Issue 10 April 2017
magazine
Cover photo: Anthony Biondi
Editor-in-Chief Katie Stobbart
Publisher Anthony Biondi
Associate Editor Jess Wind
FRESH Curators Aymee Leake - Art Alex Rake - Fiction
Business Dessa Bayrock - Ad Sales
Writers Martin Castro Christopher Towler
Raspberry publishes letters to the editor of 150 words or less. Letters should be sent via email to info@raspberrymag. ca. The editors reserve the right not to print a letter for any reason. If you have a tip for arts, culture, or community coverage, let us know.
Contents
An intimate look at What We Once Believed Jess Wind sits down with author Andrea MacPherson to discuss her new novel— feminism, celebration of the "unlikeable character," and more.
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On the cover This month's cover is a visual representation of a running theme through the issue: the old and the new, the border between past and present, and approaches to building the future.
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Contents Night in the Woods p.9
The Future of Blessed p.26
Canadaland comes to Abbotsford p.30
Columns FRESH Art: Julie Epp
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Art on the Wing
p.15 p.25
Local Harvest book review
p.38
p.40 FRESH Fiction: Keith McQuade p.43 Let's Play game review
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The Red Press Society is a non-profit organization dedicated to fostering the growth of the literary arts in the Fraser Valley; publishing works which stimulate local arts and culture, including Raspberry magazine; and promoting awareness and readership of contemporary Canadian literature.
Editor's Note
Left holding the bag Age should not dictate our responsibility for change Katie Stobbart Youth is glorified as a time of great mobility, energy, and blissful ignorance. This has long been the case; our views of youth extend from the mythological (the fountain of youth, the philosopher’s stone) to the technological (alleged age-repelling products and Photoshop flattery). When we imagine the quintessential young person, some of us see her walking blithely along a row of trendy boutiques holding a compostable coffee cup: a perfect Instagram snapshot. Afterward, Youth returns to her cramped living space, washes away the make-up, and skims another article about lazy, entitled “millennials” who aren’t buying houses or new cars. Brought up on the falsehood that success is the inevitable result of hard work, Youth is working harder than ever. But so far, she hasn’t reaped any tangible rewards, like the job security or the health benefits her progenitors enjoy. On the one hand, youth is highly coveted: politicians scramble for the elusive “youth vote”; increasingly, businesses do the same for the youth dollar. Institutions attempt to pepper their ranks with youngish people. We laud youth accomplishments in “30 under 30” lists and bestow effusive praise on people who succeed early in life.
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Why is it so remarkable to accomplish great things by the time one is 30? Conversely, youth are patted on the head, invited to the table only as a token representative of their peers, and their ideas are often disregarded. Why is it so remarkable to accomplish great things by the time one is 30? In my experience, it is because it is extremely difficult to achieve anything wading through the bureaucracy, discrimination, and dismissiveness in which our society is entrenched. I started volunteering in the community in elementary school. By high school, I had a wealth of experience with local arts organizations, literacy initiatives, office and event assistance, and politics. I attended leadership retreats and workshops, and was part of leadership, arts, and community groups at school. I earned youth representative
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positions on two local society boards, one of which was a provincial initiative focused on municipal community-building. Yet I accomplished little in that capacity, and struggled with the frustration of being the token young person. These boards that verbally encouraged my success smiled generously at the ideas I brought to the table, nodded approvingly at my reports on the youth committee I spearheaded, and ultimately took no action on any of them. Now an adult, I am still considered a “youth� under 30, and feel even more aware of the resistance of long-established institutions to new ideas, inclusiveness, feminism, environmental mindfulness, and experimenting with more sustainable social and technological systems.
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I recently spoke on a panel where an older male organizer boasted of the event’s inclusiveness and supposed range of representation. I was the only woman, and the only young person. Before I spoke, it was asserted more than once that “now we would look at what young people are doing to change things.” Why do we place the burden of change almost exclusively upon the young? The people who should make the greatest changes, who have the greatest responsibility to participate in addressing the deeply ingrained flaws and injustices of our society, are those who benefit from those flaws the most. It’s so tiring to hear people at the top of social strata lauding youth for our contributions in a way that suggests we alone must bear the onus of creating a better world. If that’s you, stop absolving yourself of the responsibility for change. Stop expecting that, without any effort from you, the least powerful and respected will claw their way forward, dragging the heavy chains of your deadweight behind them.
