news | Friday October 17, 2025

You're Invited to the Talonbooks Fall 2025 Launch

You’re invited! On Friday, October 24, join us at the Martha Lou Henley Rehearsal Hall for the Talonbooks fall 2025 launch! Help us celebrate the arrival of this unreal lineup:

The Book of Z by Rahat Kurd
th book uv lost passwords 1 by bill bissett
No Depression in Heaven by ryan fitzpatrick
Stigmata by Scott Jackshaw and
tours, variously by Drew McEwan.

The launch will be hosted by the author of #postdildo, Danielle LaFrance! Books will be sold by the amazing folks at The Paper Hound.

The Martha Lou Henley Rehearsal Hall is wheelchair and scooter accessible. There is a parking lot behind the venue in the alley between East 3rd and East 4th Avenues. Attendance is free! Snacks and drinks will be served. A live stream will be available on the Talonbooks YouTube channel. We can’t wait to see you there!

Talonbooks Fall 2025 Launch
Martha Lou Henley Rehearsal Hall
1955 McLean Drive
Vancouver, BC
October 24, 2025
Doors open at 7:00 p.m.; readings begin at 7:30 p.m.

news | Saturday October 25, 2025

The Grand Melee and Twists of Fate in Canadian Literature

Ralph Sarkonak writes about two books in Michel Tremblay’s Desrosiers Diaspora series in Canadian Literature: The Grand Melee and Twists of Fate. Sarkonak provides analysis of both texts in the context of both the series and Tremblay’s wider oeuvre. He writes, “As always Tremblay is at his best in the in-between of literature and history or reality and fantasy.”

Read the complete piece here.

news | Friday October 24, 2025

The Piano Teacher in The Kingston Whig Standard

Michaela Tassone reviews Thousand Island Playhouse’s production of The Piano Teacher by Dorothy Dittrich in The Kingston Whig Standard. In this lovely, considered review, Tassone calls The Piano Teacher “sincere, heart-wrenching and a testament to the power of art; another stunning piece of Canadian theatre that should not be missed.” Read the complete review here.

news | Friday October 24, 2025

Play Ball!

CBC Books is celebrating the Toronto Blue Jays reaching the World Series with a spate of fantastic book recommendations about – you guessed it – baseball! On that list is George Bowering Baseball Love. Check out all of their selections here. 49th Shelf also recommends Baseball Love for their World Series reading, all of their suggestions can be found here.

news | Thursday October 23, 2025

Uiesh / Somewhere Named a Governor General's Finalist!

We are elated to share that Uiesh / Somewhere by Joséphine Bacon, translated by Jessica Moore, is a finalist for the 2025 Governor General’s Literary Award for Translation! Translated from the French, the poems in this incredible dual-language collection appear in Innu-aimun and English.

The pieces in Uiesh / Somewhere are rooted in Innu Elder Joséphine Bacon’s experiences of moving between the nomadic ways of her Ancestors in the northern wilderness of Nitassinan and the clamour of the city. Bacon is attentive to the smallest details of her environment, from the moon and the stars, the Northern Lights, and the falling snow, to the sirens of fire engines and the noise of a busy bar night. In this collection, she listens to the voices of the Old Ones, whose stories are alive within her, and reflects on the beauty and the pain of her long life.

A huge congratulations Joséphine and Jessica for this wonderful and well-deserved accomplishment, and congratulations to all of this year’s finalists! Read all about them here.

news | Thursday October 23, 2025

Crowd Source in BC Living

If you’re looking for a book by an author residing in British Columbia to read this fall, BC Living has got you covered. Sheri Radford compiled a list of fantastic local titles, including Crowd Source by Cecily Nicholson that will wow you this autumn. Radford asserts that “anyone who’s ever marvelled at the twice-daily crow migration in Metro Vancouver will be enchanted by Crowd Source.” Peruse all of her recommendations here.

