Drawing the Curtain

I reviewed some books for the current issue of Canadian Literature.

Regarding Stan Persky’s Post-Communist Stories, I wrote:

A thoughtful, warm, and often wryly funny examination of a topic usually given a sober treatment: the state of the former Eastern Bloc after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Perhaps because in his day job Perksy is a philosopher, his tone is one of gentle but insistent inquiry and his approach is that of a curious traveller instead of an academic with a historical axe to grind.

Mark Bryant’s two collections of war cartoons are essential for anyone interested in how those conflicts were viewed at the time.

The full review can be read here.