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Why do we place the burden of change almost exclusively upon the young?
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hit sc
e m o h lose to
Christopher Towler
Welcome Home
night in the woods' exploration of small town life is #tooreal
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t appears to be a simple two-dimensional platformer with linear gameplay, but the aesthetics merely shield a complex, deep, and at times painfully sorrowful narrative. Released in late February, Night in the Woods walks into uncomfortable yet familiar territory few games dare to tread. But you see, that’s just the thing about Night in the Woods. It cloaks itself in the appearance of simplicity and normalcy. Its characters, its setting, its narrative, even its gameplay are in many ways unremarkable. This isn’t a game that tries to seduce you with extraordinary adventures, breathtaking locales and a cast of quirky, out-there characters. This down to earth sense of regularity makes Night in the Woods painfully relatable.
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A tale as old as time Night in the Woods stars Mae, a 20-something college dropout who returns to her home town of Possum Springs. Feeling directionless and lost, Mae has nowhere else to go. In Possum Springs, she finds things almost exactly as they were before she left for college. It’s not just the things that she left behind, either; it’s the people. Friends she grew up with in this small town are still here, doing the things they were always doing. It’s a dead end town full of characters who have themselves reached a kind of dead end; they are victims of their circumstances, as we all are. The medium suits the too familiar story, though it is one rarely explored in video games. As you run about town, you choose who you spend time with, hear their story, and see how they live out their days in Possum Springs: an anytown whose glory days are long past. Perhaps this is why the game hits very close to home for me.
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I grew up in Possum Springs Having lived in the Fraser Valley for most of my life, it’s easy to connect the dots between Possum Springs and a place like Maple Ridge, which had a thriving forest industry. Like Possum Springs, it’s safe to say Maple Ridge has seen better times. Mae’s father is a victim of such circumstance. Before the mining industry in Possum Springs collapsed, he was able to support his family on his income as a miner. He now sells meat in the local deli as his family struggles to get by, even with two incomes. These stories hit familiar chords. My grandfather was able to support a large family on a single income which he earned through a union-secured job with Hammond Mill — the kind of job that is largely unheard of anymore. Most people I know from my high school days in Maple Ridge have, like Mae, left at the first opportunity to seek their futures in far more metropolitan areas.
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Everyone has a story
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Unlike other games that attempt to deal with similar subject matter, the politics inherent in the game’s narrative aren’t just shoehorned in or mentioned in passing. They are baked into the game’s very core. All of the citizens of Possum Springs have their own tales to tell, and their circumstances are impossible to truly understand without delving into the politics and ideologies that have shaped their lives. Selmers is a local poet, who speaks in short but amusing rhymes that Mae finds endearing. Later in the game, you find Selmers at a sparsely attended Possum Springs Poetry Jam at the local library. Throughout the game, characters frequently remark that the library is the only nice thing left in the city, since it was funded by a wealthy philanthropist “way back when.” It’s at this reading where the gloves really come off as Selmers launches into an incredible poem that stabs at the heart of the “techno-capitalists” of Silicon Valley, who Selmers sees as responsible for the plight of many in the economically forgotten Possum Springs. Bee, another resident of Possum Springs and perhaps Mae’s oldest friend, epitomizes the archetype of the cynical, jaded, dead-onthe-inside millennial. Forced to take over running her family shop, Bee lives a subsistence existence where work dominates her every waking moment. Unable to save for college, she realizes she may never be able to leave Possum Springs, and watches her dreams of a better future disintegrate before her eyes. The characters in Night in the Woods are flawed. Many suffer from issues beyond their control: mental illness, impoverishment, alienation, isolation, and a sense of nihilistic hopelessness. These are not just individualized issues, but failings of the society that does not support its citizens, and that allows our most vulnerable to slip through the cracks.