news | Wednesday October 22, 2025

Stir Reviews Fire Never Dies: The Tina Modotti Project

Angie Rico writes about Electric Company Theatre’s production of Fire Never Dies: The Tina Modotti Project by Carmen Aguirre in Stir. Rico says the play is “engrossing … it lets us in on the making and remaking of a revolutionary spirit.” Read her lovely piece here. To order tickets to see Fire Never Dies (running now at The Cultch!) click here.

news | Wednesday October 22, 2025

Lisa Tronca Reviews Convivialities

Lisa Tronca reviews Convivialities: Dialogues on Poetics by Michael Nardone on page 114 of issue 141 Espace. Tronca calls Convivialities “a sensitive and critical mapping of artistic and discursive practices … In dialogue with its epoch, the book explores how to enter into conversation, reflect, and listen together, inspiring us by the ways language and art respond to the urgencies of the present.”

Check out the issue here.

news | Monday October 20, 2025

ORACULE and Flying Red Horse in Canadian Literature

Scott Inniss responds to two Talon titles in Canadian Literature: ORACULE by Nicole Raziya Fong, a philosophical work that lives on the border of poetry and theatre, and Flying Red Horse by Dale Martin Smith a book of poetry about fatherhood and masculinity, and the conditions of whiteness that pressure those terms. Inniss looks at both books individually and also what themes and aims the two works share.

Of the works, Inniss writes “In both texts, poetry is not simply a vehicle of lyric self-expression but a mode of philosophical, intersubjective, and affective exploration. Both Fong and Smith construe poetics as a mode of questioning, with the interrogative as a prominent trope. … Although the language and tone are an intermixture of the meditative and the everyday, the concerns of the poems are widely phenomenological, existential, ecocritical, and anti-capitalist.”

Read the complete article here.

news | Sunday October 19, 2025

ryan fitzpatrick on Writing the Wrong Way

ryan fitzpatrick talks No Depression in Heaven on the podcast Writing the Wrong Way with Jonathan Ball. The pair talk poetry, country music, and much more. Tune in here or wherever you listen to podcasts.

news | Saturday October 18, 2025

2024/2025 Jessie Award Nominations

The 2024/2025 Jessie Award nominations are in and we are thrilled to see some familiar names and titles among the nominees! Wonderful to see Behind the Moon by Anosh Irani and Little Red Warrior and His Lawyer by Kevin Loring up for awards. Additionally, Lasa ng Imperyo (based on a A Taste of Empire by Jovanni Sy) has multiple nominations as does playwright Niall McNeil! The Jessie Awards celebrate outstanding accomplishments of theatre in Vancouver. Congratulations to all of this year’s nominees! See the full list here.

news | Friday October 17, 2025

Read Local BC Recommendations for LGBTQIA2S+ History Month

To celebrate LGBTQIA2S+ History Month, Read Local BC recommends checking out Stigmata by Scott Jackshaw and Heartlines: A Love Story by Sarah Waisvisz! See all of their suggested reads here.

news | Thursday October 16, 2025

An Interview with Carmen Aguirre

David Cooper

Janet Smith chats with the award-winning playwright Carmen Aguirre about her new play Fire Never Dies: The Tina Modotti Project which premieres tonight at The Cultch. Smith’s article covers the structure of the play, what inspired Aguirre to write it, and the life of Tina Modotti herself. Read the complete piece here.

news | Wednesday October 15, 2025

Two Talon Titles Among Read Local BC's Autumn Book Recommendations

No Depression in Heaven by ryan fitzpatrick and th book uv lost passwords 1 by bill bissett are highlighted in Read Local BC’s post on books to cozy up to this fall!

No Depression in Heaven uses country music as an engine to riff on our latter-day anxiety. It asks how we respond to bad times and what it means to hold onto something toxic because of the comforts it affords. th book uv lost passwords 1 expands on bissett’s multivalent and long-standing poetic practice by rearticulating the novel as a radiant field of sound, image, story, memory, dream, and fantasy.

