At the halfway point in the book, I thought the story premise was interesting, the structure and contrast were good, and the writing was competent … but something I couldn’t put my finger on was not drawing me in to the characters.

After I finished it, I could say the story drew me in a bit more towards the end, and although the ending itself was a bit overstated, it was still very touching, too.

I laughed out loud numerous times as I sailed through this book, which is so compellingly easy to gobble up in one gulp. Somehow, Toews manages to make unbelievably snappy dialogue come out of the mouths of utterly believable and attractive, albeit damaged characters. As a complete reading experience, I think A Complicated Kindness was more cohesive and felt more finely crafted, but The Flying Troutmans is still a splendid book. (I was surprised that it was not longlisted for the Giller.)

Eisenberg propels many of her stories through pungent, captivating dialogue. Like conversations that are overheard, joined in progress and out of context, it sometimes takes a while for the reader to sort out what is going on, but the joy and satisfaction is in assembling Eisenberg’s intricate puzzles of personalities, relationships and situations. Her stories are often surprising suspenseful, and “The Robbery” in particular clutched at my heart.

Low key and seemingly slow moving on the surface, this novel is stunningly rich with layers of entwined relationships and emotions. As novel craft, the book is a treasure trove of metaphors and Biblical parallels that you as the reader can choose to specifically ponder, or just let run as an underlying resonance under the main story. At its simplest, it’s a story of family relationships and friendships that deepen and evolve over time. Less simply, those often profound relationships are tested, but ultimately become even stronger as each character struggles and strives to keep his or her love unconditional. The two aging patriarchs, both ministers, test each other’s beliefs. Father and daughter are tested to understand each other, and understand the prodigal son who returns to the family homestead, but cannot fully disclose where he has been and what he has done while they longed to see him again.

This novel stands on its own as an ensemble character study, and as an intriguing examination of what constitutes “home”. It is also a captivating companion to Robinson’s “Gilead”, which depicts the same time period and locale, but told from the perspective of the other patriarch minister. Taken together, they are a subtly moving literary experience.

Deservedly shortlisted for the 2007 Man Booker Prize, Nicola Barker’s Darkmans pivots on the various forms of upheaval wrought by the construction of the Channel Tunnel between England and France in the late 1980s to early 1990s. The Chunnel churned up lands and historic buildings, sundered communities and families, and both destroyed and created new employment and ways of life. The colourful, rambling cast of Darkmans is touched in numerous fashions by this disruptive force.

While the new housing developments and roadways literally pave over the history of the area, forces from the past still seem to bubble to the surface and manifest themselves in disturbing ways. Is the young boy Fleet autistic, brilliantly gifted, or is he possessed by the ghost of an evil court jester who was at one time banished to France from England? Is Fleet’s father, Dory, clinically schizoprenic or also possessed by the same devious spirit? Elen, Dory’s long-suffering wife and Fleet’s bewildered but ever patient mother, seems like a put-upon heroine who also captivates hospital worker and amateur historian Beede and Beede’s easygoing drug dealer son Kane … but then might be a malevolent temptress as the many tendrils of plot and character swirl to a dizzying conclusion.

Even the more peripheral characters in Darkmans are vivid and intriguing. Barker orchestrates some clever use of typography to convey the idea of people speaking and conversing in multiple languages at once. Yet while so much going on at once would seem to defeat or exhaust even the most dedicated readers, you’re left wanting more after a breathtaking 840 page sprint.

This bit from near the beginning of the book lays some of the foundation for the disruptive force of the Chunnel development:

“It went without saying that the Chunnel (now a source of such unalloyed national complacency and pride) had caused huge headaches – and terrible heartache – in East Kent …

When the developer’s plans for the new Folkestone Terminal were initially proposed, however, it quickly became apparent that all this was soon about to change. Several farms and properties (not least, the many charming, if ramshackle homes in the idiosyncratic Kentish hamlet of Danton Pinch) were to be sacrificed to the terminal approach and concourse, not to mention over 500 acres of prime farmland and woodland, as well as all remaining evidence of the old Elham Valley Railway (built in 1884, disused since 1947). But worse still, the access road from the terminal to the M20 was due to cut a wide path straight between Newington and Peene, thereby cruelly separating them, forever.”

The title story features a chilling, amoral, American Psycho-esque narrator whose account of his outing to a jazz concert with his drug addled punk friends is by turns horrifying, perversely comic and, momentarily, shockingly touching. Each story in this collection is a daring exploration of voice, perspective and form. When such real life figures such Alex Trebek, Merv Griffin and David Letterman appear in secondary or peripheral roles, it adds intriguing dimensions rather than gimmickry to those stories. The portrait of Lyndon B. Johnson in “Lyndon” is moving and revelatory. “Westward the Course of Empire Takes Its Way” is a dense, intricate journey and pop culture pastiche featuring, amongst others, former child stars of McDonald’s commercials. Somehow, the topical references feel like they will accrue historical heft rather than feeling dated as time goes on.

David Foster Wallace was a fearless experimentalist and humanist, and is so dearly and immensely missed.

Halfway through India, Elizabeth starts to shed her self-absorption and the book becomes a fairly tolerable read. By the end, she’d more or less won me over, and I admired her quest to learn to live more effectively, for herself and others around her.

At the same time, her premeditated and well-financed ability to have such an adventure in the first place makes it largely out of the realm of possibility for most people experiencing similar personal crises. It bewilders me a bit that so many readers felt a connection to this rather rarified story.

Deservedly shortlisted for the 2007 Man Booker Prize and winner of the 2007 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, Lloyd Jones’ Mister Pip is a memorable tribute to the power of words to give people focus, hope and courage. When a remote village on a Pacific island is blockaded during a civil war, the island’s only white man, Mr Watts, reopens the school and bolsters the spirits of the children and eventually of the entire community by taking them by memory through Dickens’ Great Expectations. For many, the life of Pip becomes more real to them than the surreal and increasingly frightening and shocking events occurring around them. The story is told from the point of view of Matilda, one of the children, and her journey to pay her respects to Mr Watts and find closure many years later meanders a bit and makes the end of this novel feel a bit ragged, but this is otherwise a stunning and beautiful work.

This is one of the titles selected by writer Yann Martel to provide to Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, to encourage an appreciation of the arts and literature in particular in the PM, and to also help him with his stillness and thoughtfulness. Martel has regularly sent books from a wide range of literary traditions to Harper, and has devoted a Web site to the book list and his kind and considered covering letters with each volume.

“You cannot pretend to read a book. Your eyes will give you away. So will your breathing. A person entranced by a book simply forgets to breathe. The house can catch alight and a reader deep in a book will not look up until the wallpaper is in flames.”

This is a decidedly quirky tale of personal and professional competition and obsession, likely all in the fevered brain of the protagonist.

Wally seems nice enough, but Marsha is rather a bore.