Recent Class Notes

Books and Beyond

  • Black cake, turtle soup, and other dilemmas by Gloria Blizzard

    Black Cake, Turtle Soup, and Other Dilemmas

    Gloria Blizzard, Artsci’85

    Author Gloria Blizzard, Artsci’85, is an award-winning, Toronto-based writer and poet, and a Black Canadian woman of multiple heritages whose collection of personal essays, Black Cake, Turtle Soup, and Other Dilemmas, is a thought-provoking and poetic work. Weaving together moments from different parts of her life, she takes a closer look at the connections between music, dance, and culture, as well as geography and language, in what CBC Books calls a “powerful and deeply personal collection.” Her work draws attention to issues involving belonging, while fearlessly addressing contemporary themes of feminism, racism, and colonialism. is available from Dundurn Press.

  • Irrepressible: Yukon's Martha Black – from gold rush to parliament hill by Enid Mallory

    Irrepressible: Yukon’s Martha Black

    Enid Mallory, Arts’58

    In 1935, Martha Black became only the second woman ever elected to the House of Commons – the culmination of an unstoppable spirit that governed her life and is captured by Enid Mallory, Arts’58, in her biography, Irrepressible: Yukon’s Martha Black. The author of 11 books, some of which chronicle other prominent figures of the North such as Robert Service and George M. Douglas, in Irrepressible she takes the reader from late 1800s gold-rush-era Yukon to Parliament Hill. Abandoned by her first husband, Martha perseveres and later marries a lawyer who becomes commissioner of the Yukon. When he falls ill, there is an opportunity for Martha to take his place. is available from Hancock House Publishers.

  • False bodies by J.R. McConvey

    False Bodies

    J.R. McConvey, Artsci’02

    The mass death on an offshore oil rig on the East Coast is believed to be the work of the fabled kraken, a legendary sea monster of mythical proportions. In his debut novel, False Bodies, J.R. McConvey, Artsci’02, plunges an already unhinged detective into a sinister world of squid cults, a corrupt corporation and tentacled beasts. The author was the winner of the for his collection of short stories, Different Beasts. Giller Prize-nominated author David Demchuk calls False Bodies “a gripping supernatural thriller with a wry, noirish edge.” is available from Breakwater Books.

  • Going to see, essays on Idleness, nature, & sustainable work by Kate J. Neville

    Going to Seed: Essays on Idleness, Nature, and Sustainable Work

    Kate J. Neville, Artsci’04

    Idleness is not often praiseworthy; it is associated with laziness and unproductiveness that can lead to ruin – a state captured by the idiom “gone to seed.” But author Kate J. Neville, Artsci’04, makes a case for the opposite in Going to Seed: Essays on Idleness, Nature, and Sustainable Work. What could we learn about ourselves, our society, and our planet, she explores, if we simply took a cue from nature and sat idle like a seed, which is a packet containing the energy for new life? Winner of the. is available from University of Regina Press.

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