- Book Club Questions:
- After reading “Good-Enough Mothers,” what do you think it means to be a ‘good enough’ mother?
- A ‘maquiladora’ refers to factories in Mexico that export what they produce. Why do you think the author chose to title this chapter “Maquila Bird”? Do you think there is anything ‘motherish’ about the secret labels Maru sews onto some of the garments she makes?
- In “Transit,” the heavily-pregnant narrator is very much ‘in transition’ to motherhood. What transitions are expected of women who become mothers? How do the narrator’s actions fit into these expectations?
- In what way do characterizations of ‘fatherhood’ reflect upon the nature of motherhood in the story “Let Heaven Rejoice”?
- In “At the Track,” the narrator’s adult is life is strongly impacted by the experiences she had with her grandparents at the horse racing track. Is there a particular brand of ‘mothering’ that is expected of grandparents? In what ways does this story rewrite them?
- In “The Winnings,” the narrator’s fiancé works at a cardboard plant. What are the other ‘boxes’ the narrator is faced with inhabiting? What do you think makes it difficult to break free from them?
- What are the different versions of motherhood presented in “Me and Robin,” “Masters Swim,” and “The New Kitten”?
- In “Leaping Clear,” womanhood could be considered the driving theme, rather than motherhood. Do you agree or disagree? Explain.
- In “Woman Cubed,” is Dale’s secret admirer actually a man, or something else? Why is his intervention important for Dale? What is the significance of the name he gives her, La Reine Anguille, or the Queen Eel?
- After reading “Mother Makeover,” do you feel there is an inherently competitive element to motherhood? Explain.
- In “A Flock of Chickens,” Rae-Ann has a motherly role as a teacher; however she is also a woman with sexual desire, as she enters into a relationship with her colleague, Rick. After reading the story, do you think it communicates anything about the societal expectations forced on sexually-active women who are mothers? Why do you think the chicken coop is a place of refuge for Rae-Ann?
- Which short story did you like best? Why?
- Which short story did you like least? Why?
Fiction
- Book Club Questions:
- If you are unfamiliar with Mennonite culture, how does The Salvation of Yasch Seimens portray the ideologies and values of this group? If you are familiar with Mennonite culture, how does the book uphold or challenge your understanding of this group?
- Yasch’s dialect combines English, Plautdietsch or Flat German, and the rhythm of German sentence structures. How does this use of language and syntax impact your reading and understanding of the novel?
- In Douglas Reimer has described The Salvation of Yasch Siemens as an archetypal “quest for the father” novel. Do you agree with this assessment? Why or why not?
- How does the novel address sexuality and queerness? Is Yasch comfortable with his own sexuality? Explain.
- What is Yasch’s relationship to the church? Does he come across as a particularly pious character? Explain.
- What does it meant to find “salvation”? Where, exactly, does Yasch find his “salvation” in this novel? Is it through his testimony? Through his relationship with Oata? Or something else? Explain.
- Is The Salvation of Yasch Seimens a feminist book? Why or why not? What other prevalent themes do you see at work in the novel?
- Does Yasch change in any fundamental way from the beginning of the novel to the end? How so? Are there any pivotal character-altering moments in his life?
- The chapter titled “Mouse Lake” is new to this 2nd edition of The Salvation of Yasch Siemens. What does this chapter add to the narrative as a whole?
- This novel is told as a collection of episodic stories. What are some of the gaps you would like to see filled? Now that you have a sense of Armin Wiebe’s humour, how do you think these scenes might unfold?
- Awards and Honours:
Shortlisted: Carol Shields Winnipeg Book Award
- Book Club Questions:
- All That Belongs is about family relationships – mother-daughter, niece-uncle, brother-sister, brother-brother, husband-wife, friend-friend and more. Discuss these relationships. Which did you enjoy most? Which find difficult? Did the complexities of family and marriage resonate with you?
- Shame has worked its way into Catherine’s psyche, sometimes in ways that seem small and unreasonable? Why, do you think, was she especially vulnerable to shame’s power? Are you sympathetic to this aspect of her character? How has she formed herself against the shame?