Not just “Anytown”: our towns Of course, there are differences between places like Possum Springs and say, Maple Ridge. Possum Springs, as Mae points out, is hours from just about anywhere. Most of the Fraser Valley is decently connected to the rest of the Lower Mainland. Where Possum Springs seems devoid of any social intervention, places like Maple Ridge do see progressive social initiatives, like housing for the homeless, or the Greg Moore Youth Centre — an organization that specifically seeks to assist youth in gaining the team-building skills and experience they need to land them that first job. Yet, just as the political is inseparable from the stories that tell these characters lives, it is impossible to tell the story of life in the Fraser Valley without understanding its history, politics, and culture. There are clear parallels in terms of the working conditions of its residents, the decline of unionized jobs, and how cut off the rest of the world can seem in places like these. Cloaked in familiarity and simplicity, Night in the Woods is a remarkable gaming experience. These characters can be anyone, this place anywhere — the stories told in Night in the Woods are our own.
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fresh art Julie Epp About the artist Julie Epp is a Fraser Valley artist and graduated in 2015 from University of the Fraser Valley with her BFA. Her work uses the human body as a subject, interrogating issues surrounding the mental and physical state of the body and how it functions in the modern world.
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Venus of Filigree 2012 raspberrymag.ca
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Body Series 6 (above) 2015 Body Series 5 (left) 2015
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Mandala 2 2016
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Mandala 5 2016
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Mandala on Grey 2016 raspberrymag.ca
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artist statement 24
Abstract interpretations of the human form are minimalistic in their appearance, but the abstraction allows for the viewer to project onto it what they see. In these sculptural works I am using the lines, curves, and shapes that appear in the human form, but the abstract nature of the works and the sweat-like sheen on the clay can cause both intrigue and disgust in the viewer. My illustrative works incorporate the same lines and curves that draw in the viewer to the point where they often have the piece only inches from their face to see the intricate details. In the future I hope to combine these two styles to create illustration in detail on the simplistic abstraction of the clay forms.
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art on the wing Anthony Biondi “I want to create discomfort in a viewer, to make them look a little harder,” said Christina Billingham, describing her preferred style of art, as well as the theme she had chosen for this month’s Art on Demand 3.2. Fragmented Self features the talents of Andrew Booth, Paige Caldwell, and Amanda Vergara. Featureless and smothered faces and distorted bodies inhabit the array of artwork on display. “It speaks for itself with its alienation of form, very rich texture, and slightly uncomfortable positions and poses: which really does interrupt your viewing experience, and makes you look a little harder,” said Billingham. Both Caldwell and Vergara are UFV visual arts students. This is Billingham’s first opportunity to curate her own public show, aside from showcasing her own work. “I have a little bit of gallery experience,” she said, “I was a docent at the gallery at UFV. This opportunity came up and I jumped on it … It’s an exciting surprise.” The show opened March 23, at The Reach Museum Gallery with a performance by Jeffrey Trainor and a Make and Take table. Art on the Wing is a monthly column featuring emerging artists in the community. We partner with the Emerge at the Reach program to give a brief inside look at new art by young artists in each issue.
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Raising up the local scene Blessed’s Drew Riekman on the band’s success, and paying it forward
Martin Castro When Blessed first took to the stage in December 2014, opening for MALK, the Abbotsford-based four-piece had no idea they would one day be at the centre of the Abbotsford music scene. But as 2016 rolled around, the band found itself being noticed by publications like Stereogum and Noisey (Vice), which urged their readers not to “waste their time: listen to [Blessed’s single] ‘Waving Hand.’”
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A rise to success That first EP, which came out in May 2016, heralded the rise of one of Abbotsford’s more prominent bands. But lead vocalist and guitarist Drew Riekman says that’s not the whole story. “From the outside, it looks like we’re taking a lot of initiative and appropriate steps,” he explains, “but that’s just a product of so many projects before this failing, and [the band] learning from the mistakes before starting this one.” That experience, though crucial, did little to prepare Blessed for the wave of recognition that followed. The coverage of the EP in Vice and Stereogum was an unexpected success, which Riekman says is virtually unprecedented among local bands. “None of our bands have ever had an immense amount of success. Oh No! Yoko toured with Said the Whale, GSTS toured the country, but nothing like
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this.” Blessed’s debut EP came across as sleek and polished. Unlike many debuts, it didn’t sound as if it had been recorded in someone’s bedroom. Hearing this, a smile peeks out from behind Riekman’s beard. He chuckles sheepishly. “Why, that’s funny … it was put together in a bedroom,” he says. Although unexpected, Blessed’s success with their debut was won through their experience and work ethic. Riekman notes that despite the appearance of a quick rise from the outside, it doesn’t feel that way to the band. Riekman and fellow guitarist Reuben Houweling have been in other projects that toured across the country, and Blessed played its first show back in 2014. “[Now,] I think we just know the steps that make sense to take,” Riekmen says.
