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Life's Little Difficulties
by France Daigle
from House of Anansi Press
In this delightful novel, both humankind's smallest problems and largest questions occupy the same delightful stage. Terry's on-and-off job allows him to take care of his baby son, Etienne, while wife Carmen works as a waitress and aspiring manager of a popular pool lounge. Terry loves the I Ching and has been consulting his oracle daily. Sometimes he also visits his friend Zed, who is converting an old building into lofts and a cultural center. As the novel unfolds, unexpected possibilities develop between Terry, Carmen, and Zed. All of this activity stirs up the three friends' spirits, as well as opening up difficult questions, and more than a little anxiety. Everything they've taken for granted in their lives is suddenly called into question, even the language they speak in front of Etienne. Life's Little Difficulties raises big issues that suddenly, in the end, seem solvable.
Real Life (The Spider Line Series)
by France Daigle
from House Of Anansi
Real life is lived in fragments. In France Daigle's novel the characters struggle to make sense out of this fragmented world, to find meaning. Daigle gives us hyper-reality by intertwining threads of highly charged moments in a story brimming with irony, wit, and often depth.
LA Vraie Vie/Roman
Just Fine
by France Daigle
from House Of Anansi
Just Fine is a touching and often hilarious novel that traces the mishaps and misadventures of a conflicted agoraphobe: a woman psychologically restricted to a life indoors but spiritually inclined to wander the meadows, roads, and community beyond the house and river of her youth. Her struggle assumes historic proportions when her neighbors in the small town of Dieppe begin to dream of their own escapes from the insular, predictable cadences of life in Acadia: Camil changes his name; Terry embarks on a voyage of discovery; Carmen studies exotic river deltas; Elizabeth searches for a transcendent love; and the woman at the center of it all, the agoraphobe, dreams of travelling to Paris and telling her story to a French television star. The course of their endeavors, like the river that dominates Dieppe, twists and turns, and playfully reveals a landscape of wonderment and new beginnings. In its brilliant collage of river lore, art history, astrology, and mythology France Daigle's rich and witty novel journeys beyond the cultural, psychological, and literary bounds within which its characters live and leads us to where history, fantasy, and memory collide.
A Fine Passage
by France Daigle
from House Of Anansi
In France Daigle's Governor General's Award-winning novel, Just Fine, the townsfolk of Dieppe dream of escape from the insular, predictable cadences of life in Acadia, and, each in their own often touching and hilarious way, changes the course of their lives. In this extraordinary sequel, we follow many of the same characters in their explorations of their newly gained freedom. And whereas Just Fine had as its central element water, rivers, deltas, springs, and movement from inner landscapes to the sea and open spaces, this book has as its central element air, wind, planes, music, and voices from around the world, underscoring the ideas of liberty and sensuality that motivate the book. A rich, sweeping, and delicate exploration of how we create and then employ our freedom in relation to those we love, A Fine Passage secures France Daigle's place as one of Canada's most intriguing writers.
1953: Chronicle of a Birth Foretold
by France Daigle
from House Of Anansi
France Daigle casts a droll eye on what it means to be born a writer in the middle of the twentieth century. 1953 crackles with wit, intelligence, and insight, and the year in question emerges as a turning point not only for the heroine, but also for the entire world.
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