Hope in the Desperate Hour

Hugh Oliver is the former editor-in-chief of the OISE Press.

Set in a small New Brunswick farming community bordering an Indian
reserve and a university town, and spanning the early 1950s to the
present, this amateurish and second-rate novel chronicles the activities
of the Shackle brothers (hockey superstar prospect Garth, university
professor Neil, and soldier Reggie); Garth’s attractive and vulnerable
wife, Vicki; and Peter Bathurst, former head of the Indian band, who is
under suspicion for absconding with the money for a casino he was
planning to build. The power struggles between the university and the
farming community, and between the farming community and the Indian
reserve, initially pique the reader’s interest but not enough to
compensate for the two-dimensional characterization and aimless plot. A
disappointing effort by the winner of the 1988 Governor General’s
Award for English fiction.