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Next steps for Blessed
Building the local scene
Looking forward, Blessed will release a second EP on April 28 this year, with a slightly different approach. “We want to be more nuanced in how we go forward. The new EP has parts on it that are fully electronic, but they’re subtle. I’m interested to see how people react to it, because we definitely took some chances on it.” In October, the band will record their full-length album. While the EP will feature Blessed’s current line-up, the album will include a new member of the band. “Compositionally we’re starting to get more ambitious,” Riekman says. “We have a sound in mind that we want to hear, and it requires somebody else to play live.” Matt McKeen will join Blessed’s shows starting in August as their third guitarist and keyboard player. McKeen moved to the Fraser Valley from Edmonton. After mentioning he was thinking of moving, potentially to Vancouver, he was invited to move to Abbotsford instead, and join Blessed. Riekman says McKeen is a natural addition to the band. “He’s an incredibly talented guitar player. He’s got a degree in sound engineering, and we’re trying to put together more electronic passages. You don’t have to expect a techno album from us, but we’re experimenting with synthesizers and drum machines, and he’s very well-versed in that.”
Along with the other members of Blessed, Riekman has been part of the Abbotsford music community in various capacities over the past decade — both onstage and in front of it. He and other members of more established local bands like Blessed, Loans, Cheap High, and Little Wild, have the benefit of historical context looking at the future of the local scene. In particular, Riekman reflects on a lack of performance venues, and the benefits of mentorship. “After the Del Boca Vista closed,” he says, referring to a frequent spot for house shows in the 2010s, “there was a really weird period where there weren’t a lot of places to play. There wasn’t an all-ages, central venue, kind of like Carport [another house show venue] is starting to feel.” Playing local shows and connecting with other bands plays a huge part in driving the music scene and the development of individual bands and musicians. Riekman says his first show, with Spread Eagle and You Say Party We Say Die! was 12 years ago, and had an early impact on his career. “I was really lucky that people like Stephen O’Shea from You Say Party!, Jason Nicholas of The Progressive Thinker, and a bunch of community members saw GSTS [of which Riekman was a member] play early on when I was in high-school. They were really helpful in guiding me and helping us make decisions. I don’t think I would be making
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art at the level I am today without guidance from older people in the scene really early on in my life.” Years after GSTS’s first gig, Riekman says he and other local bands who already have the swing of things want to see new, younger bands entering the scene. He encourages emerging musicians to reach out. “I remember being a 15-year-old, not wanting to message Fun 100 or You Say Party and ask, “what do I do?” Because it’s weird. You place someone on a pedestal that they’re not on at all. Blessed isn’t on it. Loans isn’t on it. None of us are. We’re all Abbotsford bands.” Riekman says one of the benefits of talking to him and other bands in the local scene is a fast-track to playing locally. “We can help them get shows. That’s regardless of genre. Loans just had a show at Captain’s Cabin with gold gloom [an emerging lo-fi pop duo] opening. The Blessed release which hasn’t been announced yet will have Jenny Banai
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opening.” Nerves are inevitable, Riekman says, but if there’s one thing he wants to make clear to younger performers, it’s that they are welcome. “If anyone reads this, and does have songs they’re thinking of putting out: no one would judge you if you came and played your first show. We all remember what it was like.” On the other side of the equation, Riekman says, other bands and patrons need to come to shows and be involved. He cites a recent show with a touring band from Saskatoon as an example. The show was poorly attended. While Riekman acknowledges it was not held on a peak day for concerts, he stresses the importance of showing up in support. “The thing that people need to start doing is coming out … Don’t stay for the whole show, even. But go out and pay your five bucks.”