- Another theme in All That Belongs is time. Of Darrell, Catherine says, “I had to pass through every year I’d lived beyond his death before I encountered him again. The injustice of this…was overwhelming.” (181) How does the episode with Jim’s souvenir clock illustrate Catherine’s frustration with the relentlessness of time, but also – perhaps – convey some amusement about it?
- We see Uncle Must mostly through Catherine’s eyes. Are you sympathetic with her conflicted youthful feelings and frustration with him? (“I steeled myself against him.” 191) What does the unusual family moniker (Uncle Must) for Gerhard/George say about him? How does the event revealed in the packet letters and documents affect your understanding of him?
- Think of the various letters in the novel: Uncle Must’s notes to Catherine, his letters to the German Mennonite newspaper and college and his brother; Darrell’s letters to Catherine and his parents; Catherine’s Moleskine notes to Darrell and her uncle. How do the sometimes contradictory voices of these letters affect your views of their writers? Do you agree that there’s always something “hidden in the folds”? (248)
- Catherine’s attempts to face and accept “all that belongs” to her are, at times, bold, and at other times, tentative. Where do you see the boldness? The hesitation? Is her quest more about acceptance than final answers to unresolved mysteries? When she learns the shocking “truth” of her uncle’s archive, does her insistence that it doesn’t matter surprise you as it surprises her? (“I could scarcely believe my own freedom in this turn of events; me, who’d always been so ashamed… I would have to practice saying my own genealogical truth…. Weave acceptance in, maybe even pride… Or encouragement…” 277) How has the process of remembrance prepared and helped her to this conclusion?
- How does Lucy’s character contribute to the themes of shame, acceptance, growth, and love in the book?
- Catherine considers herself a competent, and independent woman, yet she resents retiring “alone”. Does her yearning for Jim represent a reluctance to engage with remembrance? Is this year actually a gift that forces her to remember and do some long-neglected grieving? Discuss.
- Discuss how Mother Edna’s state of disability and increasing confusion both complicates and clarifies aspects of Catherine’s preoccupation with the dead? Are the generational gaps between mother and daughter adequately bridged?
- “The good thing about both yearning and remembering was that not much of it happened on the surface. Control could be maintained. I had—still have—a tremendous capacity for calmness on the surface. As well as a tremendous capacity for effervescence when required.” Discuss in reference to narrator Catherine’s character.
- Of Darrell’s going off to walk with Uncle Must, Catherine says: “A choice he’d made to single out the world of men from the wider humanity we shared, some difference I was beginning to perceive that put me at a disadvantage.” (189) Discuss this in terms of both Catherine’s feminism and the losses she has experienced on account of her brother.
- “My uncle’s strange paralysis about women was hardly original to him; it was the inheritance of an error long and pernicious.” (91) How does the patriarchal tradition affect Catherine, her mother Edna, Sharon Miller?
- Although shame affects both cases, how does remembering Darrell differ for Catherine from remembering Uncle Must? In what ways are the two preoccupations linked? Has Catherine finally grieved her brother properly?
- Music is at the core of Jim’s being, and was also important for Darrell and Catherine in their teen years. Snatches of song appear at various points in the book. Do you have a favourite musical reference in the novel? Do we ever exhaust ways to sing about love? (see 284 and 322)
- What are your impressions of and reactions to Sharon Miller?
- Catherine recalls learning that “Every document represents a construction of some kind and creates an impression.” Do you agree? What impression do the documents (photos and packet papers) of the novel leave with you?
- How do Catherine’s roadtrip reflections on her infertility fit the themes of the book (shame, love, aging, memory, acceptance)? At the end of mulling she says, “[Uncle Must] bore his traumatized mother inside him. And now, in some crazy, unintended way, I cradled him and his mother Elizabeth and my brother Darrell, too.” Do you agree with her interpretation of this year of remembering as an act of maternal nurturing?
- Do you think three poems about Darrell comprise enough of an “archive” for him? Sufficiently contain, that is, who he was? What about the slender packet regarding Uncle Must? Do they contain the man, or are archives by their nature mere “husks”?
