Bridge City Anthology: Stories from Saskatoon

Boyd Holmes is an editor with Dundurn Press.

Bridge City Anthology contains 16 stories, 12 of which have not appeared
before. Just one story is, in fact, clearly set in Saskatoon, although
all the authors live in the city.

The emergence of regional anthologies is a poor development in recent
Canadian literary history, since, by definition, the selection criteria
for these books entail the deliberate setting of low sights. In this
case, because few important writers live in Saskatoon, most of the
stories chosen are, inevitably, cutrate; indeed, the faults of these
fictions are so glaring that I see no point in elaborating on them.
There are, however, three exceptions. Lois Simmie, with “Betty Lee
Bonner Lives There,” presents an examination of domestic life that,
with its stylistic precision and crisp detail, is worthy of Linda
Svendsen. Similarly, Guy Vanderhaeghe demonstrates a capacity for
haunting imagery with the carefully crafted “Home Place” (“He also
dispensed with the shade because he wanted the models banging beneath
the light bulb to cast their shadows on his bedspread and linoleum in
the way fighter planes and bombers passing between sun and earth print
their images on country lanes and city squares. These shadows were
repeated everywhere about the room, and in their midst lay Ronald,
gazing up into the strong light, gazing up at undercarriages and
silhouettes.”) The finest of the three, however, is Patrick Lane’s
“Where’s the Baby, Rose?”, a cruel tale that echoes Raymond Carver
at his best.

Robert Grey of Apex Graphics is to be commended for the elegant design
of this book, which includes, on the front cover, a full-color detail
from Jim Graham’s striking realist painting Albany (1984).