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Canadaland’s
Aliya Pabani visits Abbotsford to host
new podcast What do feminism, art, and Chad Kroeger have in common? Martin Castro What’s the bridge between Canadian art and Nickelback frontman Chad Kroeger? Apparently, Abbotsford. On March 18 Aliyah Pabani, host of Canadaland’s new Wednesday podcast, The Imposter, took the stage at UFV’s main lecture hall for the show. The event featured a mix of pre-recorded material, live interviews, comedy by Fatima Dhowre, and an eclectic performance by Vancouver band Mourning Coup. It then turned toward the ridiculous, when, in a series of recorded phone calls, Pabani tries to reach the person responsible for Kroeger’s mansion in Abbotsford — she wants a tour. Perhaps not the craziest request, since the property is up for sale. Eventually, the string of calls reaches Kroeger’s publisher. Pabani’s excitement was clear despite
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the fuzz of the recording. “Oh my god — do you know how to get in there?” He did not; the most Pabani got from the phone call was an indication of the mansion’s size: “It’s not as big as the one Michael Buble’s building right now.” Pabani’s interest in Kroeger’s mansion proved unsuccessful but not fruitless. As seemingly out-of-left-field as the topic was, the event was well-received by local attendees. To the uninitiated listener, The Imposter casts a wide net: covering everything from performance art to literature and, as their live show proved, humour. The show’s scattered nature goes right back to its inception, when the results of a nationwide host search went awry. “The first host [Canadaland] had
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chosen before me ended up leaving at the last minute,” says Pabani. “On the launch [date], they had a show, they had sold tickets—everything had been announced. And at the very last minute she decided to take another job.” As a result, The Imposter’s first episode was as new to its creators as it was to the audience. Its half-entertainment, half-commentary make-up was informed by Pabani’s convictions. “I’m of the mind that most, if not all, art is political,” she says. “It’s part of my make-up.” While she agrees there’s more to art than feminist interpretation, Pabani
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doesn’t shy away from the feminist label. “I wouldn’t say everything is about feminism and politics, but I think there’s so little of that critical discourse happening that if you speak about those things, you’re The Feminist. Talking through those broader social or political interests is a way to engage with any form of art.” While Pabani acknowledges the gap between her podcast’s focus and Kroeger’s real estate, she still saw some value in the goose chase. “I just thought, if we were going to do something so incredibly low-brow in the show, it had to be this,” she said.
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There are protests and growing movements across North America and the word feminism is being tossed around an awful lot.
Stories are th Wine, women, and Andrea by Jess Wind 32
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he easy part MacPherson's new novel
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I knew this wouldn’t be a regular author interview. It couldn’t be. So when I sat down with Andrea MacPherson, a longtime mentor to many of us here at Raspberry, and frequent first reader of most of my own creative fiction, I went for the casual approach. Just a chill conversation between two passionate people about a cool thing one of them did. There was wine. MacPherson’s new novel What We Once Believed is a story set in a precarious moment in time. Women are restless with their prescribed roles and are starting to consider different options. They are exploring what it means to choose, and dealing with the consequences. There are protests and growing movements across North America and the word feminism is being tossed around an awful lot. It’s set in the 1970s. “I set it during the ‘70s because of all the changes in terms of women in the workplace, birth control, the second wave of feminism, all that stuff — then looking at [how], if I plunked it and positioned it right now, it would be the exact same.” MacPherson explains. “Even though we think things are so much different — and they’re better — ultimately there’s still those very defined parameters for what you're supposed to do as a woman, as
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a mother.” We mull over this idea for a beat. “I think that’s what surprised me by the end … I thought there’d be bigger differences between 40 years ago and now. And there weren’t any. Sadly it’s the same thing.” We move on quickly, neither one of us wanting to dwell on the current socio-political landscape for women and feminism. It’s a conversation for a different time. And more wine.