If you’re in need of winning autumnal book suggestion, click here.

news | Tuesday October 14, 2025

Taryn Hubbard Nominated for Chillie Award

Taryn Hubbard, author of Desire Path and the forthcoming poetry collection Beautiful Unknown Future, has been nominated for a 2025 Chillies Award! The Chillies Awards celebrate outstanding arts practitioners in Chilliwack, BC. Check out all of the nominees here!

news | Monday October 13, 2025

Revolutions in The Winnipeg Free Press

melanie brannagan frederiksen reviews Revolutions by Hajer Mirwali in The Winnipeg Free Press, calling it an “astonishing debut.” Revolutions sifts through the grains of Muslim daughterhood to reveal two metaphorical circles inextricably overlapping: shame and pleasure. Read melanie brannagan frederiksen’s full review here.

news | Sunday October 12, 2025

Rom Com (Taylor's Version)

According to 49th Shelf, Rom Com by Dina Del Bucchia and Daniel Zomparelli is the Canlit equivalent of Taylor Swift’s “Actually Romantic” on her twelfth studio album Life of a Showgirl. The poems in Rom Com trace the attempt to deconstruct as well as engage in dialogue with romantic comedy films and the pop culture, celebrities, and tropes that have come to be associated with them. These irreverent, playful, weird, and comedic poems come in a variety of forms, fully engaging in pop culture, without a judgmental tone.

See which books line up with which songs here.

news | Saturday October 11, 2025

The Piano Teacher on Read Local BC

For World Teacher Day, Read Local BC featured the 2022 Governor General’s Literary Award for Drama–winner The Piano Teacher by Dorothy Dittrich in their list of books that demonstrate the power of a great educator.

The Piano Teacher is about loss, love, friendship, and the healing power of music. When Erin, a classical pianist, experiences the loss of the life she knew, she finds herself dealing with the departure of her own musical expression. Navigating her way through this change, she meets an unconventional piano teacher who gives her new hope for the future.

Check out all of Read Local BC’s suggested titles here.

news | Friday October 10, 2025

CBC Books Features Stigmata

Wonderful to see Stigmata by Scott Jackshaw on CBC Books’ fall 2025 reading list. Stigmata draws inspiration from a broad archive of texts and practices – apophatic theology, body horror, gardening, queer theory, classic films, poststructuralism, and bad sex. This collection takes the confessional mode and weaponizes it. Peruse CBC Books’ full list here to see all of their stellar recommendations.

news | Friday October 10, 2025

Hot Off the Press! Stigmata Has Arrived!

Hot off the press! The debut poetry collection Stigmata by Scott Jackshaw has arrived! Drawing inspiration from a broad archive of texts and practices – apophatic theology, body horror, queer theory, classic films, poststructuralism, and bad sex – Stigmata is an experiment in fractured memoir and misplaced anatomy that weaponizes the confessional mode.⁠

An excerpt from “Contrition:”

“I scatter polities with my strange toe
a latent mystic sits on my thighs
home is a technology of baptism
god has become everything or nothing

I withhold myself
where is the portal to desire
his abyss face lingers or not
I leave thinly and draped in blankets”
⁠
Stigmata fuses the “high” to the “low” – the “sacred” of theory and theology to the “profane” of leaking and lust. The result is a treacherous adventure through the cross-currents of sexual deviancy and religion, helped along by a bitter sense of humour, to the limits of faith and body.⁠ Available now from your favourite local bookstore, or pick up your copy here.

news | Thursday October 9, 2025

cop city swagger in C Magazine

Emily Guerrero pens a heartfelt review of City of Vancouver Book Award–finalist cop city swagger by Mercedes Eng in C Magazine.

Guerrero writes, “Enraging and clarifying in equal measure. I am holding it close as a text to help me make sense of the wild present we are moving through—a possible map to all the love for the world that surges up after an unwavering refusal of the police.”

Read the complete piece here.