:weird era, Books

3 books to read this month: Good Want, How It Works Out and The Coin

by Sruti Islam

Brilliant new titles by Domenica Martinello, Myriam Lacroix and Yasmin Zaher.

More about books you should read, and the authors who wrote them, that were recently featured on the Weird Era podcast, by co-hosts Sruti Islam and Alex Nierenhausen.

Good Want by Domenica Martinello

Montrealer Domenica Martinello makes a triumphant return to the poetry scene with her newest collection, Good Want. While her debut All Day I Dream About Sirens tackles myth, Good Want is all about religion, prayer, devotion. What is desire, she asks, and how do we define “good” wanting vs. “bad” wanting? Are poetry and prayer two sides of the same coin? Does growing up poor give you an upper hand in the search for godliness? What even IS godliness? All is laid bare in this stunning collection, best read on a sweltering day by the canal when there’s nothing else to do but contemplate. In this episode, we talk fake Catholics, confession, craft and how poetry can be prayer. (AN)

How It Works Out by Myriam Lacroix

In Myriam Lacroix’s debut novel How It Works Out, we explore the relationship between Myriam and Allison, a young lesbian couple, through a series of hypotheticals. What if the only cure for Myriam’s depression was Allison’s flesh? What if they were house pets planning an escape from their owner? What if they were famous self-help authors who were celebrity friends with Tegan and Sara? As their relationship unfurls across the multiverse, each reality offers new insights, perils and deeper connections to themselves and the world. Come for Lacroix’s brilliant new voice in the queer CanLit landscape, and stay for the delicious absurdity of her mind. In this episode, we discuss queer fiction, the Canadian literary landscape, love as hunger, and parallel worlds. (AN)

The Coin by Yasmin Zaher

I cannot emphasize how significant this novel has been for me. In The Coin, we meet a seemingly wealthy Palestinian woman navigating life in New York City. Seemingly, because she finds herself struggling with her inaccessible inheritance, memories of her lost homeland and her quest for identity in America. Think, My Year of Rest and Relaxation meets the Middle East. Teaching at an underprivileged school, our narrator befriends a homeless man and becomes entangled in an international scheme involving Birkin bags. As she grapples with her sexuality, and her fixation on purity and control intensifies, she draws her students into her obsessions. Her trauma fills her body, and is then projected out in the world in unexpected ways. In this episode, I talk to Yasmin about physicality, sexuality, the dirtiness of cities and problematic female narrators and their students. (SI)

The Weird Era podcast is available via Apple and Spotify.

This article was originally published in the July 2024 issue of Cult MTL.

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Posted in :weird era, Books

by Sruti Islam

Contributor
Sruti Islam reads. She runs a literary newsletter: Weird Era, partnered by Librairie Saint-Henri Books, while also freelancing in literary and cultural coverage. She is a Libra.