Carnival: A Scream in High Park Reader

Susan Patrick is a librarian at Ryerson Polytechnical University.

This anthology, containing works from 48 authors who have read at the
Scream in High Park, Toronto’s annual (since 1993) literary night
under the sky, has something for every taste. The contributors range
from the obscure to the well-known (Susan Musgrave, bill bisset, Al
Purdy, Sky Gilbert), writing in a wide variety of styles and formats,
from the experimental to the conventional. Readers may find some of the
shorter pieces tantalizing enough to seek out the longer originals (such
as Christine Slater’s “The Smaller Matter,” for example) or other
works by the same author (Barbara Gowdy’s characters’ visit to the
funeral parlor in “Resurrection” may lead curious readers to her
stranger funeral parlor story “We So Seldom Look on Love” or to its
film version Kissed.) Those who enjoy the annual High Park event will
enjoy this book; others may find it an exciting excursion into a new or
only partially familiar world celebrating Canadian literature.