I of a two-part interview. Part II is here.

From books to booze, from Montreal to Toronto, and from A. J. Liebling to The Simpsons

2018-01-23 20:29:00

Contributing editor Leigh Kinch-Pedrosa chats with author Jonah Campbell. 

Just a Lazy, Skull-Boiling Afternoon, by Jonah Campbell

2018-01-22 20:29:00

"A pig’s head, in case you are not aware, has eyes and eyelashes and teeth and a nose—all the makings of a face."

An excerpt from Jonah Campbell's Eaten Back to Life (Invisible Publishing, 2017).

Joy Kogawa in "A Long Journey to Mercy"

2018-01-16 20:29:00

This excerpt from "A Long Journey to Mercy: Joy Kogawa’s Gently to Nagasaki," by Irene Sywenky, was originally published in Confluences 2: Essays on the New Canadian Literature, edited by Nurjehan Aziz. It appears on Salon .ll. by kind permission of Mawenzi House.  Joy Kogawa's most recent work, Gently to Nagasaki (2016), is a memoir that connects with many of the themes she has developed in her earlier books on Japanese-Canadians.

Merry Effing Christmas, or, Giving Rum Another Chance, or, Rum Gives Me Another Chance, by Jonah Campbell

2017-12-22 20:29:00

"She had eyes that were kind of sleepy like a cat’s eyes, but precisely in the way that a cat’s eyes can be at once sleepy and burningly, terrifically alive." An excerpt from Jonah Campbell's Eaten Back to Life (Invisible Publishing, 2017).

Publishing Translation in Montreal, II

2017-12-10 20:29:00

Part II of the text of a talk prepared for a panel on Publishing Literature in Translation at the Concordia University colloquium Traduire Arabe on Thursday, December 7, 2017.

Author Linda Leith with journalist Akim Kermiche.

Publishing Translation in Montreal, I

2017-12-10 18:29:00

Part I of the text of a talk prepared for a panel on Publishing Literature in Translation at the Concordia University colloquium Traduire Arabe on Thursday, December 7, 2017.

Scottish Stones, part II, by Kenneth Radu

2017-12-07 13:29:00

I had read Andrew Lang’s collections of fairy tales as a child and later as an adult. In university I also read David Hume’s philosophy, which provided a pathway out of dingles and a ladder out of wells of wishful thinking. Through fantasy or fact, the geography of dramatic basalt rock formations, covered in green, obviously came into being through the forces of eons for the sole purpose of providing dancing venues under moonlight and feeding our insatiable need for stories.

Scottish Stones, part I, by Kenneth Radu

2017-12-06 13:29:00

“I tell you. I fell in love with a tree. I couldn’t not. It was in blossom. It was a day like other days and I was on my way to work, walking the same way as usual between our house and the town” (Ali Smith).

Well, I fell in love with Scotland. I couldn’t not, although flowering trees had little to do with it. 

Our Year of Mourning Leonard, by Ariela Freedman

2017-12-01 13:29:00

My father died twenty years ago and I cannot listen to Leonard Cohen without mourning him. As I write, I’m listening to his copy of Cohen’s album Songs from a Room. “What is a saint?” Cohen asks in Beautiful Losers, and he answers himself, “I think it has something to do with the energy of love.”