On characters: we don't have to love them The novel centres around an 11-yearold girl named Maybe, whose mother abandons her with her grandmother in a small town off the coast of Vancouver Island. Her mother Camille returns nine years later and catapults Maybe into a muddy world of complex adult relationships and unmet expectations. “Is Camille supposed to be unlikeable?” I ask. “She is! See, this is interesting because I’ve had multiple conversations with my publisher and editor about her,” MacPherson chuckles. “They wanted her to be more likeable. And I said, that’s not the point. I don’t want her to be the mom who comes
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back and has an epiphany and is suddenly Suzie Homemaker and wants to do everything she missed out on. I wanted her to be consistent to what her character was. She left … I didn’t want her to be apologetic about it or to be wishy washy in terms of that.” This likeability of characters hits a nerve that we both grumble over. “One of the conversations that drives me crazy in literature is that every female character has to be likeable in order for it to be worthwhile,” she continues. “And I vehemently oppose that. I want to see flawed characters and characters I don’t like, yet they still have value and they still have interest in terms of story and in terms of what they bring to a narrative.” I cheer. We high-five over the value of flawed characters. The same goes for men in the novel. For Maybe’s neighbour Robin, the men in her life breed conflict. We meet the husband — a stereotypical product of the times and the lover — the dangerous draw of a life unlived. MacPherson was conscious while writing to avoid including male perspectives — it wasn’t about them. And it pays off when choices are made, and those choices are strictly Robin’s to make, consequences and all.
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Each of their stories were individually important but also worked together as a chorus "Maybe wondered if a story ever really belonged to one person" MacPherson’s novel is, at its core, a story about stories. Throughout the novel we get Maybe’s perspective. We are with her as her 11-year-old innocence gives way to something much more complex. But we also get the perspective of all the women in Maybe’s life. While Camille’s attitude suggests each person’s story is their own, Maybe stops to wonder if a woman’s story is only as good as the perspectives that shape it. At first it was told entirely from Maybe’s perspective, but MacPherson quickly realized there were other stories that needed telling. “It started out that the first secondary story that appeared was Robin’s, only because I needed some place for Maybe to go that wasn’t her house. So she went to Robin’s house and then [Robin] kind of hijacked the story and said, ‘I have something to say over here.’” From there, we hear from the new neighbour who chose not to be a mother, who is running from a past life; we hear
from Camille, the mother who abandoned motherhood; we spend time with the grandmother who picks up the slack, and the widower who never got to be a mother. These stories unfold anchored by the setting, where old houses and old social values crash against new renovations and new world views — where the relentless ocean crashes against the quiet suburban island neighbourhood. “So then each of their stories were individually important but also worked together as a chorus between the people living on the street.” The Chorus served as the working title throughout the process until it was deemed too common a title. It was inspired by Catherine Barnett’s poem "Chorus" that appears as an epigraph in the final publication.
Why this book? Why now? MacPherson takes a sip of wine. I check my recording and we opt to share a plate of artichoke dip. She tries to read my notes upside down. “It’s nothing scary,” I tell her, pointing to her name scrawled across the top of
the page. Below it, barely legible, I had reminded myself to ask where the novel came from, and about the process of writing it. Questions about craft and what putting a book together really looks like; questions that come from a place of study and mentorship, not from a place of reportage. So I ask, why this book. “It just jumped up and said, this is what you're writing now, and I said okay. It was probably the fastest book I’ve written.” She tells me about a exchange with her daughter where the answer to an unrelated question sparked a character. “I had a conversation with Nora … and I said something and she answered me with 'Maybe' and I heard the word ‘maybe’ and I had this idea suddenly of a little girl who was named Maybe and what would happen if you named your child Maybe. It’s the uncertainty behind it and what that would allude to. It started off I was just taking notes and scribbling whatever, and it turned into a book.” Before getting into Maybe’s story, the first page understandably dedicates the book to Nora. Later in the novel we learn that Camille dedicates her own book to Maybe. I take a moment to consider how to bring up the parallel without suggesting MacPherson and her unlikable character have anything in common. “Obviously you’re not Camille … but.” A great start. We both laugh. She knew this wouldn’t be a regular interview either. We dip a couple chips into the appetizer before she tells me about writing the book for Nora. “I wrote it, ultimately, [so] someday when she reads it to see that she has choices. She doesn’t have to do just one thing, there’s not just one avenue she has to go down. I’m really interested personally in the choices women make and how they’re judged or condemned. So I want her to be really aware that she can do what she wants and there’s consequences, but that you don’t have to follow a prescribed road.”
Local harvest Home grown Westcoasters Dessa Bayrock and Jess Wind bringing you some local literary flavour. We review works set in the valley, written by authors from the valley, or that have that British Columbia, Fraser Valley vibe. Come back each month to see what the Fraser Valley has to offer.