- “Was it my hope to understand, then love? This seemed an error to me now. Understanding came to the aid of love, but shouldn’t be a precondition, should it? Love had to stand on its own.” Discuss.
- In All That Belongs, Catherine is looking back at a year of “preoccupation with the dead,” a year which involves looking back even further back into the past. How do you imagine her and Jim’s life now – beyond that year of remembrance?
- Praise:
Catherine, the narrator in All That Belongs, is an archivist who, curiously, has waited until retirement to explore her own genealogy in search of answers to questions that have haunted her since childhood. Dora Dueck weaves an eccentric tapestry of present and past from the uncomfortably scratchy fabric of family secrets and lies. Her characters are complex: loving, vulnerable, ashamed, frightened, always drawn with compassion, but even in sorrow and grief never descending to the sentimental. In each of our lives there are those who remain puzzles. Dora Dueck offers insight that goes far beyond archives.
-Betty Jane Hegerat author of The Boy
After a stranger playfully suggests that she might have “a little embarrassment” in her family tree, retiring archivist Catherine Riediger embarks on an initially reluctant journey into her family’s history. The result is a gentle but compelling meditation on love, aging, the nature of memory and the need to acknowledge and forgive the pain of the past.
—K.D. Miller, author of Late Breaking
All That Belongs is a lyrical, keenly-observed study of the strange and difficult beauties of family life. Dueck's writing captures the crackle and hiss of submerged memories and mysterious loyalties. This is a moving story, flavoured with delicacy and integrity.
-Sue Sorensen, author of A Large Harmonium
- Book Club Questions:
- Is Farinata Feck a likeable protagonist? Why or why not? What does he bring to the landscape of contemporary Canadian fiction that’s different or memorable?
- How reliable do you find the narrative voice? What is their attitude towards Farinata and how does it impact your perception of him?
- Farinata suffers from a mild form of bipolarism. Throughout the book and his journey across the prairies, he tries to find anchors to help centre his mind and maintain his mental composure. What are some of the things that succeed in grounding Farinata? What are some of the things that unmoor him?
- Are you familiar with Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy? If not, after reading Yams, what is your overall impression of what Dante’s book might be about? If yes, what parallels do you see between it and Yams Do Not Exist?
- The novel is heavy with intertextual references and footnotes. Did this add to or take away from your experience of reading the book? Please explain.
- Yams Do Not Exist is a work of “prairie surrealism”; unpack what characteristics you think a book needs to fit in this category and find examples from the book that demonstrate it. How does this compare to the typical portrayal of the prairies that you’ve come across in other books/media?
- The novel documents Farinata’s search for his romantic ideal. Describe the kind of woman you think fits this ideal, and the amount of power/agency she might have. Do you think his final partner fits these criteria?
- What do you think the novel is saying about the power of imagination and creativity in the face of mental illness?
- The book is divided into episodic snapshots of Farinata’s life. Which one was your favourite?
- This novel strongly emphasizes literary style, sometimes more than subject matter or storyline. How does this kind of writing compare to your experiences with Canadian fiction?
Yams Do Not Exist finds footholds in Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy, footnoting a twisting, prairie roadmap to romance, by turns hellish and sublime.
- Praise:
In the spirit of Beckett, Kafka, and Margaret Laurence, these stories reinvent narrative to combine the tall tales of the prairie with the post-prairie mindscape of the 21st century. As Farinata Feck undertakes a romantic quest that flings him from one parodic adventure to another, the point of Morse's satire is wickedly sharp, yet always sweetly tempered by his generous acceptance of our human failings … and his kick-ass sense of humour.
—Catherine Hunter
Related in dazzling prose, Farinata's picaresque adventures transpose whole worlds of art, poetry, and music onto the dreamscapes of the prairies. Morse's pyro-technique produces a marvel of witty discord.
—Meira Cook
- Awards and Honours:
- Winner of the 2021 Eileen McTavish Sykes Award for Best First Book
- Shortlisted for the Margaret McWilliams Award - Popular History
- Book Club Questions:
- Discuss the possible meaning(s) behind the title Once Removed.
