Category Archives: Reviews

Ann Radcliffe’s Absolutely Essential “The Mysteries of Udolpho” (1794) and the Books I’d Rather Read

Posted on March 23, 2021 by Brenton Dickieson

Ann Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho: A Romance Interspersed With Some Pieces of Poetry (1794) has been one of those books that I have been wanting to read for some time—wanting to read in one way, but hesitant in another. … Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Tagged Ann Radcliffe, Becoming Jane, Bleak House, Charles Dickens, Charlotte Brontë, feminism, Jane Austen, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, mary shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, Michael Lewis, Northanger Abbey, Pamela, Samuel Richardson, Stephen King, Susanna Clarke, The Brothers Karamazov, The Green Mile, The Monk, The Mysteries of Udolpho | 19 Comments

The Canadian Authors the Prime Minister and Brenton Forgot to Read: Guest Post by Author Mark Sampson

Posted on March 16, 2021 by Brenton Dickieson

I was so grateful and humbled when Brenton included some of my work on his list “The Canadian Books the Prime Minister Forgot to Read,” so I jumped at his invitation to add five more Canadian authors of my own … Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Tagged Amy Jones, Canadian literature, Esi Edugyan, John Wall Barger, Lynn Coady, Mark Sampson, Ray Smith | 2 Comments

The Pretty Cool Imaginative World-building in Margaret Cavendish’s Pretty Terrible “Blazing World”

Posted on February 16, 2021 by Brenton Dickieson

Margaret Cavendish’s The Description of a New World, Called The Blazing-World is just terrible. For me, anyway. It is an important book in feminist history and natural philosophy and, I would argue, the development of science fiction. Except for experts … Continue reading →

Posted in Fictional Worlds, Reviews | Tagged 17th Century Literature, Margaret Cavendish, speculative fiction, The Blazing World, utopia | 3 Comments

Avoiding The Road, 31 Years

Posted on February 4, 2021 by Brenton Dickieson

For fifteen years I have avoided The Road. Perhaps longer. I did not need the book description to know that I would avoid reading it. I picked it up, held it in my hand, and I knew. It was Cormac … Continue reading →

Posted in Reflections, Reviews | Tagged Blood Diamonds, books, Cormac McCarthy, Death, father, fire, Post, The Kite Runner, The Pursuit of Happiness, The Road, The Walking Dead | 7 Comments

The Remarkable Ordinary, with Frederick Buechner

Posted on January 18, 2021 by Brenton Dickieson

A few weeks ago, I wrote about being “Enslaved to the Pressure of the Ordinary.” This was a quotation I found in The Screwtape Letters, and what I thought was a self-revelation I had during our COVID-19 lockdown and the “new … Continue reading →