Anatomy of a Girl Gang by Ashley Little
Dessa Bayrock
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he underbelly of Vancouver is as vivid as it is gritty, as dangerous as it is beautiful, as delicate as it is hard, and no one knows this better than the five members of the Black Roses. This is Anatomy of a Girl Gang: a vivid world of ragged hope, terrible consequences, and unlikely joy. It starts with a black eye. They tried to get me to do it first. I flat out refused, our narrator explains. This is how we meet Mac: the first and toughest, still embroiled in another Vancouver gang. Mercy worked East Cordova for two nights. The second night she got home, the side of her face looked like a grated eggplant. The idea strikes. That’s about when I realized the Vipers didn’t really give a solid fuck about
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us. They weren’t our family, they weren’t our friends, they were just using us like everyone else. You know what? Fuck this shit. This is over. This ends. Now. And so the Black Roses are born: Vancouver’s first and only all-girl gang. Mac, the original gangster, the leader, and Mercy, a Punjabi princess with a gift for theft, are the inaugural members, seeking a better life than their current gang can give them. They quickly recruit others, and the gang blooms into full colour. Kayos, a high-school drop-out with an education in fists and speed. Sly Girl, who thought anywhere would be better than her reserve, and landed deep in the middle of the Downtown Eastside drug trade. Z, a graffiti artist who paints Vancouver black with roses until the whole city knows their name. Through the Black Roses, these lost teenagers assert their strength, refuse to let themselves be taken advantage of because of their age or their gender, and create something wholly their own — something honest and true in intention if not in action, something bright and optimistic in its own dark, thorny way. They build a new life for themselves despite all odds, using scavenged scraps of hope and opportunity and relying on their own determination to carry them
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through. Creating the gang is an act of survival and creation — the tale of Robinson Crusoe set in downtown Vancouver. But this gang story, as all gang stories, is anguishing to read. As hopeful and as brilliant and as tough as these girls are, they can never be hopeful and brilliant and tough enough to obscure the fact that the gang grants them temporary power, at best. The gang may be their best option, and it may be their only option, but they are nevertheless throwing their lives away. Despite their determination and fearlessness, only one of the Black Roses makes it out alive. This novel is a beautiful collage of impressions and dreams, switching between the girls’ perspectives every page or two. Best of all are the tiny, unexpected sections written from Vancouver’s perspective, which glow with the same hope and poetry that power each of the fierce, delicate Black Roses themselves. In these small excerpts we see the shining beauty of this gang – as well as the foreshadowing of its tragic, heartbreaking end. The Blue-Black night folds into me, and the people of my city search for sleep, Vancouver writes. Some find it on waterbeds, futons, goose-down feather mattresses; others in parkades, stairwells, dark doorways, shining alleys. Still others don’t look for sleep at all, but something else entirely. Something necessary and familiar. They hunt through the night, bleary-eyed, fervent, skin glowing green under the buzzing streetlights, moaning into the wind like hungry ghosts.
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fresh fiction
Keith McQuade
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Image by Julie Falk
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few minutes to nightfall at a weathered farm in northern British Columbia: Ted Avery, a long-bearded octogenarian, sits on his back porch and scans the treeline on the edge of his yard for wayward creatures that might have the audacity to approach before the sun goes down. This is a dance Ted and those who live in the forest have been doing since he bought the farm in his early forties. They're after the pelts, see? They’re after the furs of their fallen brothers and sisters, which nightly are claimed and lifted from their corpses by Ted himself. What they want with them, he can only guess —but night after night they appear like clockwork. Slowly at first, they approach trudging through the overgrown wheatgrass and seeding dandelions, making no sound, save a soft crinkle where their paws supposedly land with each step.