- Describe Timothy as a character. What are his strengths/weaknesses in light of the various challenges he faces throughout the book? What motivates him? What is his relationship with authority?
- Describe what Edenfeld was like before BLT Wiens became mayor. What is it like now under BLT’s reign?
- What does “progress” look like in your community? Does it come at the expense of the community’s history or is there a balance between the new and old? Is a “balance” even necessary? Why or why not?
- Are there are specific buildings in your community that you’d like the see preserved in some way, and why?
- How important/necessary do you think “progress” and “growth” are for rural communities?
- Timothy’s ghostwriting projects are primarily those that record family histories. How important do you think it is to have this kind of information in writing? What other forms do family histories take? What form do they take in your own family?
- References to food and baking abound throughout the novel. What role does food play in the culture of Edenfeld?
- Randall has an obsession with Russian culture based on his understanding of the Mennonite diaspora of the 19th and early 20th century. Why do you think that is? What drives people to possess a fixation on our “roots”?
- What function do the rumours about Elsie Dyck play in the psyches of Edenfeld’s residents?
- Describe the novel’s attitude towards religion.
- How does the use of satire throughout the novel shape your impression of Edenfeld, its residents, and the cultural standards?
- On page 52-53, Timothy remarks: “Moving to the city is so twentieth century... Who would I be in the city? Just another hayseed from the country trying to seek fame and fortune on Henderson Highway.” Do you think it’s better to be a big fish in a little pond, or a little fish in a big pond?
- Timothy and Katie seem to enjoy a relatively harmonious marriage. What is it about their marriage that makes it “work”? What do you think are the keys to a successful marriage
- Praise:
An affectionate pastiche of small-town Mennonite life, replete with duty, folly, irreverence, and joy.
—David Bergen
Hilarious as Schitt's Creek, sinister as Hitchcock, Once Removed gives us Timothy Heppner, the quintessential non-resistant Mennonite, in a comic tour de force that exposes the friction between progress and preservation, ethnic pride and ethnic embarrassment, commerce and heritage, truth and boosterism, and the coercion and acquiescence that is as real to the big city as to a small town.
-Armin Wiebe, Grandmother Laughing
- Awards and Honours:
Shortlisted: Margaret Laurence Award for Fiction
- Book Club Questions:
- Still Meexplores the relationship between golf and memory. What are some of your most memorable golf moments?
- Is James a likeable protagonist? Why or why not? Did your opinion of him change as the novel progressed?
- How does James’s understanding of his role in his family evolve over the course of the book?
- At numerous points throughout the book, James expresses a preoccupation with what it means to be a “man” (pages 90, 108, 158, 249). 5. For James, what does it mean to be a “man”? How does his understanding of “manliness” compare to contemporary definitions of masculinity?
- Both Faith and James seem to struggle in their marriage, as they are each affected by death in their own way. How does grief shape a person? In what ways does it shape James, Faith, and Payne? Has grief affected you in a profound way?
- James is visited by a number of “spirits” during the various rounds of golf that he plays. In what ways do James's encounters remind you of other stories with encounters from “supernatural” entities? (i.e., A Christmas Carol, The Wizard of Oz, Shoeless Joe)
- On page 215, Rhodes claims: “Golf is the struggle for perfection, and sometimes you achieve it. Why else would so many people be obsessed with it?” Discuss whether you agree with this statement, and why/why not. What do you think draws people to golf?
- How does James's relationship with nature changes throughout the novel?
- The topic of privilege comes up throughout the novel; in what way(s) is golf a privilege for James? In general, do you think golf is a game of privilege? Why or why not?
- Do you think golf is an effective metaphor for life itself? Why or why not?
It’s fantastic, it’s hilarious … The Daily Bonnet is so funny! —Miriam Toews
- Praise:
It’s fantastic, it’s hilarious … The Daily Bonnet is so funny!
—Miriam Toews
Turnstone Press Ltd.
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Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
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