The Luminous Sea by Melissa Barbeau

A team of researchers from a nearby university have set up a research station in a fictional outport in Newfoundland, studying the strange emergence of phosphorescent tides. And Vivienne, a young assistant, accidentally captures a creature unknown to science: a kind of fish, both sentient and distinctly female. As the project supervisor and lead researcher attempt to exploit the discovery, the creature begins to waste away, and Vivian must endanger herself to save them both.

Being Mary Ro by Ida Linehan Young

[dropcap]One[/dropcap] might be forgiven if, after seeing the book’s cover, they think Being Mary Ro (2018, Flanker Press) is another stereotypical Victorian-era romance novel. In some ways it is, but Being Mary Ro is more historical fiction than it is romance, similar to Genevieve Graham’s Promises to Keep. Like that book, it is based on …

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Death at the Harbourview Cafe by Fred Humber

Three deaths: one, a popular Chinese businessman, the second his adopted son, and the third a rookie RCMP constable in a popular cafe and store in the unassuming town of Botwood Newfoundland. If that doesn’t have the makings of a good mystery-thriller, then I don’t know what does. But this isn’t fiction, it’s a true …

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The Mike Martin Interview

[dropcap]The [/dropcap]Sgt. Windflower Mystery series is a series of cozy mysteries set in the small Newfoundland town of Grand Bank where Sgt. Winston Windflower is the top cop in the RCMP detachment there. The latest instalment in the series, A Tangled Web (2017, Baico Publishing), has just been released. It begins innocuously enough: “Life doesn’t …

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Adventures of a Grenfell Nurse by Rosalie M. Lombard

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]here is a meme floating around the Internet that states: “Don’t live the same year 75 times over and call it a life”. For at least two years of her substantial life (born in 1927, she is still alive as of this writing), Rosalie Lombard could not be accused of any sort of repetition as she served …

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The Inward Journey by Kate Evans

“Spin me back down the years and the days of my youth Draw the lace and black curtains and shut out the whole truth Spin me down the long ages: let them sing the song.” – Ian Anderson Sylvia Drodge of St. John’s NL (the former Sylvia Bolfe-Carter of Ireland) has been temporarily relegated to …

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Weaving Water by Annamarie Beckel

Author (and former St. John resident) Annamarie Beckel once conducted behavioural research on river otters* for her doctoral thesis and her fourth novel, Weaving Water (2016, Killick Press) is about Beth, a fiftyish woman who teaches Biology at a university but longs to get back into research, specifically river otters. Her husband Alan is a …

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Jack and the Magnificent Ugly Stick by Jack Goudie

How much fun can you have with just one rubber boot? When one of his Grandmother’s pink rubber boots goes missing, Jack and his grandmother are forced to cancel their fishing trip. A disappointed Jack soon finds a tall piece of driftwood and with the help of a few of Newfoundland and Labrador’s most celebrated …

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samantha rideout

The Samantha Rideout Interview

Samantha Rideout is an author from Newfoundland and Labrador whose latest book is The People Who Stay (2016, Flanker Press), a novel about a young woman, Sylvia, who returns after ten years to the outport community she left to attend university in the U.S. and pursue a career. She and her American husband come back to attend …

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The Trudi Johnson Interview

Trudi Johnson was born and grew up in St. John’s, Newfoundland though her family’s roots are in Bonavista Bay. Currently, she is an associate professor in the Faculty of Education at Memorial University, where she enjoys teaching pre-service teachers and researches effective teaching and teacher efficacy. Trudi lives in St. John’s with her husband, Albert. …

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