A New Season by Terry Fallis

A purely Canadian, with a splash of Parisian culture, this book touched me in various ways. It was the first of Fallis’ that didn’t offer the humour I have learned to expect, but it didn’t need it. The tale of Jack McMaster and his senior ball hockey team, a loss due to COVID and a secret video helped move the story along nicely.

More than a love story, this was a love song in novel format, complete with praise and a scene with Jim Cuddy, a beloved Canadian singer-songwriter. McMaster lives with his son, or rather exists in the same home as his son, and has a ritual of freelancing writing, trying his hardest to score a goal and enjoy his son’s meals while feeling the loss of his wife and the items on his bucket list he planned to cross off with her.

This book is sentimental, relatable with Canadian layers and some Paris filling to make it sweeter. Fallis challenged himself to do something a little different and didn’t buckle, instead, he just added more adventure, mystery and compelling relationships we should all cherish more since the last two years took us for a ride.

For me, a good book is one that teaches a lesson in humanity that will last for decades and this did that. With its look at a devastating cruel sudden death, profoundly comparing it to long, slow losses, we learn there are benefits to both that help us heal and embellish our sense of grief. As we age, while we grow, Fallis teaches us to live.

TERRY FALLIS grew up in Toronto and earned an engineering degree from McMaster University. Drawn to politics at an early age, he worked for cabinet ministers in Ottawa and at Queen’s Park. His first novel, The Best Laid Plans, began as a podcast, then was self-published, won the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour, was re-published by McClelland & Stewart to great reviews, was crowned the 2011 winner of CBC’s Canada Reads as “the essential Canadian novel of the decade,” and was adapted as a CBC Television series and a stage musical. A skilled public speaker, he lives in Toronto with his wife.

Publisher ‏ : ‎ McClelland & Stewart (Aug. 29 2023)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 352 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0771094744
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0771094743

Sarah Butland

Website

I am a struggling artist, a challenging and challenged mother who always thinks she is failing, an emerging freelance writer and reporter, an author with my name on several books crossing genres and always hoping to find more readers who enjoy them.

I am also a successful artist, a wonderful and thriving mother of one, a reacher towards both people and dreams despite all of the turned backs and obstacles in my way. I am a thriving freelance writer and reporter, an author loved by enough readers to make it worthwhile and a discombobulated conundrum who loves to hear new music, tell new tales and meet new authors. And I’m doing something I always dreamed of doing – reviewing books to support others as well as myself and my family.