Up All Night

Dave Jenkinson is a professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba and the author of the “Portraits” section of Emergency Librarian.

Consisting of 14 stories ranging in length from 6 to 15 pages, Up All
Night, edited by the accomplished short-story writer R.P. MacIntyre,
pro- vides much good reading for young adults. Because the stories were
authored by a mixture of known and unknown names, it is unfortunate that
the editor/publisher did not provide any biographical information,
especially since the book’s last six pages were blank.

Protagonists are equally split between males and females, and the
stories mainly focus on adolescent concerns, especially relationships,
some of the romantic kind. Two pieces, Anne Carter’s “The Piano
Lesson” and Erica Tesar’s “Dream,” deal with pregnant girls.
Jacqueline Pearce’s “The Challenge” and Treena Kortje’s “The
Way Skin Grows” find teen males taking tentative steps into romance.
In Keith Inman’s “Dammed Waters,” a mentally challenged boy deals
with a possible child molester.

The collection also expands beyond contemporary adolescent realism.
Gillian M. Savage’s “First Snow” is a chilling horror story. Lena
Coakley’s engaging “Snow and Apples” is a “Snow White and the
Seven Dwarves” meets “Beauty and the Beast” type of tale. Barbara
Haworth’s “The Gift” is set in the mire of World War I trenches on
a Christmas eve. Cathy Beveridge’s humorous “Penance,” which
involves a very young boy who apparently wants to kill his obnoxious
older sister, occurs in the environs of a church confessional. The
closing story, Jean Rand MacEwen’s “Dog,” places a stray canine
and a homeless old man in the cold Toronto streets. Highly recommended.