I love Montreal alleys…and I’m not alone. Apparently there is a master plan for creating more green space in the plateau in particular. The plateau, where I live, reminds me a little of downtown Brooklyn and also of Philadelphia Center City, the part the juts up against South Philly. The alleys are of varying sizes...

C’est moi! Ou, non.

Over the years…they add up.

Pathology of the SensesJuly 2005 Oligotrophic: of lakes and rivers. The heatan inanimate slur, wool gathering, hanginglike a bad suit. Suspended fine particulate matter. And an eight-million-dollar ferry shoves offfor Rochester, no souls aboard. I see you,you know, idling like a limousine through the old neighbourhoods, your tinted windows. In whatthey call “the mind’s eye.”...

Oh my. That’s a huge loss. Farrah too, but Michael. Oh, Michael. Yes, I know the headlines, the controversies, all of that. The best ones are never easy to love.

How do you know what a book is? And what it’s for? Or how it should be read. I like Richard Nash’s idea that a book is more communal than we understand it to be. He points to the one positive growth area in the publishing world–that of the book club. Because yes, reading is...

Thanks to Bookninja for pointing out This plea for more book reviewing in Canada, and in particular at the CBC. And I agree, Canada Reads is not enough. In my humble opinion the problem has to do with a lack of guts. Yes, guts. It takes guts to be a good reviewer, a good publisher,...

Celebrations include drinking, feasting, drinking feasting, concerts, drinking, and many flags. Needless to say the food and drink are very good, and spirits high. Near 30 degree temperatures help. The parks are full, and even in my neighbourhood, further east than most anglos tend toward, there are anglos in evidence. And yes, why not celebrate...

Ya, well, I never tire of the sea wall.

Summer reading is good, but what about summer listening? Rattling Books offers unabridged audio books, including Gallant’s Montreal Stories, a collection of stories set in a Montreal that is geographically, if not socially recognizable. By that I mean the stories are steeped in their time and that has long passed. But the streets are the...

Okay maybe not. Still. What she said.

Absolute cuteness. JD Samson et al.