Best Reads of 2023

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Review: Bad Cree – Jessica Johns

Bad Cree

Jessica Johns

Scribe

ISBN:9781922585653

RRP $29.99

Description:

In this gripping debut, a young Cree woman’s dreams lead her on a perilous journey of self-discovery that ultimately forces her to confront the toll of a legacy of violence on her family, her community, and the land they call home.

When Mackenzie wakes up with a severed crow’s head in her hands, she panics. Only moments earlier she had been fending off masses of birds in a snow-covered forest. In bed, when she blinks, the head disappears.

Night after night, Mackenzie’s dreams return her to a memory from before her sister Sabrina’s untimely death: a weekend at the family’s lakefront campsite, long obscured by a fog of guilt. But when the waking world starts closing in, too — crows stalk her every move around the city; she gets threatening text messages from someone claiming to be Sabrina — Mackenzie knows this is more than she can handle alone.

Travelling north to her rural hometown in Alberta, she finds her family still steeped in the same grief that she ran away to Vancouver to escape. They welcome her back, but their shaky reunion only seems to intensify her dreams — and make them more dangerous.

What really happened that night at the lake, and what did it have to do with Sabrina’s death? Only a bad Cree would put their family at risk, but what if whatever has been calling Mackenzie home was already inside her?

My View:

Exceptional! Gripping! Compelling.

I was fascinated, entranced, wanted to learn more…this mystery was compelling.

I have seen reviews that describe this as horror – that made me rethink the read…whilst I was reading I was only thinking, mystery. It has some supernatural elements – which maybe could be considered more part of a cultural specific storytelling, mmm….”horror” didnt come to mind….but I guess some my read it as such.

For me this was a story about family, about culture, about progress, about greed, about grief, about coming home. However you describe this read it is compelling. This is an author to look out for.

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Review: A Brief Affair – Alex Miller

A Brief Affair

Alex Miller

Allen & Unwin

ISBN: 9781761066573

Description:

A moving novel about storytelling, about truths, and love, from twice Miles Franklin Award winner Alex Miller.

From the bustling streets of China, to the ominous Cell 16 in an old asylum building, to the familiar sounds and sight of galahs flying over a Victorian farm, A Brief Affair is a tender love story.

On the face of it, Dr Frances Egan is a woman who has it all – a loving family and a fine career – until a brief, perfect affair reveals to her an imaginative dimension to her life that is wholly her own.

Fran finds the courage and the inspiration to risk everything and change her direction at the age of forty-two. This newfound understanding of herself is fortified by the discovery of a long-forgotten diary from the asylum and the story it reveals.

Written with humour, sensitivity and the wisdom for which Miller’s work is famous, this exquisitely compassionate novel explores the interior life and the dangerous navigation of love in all its forms.

My View:

This author has such a powerful yet subtle touch – his words to be savoured, his books to be treasured.

5 Stars *****