It doesn’t feel like like summer here at the Halifax Reader until we’ve toured Nova Scotia in fiction. Let’s enjoy a literary tour of our beautiful province with some of this year’s additions to the library’s collection.
Marion MacKenzie is unhappy and needs time for solitude and self-reflection and retreats to her uncle’s home in fictional Lupin’s Point to regroup and find herself. She finds that solitude and anonymity may be easier in a large city than in a small town. Marion tries to keep her distance, but quickly finds herself involved in her neighbours’ lives.
Trish and Roy are facing life in their forties. A communal living arrangement went sour years before, but family life seemed to be back on track. Now, however, the marriage is in question and a teenage daughter moves out disillusioned with her parents. A surprise April snowstorm forces Trish from her home and compels her to confront her past and her relationships with family members.
In a stately home in Liverpool, investigative reporter Hannah Sims tries to uncover information about Maggie Collins, a young woman who vanished eight months before. Once Sims starts investigating strange things begin to happen in this quiet town, and certainly people are amazed by the large number of crows that have appeared. Two Crows Joy continues Oickle’sOne Crow Sorrow (M) and next we will see Three Crows a Letter(M).
Ronnie Doucette, who by most standards is not a nice guy, manages redemption in this truly unusual crime story. Written as an autobiography of sorts, Ronnie tells his story to the medical examiner who performs his autopsy. Ronnie’s life begins to take a bad turn when his girlfriend dies under suspicious circumstances. A series of bad choices lead Ronnie and friend Scott into the thrall of a local criminal organization.
Ellie MacAllister returns to the summer retreat of her childhood following the sudden death of her young husband. Adding to the grief are suspicions concerning the circumstances of his death. Vulnerable and alone, she is susceptible to visions and disturbing information about an ancient and mystical tree. In another storyline, Susannah Fraser, from a hundred years earlier, emigrants to this land and discovers the same faerie tree and her own powers of healing.
Winner of the Jim Connors Dartmouth Book Award for Fiction, Great Village is a novel about secrets. Flossy O’Reilly is a retired school teacher who has lived her entire life in tiny Great Village. A visit from a friend’s teenage granddaughter disrupts her quiet life and forces her to face family secrets that have long lain dormant.
