Hilda C. Landers Library & Archives

Elizabeth Hay’s wonderful novel Late Nights on Air takes the reader on an ultimately haunting trip to the dauntingly barren but breathtaking reaches of the Canadian North in the mid-1970’s, where a finely-drawn ensemble of characters are brought together in the minuscule town of Yellowknife. Hay’s talent is to create authentic, recognizable people and situate them in a place that may be exotic in its way yet one that very few of us would choose to visit for very long. For many of the characters, Yellowknife is a brief stop on their way through life, a place of possible escape where they’ve somehow landed after a disappointment or professional failure has sent them to this lonely town way off of the beaten path. Others have settled in the town years ago and decided that it would be as good a place as any to call home. The story is centered on a radio station, a nearly forgotten Canadian Broadcasting outpost that may or may not survive the coming of a new television station. An oil pipeline is also in the works causing much debate among the residents.

Although the physical setting of the book, the town and the vast natural wilderness surrounding it, is virtually a personage unto itself, the human characters that Hay has so vividly brought to life are the book’s, and Hay’s, greatest achievement. The people and the place stay with you and that, to me, is the highest praise that I can give to a book. If my description of the plot, such as it is, sounds like thin gruel, this may not be the book for you. But if you value writers who can survey the inner workings of a disparate group of individuals and plant their stories unforgettably in your mind, Elizabeth Hay is one to be cherished. This is the first book of hers that I’ve read (thank you Celia for the recommendation) but it will not be the last.

Availability: SMCM
Review Submitted by: Curt Barclift, Acquisitions Technician
Rating: Highly Recommended                                                                         

The SMCM Library’s Summer Reading Program will begin on June 1 and will end on August 15.

The Summer Reading program is open to all members of the SMCM Library community including students, staff, faculty and residents of the Tri-County area (St. Mary’s, Calvert and Charles.) You can read anything you want as long as a copy is available at the SMCM Library or via USMAI. To get points you must post a review on the blog.

See About Summer Reading for more information.

Christopher Miller’s novel, The Cardboard Universe, is presented as a manuscript for an encyclopedia; fully indexed with both literary and biographical information about the life and work of a prolific science fiction writer, named Pheobus Dank. The entries ramble and digress revealing as much about Dank as it does the co-authors of the work. B. Boswell is the leading Danken scholar and Hirt, the childhood friend and neighbor of Dank. By page 400 the reader thinks they know these three men, Dank’s a hack, Boswell is a fawning sycophant who would rather write fiction than teach it, and Hirt is a failed poet and bitter critic who pronounces Dank a hack at every opportunity. It’s around this point, page 400, that the conceit, a working manuscript edited by the two writers with opposing viewpoints, gets tired. You may be tempted to give up. Don’t. Right around the enough already point the tone of the manuscript changes. Everything we thought we knew about Dank and his biographers is upended. The ending moves at breakneck speed and is bizarre and yet, oddly believable.

Christopher Miller’s fake encyclopedia is longer and more digressive than Roberto Bolano’s, Nazi Literature in the Americas, but is great example of the fictional reference book genre.

Availability: USMAI
Review Submitted by: Pamela Mann, Reference, Instruction and Outreach Librarian
Rating: Recommended

Anne Tyler’s books are readable if somewhat predictable and Noah’s Compass does not stray from the formula. It is a pleasant read, if a tad too comfortable. The literary equivalent of garlic mashed potatoes.

Availability: USMAI
Review Submitted by: Pamela Mann, Reference, Instruction and Outreach Librarian
Rating: Recommended