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They advance in direction of the shed of Ted Avery, otherworldly, smoke-like breath oozing from their mouths and nostrils and slowly winding upward in tendrils before drifting on the sullen breeze, dissipating from view. They come every single night, and while you and I may initially be perturbed by this shocking affair, for Ted Avery it's as commonplace as washing the dishes or checking the mail. So each night, just before the sun disappears completely and the sky is blood orange and violet, he readies himself on his porch in an upward hunting stance and looks down the viewfinder of his rifle. In that fleeting moment of hazy twilight, the only sound carried on the wind is a low dulcet tone of a far-off wind chime. There has been no moment in Ted's life that makes him feel more alive and more at peace, and he inhales as the day fades. The evening arrives and so do they, from the treeline. At first it's only their animal eyes, luminous and pale, but moments pass and tardily they come out from the trees and into sight, where the brilliant moonlight makes their bodies all too visible. They glide carefully toward the shed, like leaves adrift on the currents of a placid stream. Ted dares not move, his breath kept in his lungs, as they proceed apace. There are five of them now in total — he can see three ahead of him, and two from his periphery at his right. Not yet, thinks Ted. He wants to wait until there is little chance of escape. He wants them to feel just how vulnerable they really are. More arrive, gaining
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ground toward his shed with the same tired and graceful movements as the others. Ted thinks there are eight now. One off to his right seems mere meters from their goal. NOW! he says to himself and he relinquishes his breath, exhales, and jerks his body to his side. The creature snaps from its trance and looks directly at him, but it is too late. A single bullet rips the air and buries itself between the beast’s eyes. It's dead. It collapses to the ground with a soft thud, while the others retreat promptly to the shadows of the trees beyond Ted Avery's yard, leaving not a trace to show they were even there. Ted calmly lowers his rifle and saunters to where the body fell. He looks over the corpse and at its face where the eyes are still open and they look both terrified and peaceful. The real work begins now. The night passes without incident as Ted secludes himself in his shed, busily toiling away, and morning arrives just as he reaches his porch, clothes covered in blood. As the sun rises and casts itself on the shed of Ted Avery, many faded and weather-beaten pelts are seen nailed to its surface. One of them looks new.
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Game Reviews from the Geek Beat
It doesn’t matter if it’s board, mobile, video, role-playing, or card — games are a way to bring people together, to learn and hone new skills, and to collaborate on elaborate world building. They are for first dates, family fun nights, team-building, or any other social gathering. It can’t be denied there’s a game culture thriving right here in the Fraser Valley. So what are we playing? With so many ways to play, it can be daunting to pick up and learn a new game. We’re here to help you along as we play new games, or discover classic favourites. We’ll even tell you where you might find these games to play yourself.
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Dust off your old controllers and blow in the cartridges we're going retro Jess Wind Except don’t actually blow into the cartridges, because despite us all doing it in our youth, it’s pretty terrible for your games. This month I took a trip down nostalgia lane with my people and plugged in the old NES & SNES. It was a night filled with one player games, no save points, and dying. Lots of dying. We started in 1994 with Disney’s Lion King for SNES. The main question coming out of this game is: why is it so hard? It’s a straightforward platformer with Simba navigating the main plot points from the story. He starts as a cub in the Pridelands, hops off giraffe heads, and survives a stampede before eventually growing up and facing off with Scar. At least, I assume that’s where it goes. We found ourselves drowning in ankle-deep water after repeatedly missing a rhino’s tail while trying to climb the pyramid of African animals in level 2: “I Just Can’t Wait to be King.” On a scale of one to impossible, this game ranks pretty high. Even the eight lives and three continues you start out with isn’t enough to make up for all the
times Simba misses that damn tail. Next we decided to go with something less challenging but only slightly. Rainbow Islands: The Story of Bubble Bobble 2 for NES, released in 1991. In this game you control 8 bits of bug stomping, rainbow producing magic. Bubby, your character, moves through a top scrolling platformer attempting to spell the word Rainbow by turning enemies into diamonds with his rainbows. With one touch death and a limited number of lives, coupled with the ever present threat of a rising tide, this simple retro game quickly becomes challenging as you move to higher levels. This game’s replay value comes from the fact that in 25 years not one of my people has managed to beat it. Retro games are an excellent way to bring people together for a night of nostalgia and low-stakes game play. See how much muscle memory comes back when you stomp goombas in Super Mario Bros. Play-the-winner in an all out tournament of Street Fighter 2 Turbo. Google Mario Kart 64 drinking game and remember to not drink and drive. When it comes to retro games, the value is in how much you still love them 20 to 30 years later. Check out Willow Video Games in Abbotsford or Game-Bit in Mission to find titles you may have forgotten about.
Our contributors Anthony Biondi is an artist and writer living in Abbotsford. He has been previously published in The Louden Singletree, and served four years on The Cascade’s editorial board as Art Director and Production and Design Editor. He is a humourless crab, and fundamental contrarian, whose cholesterol may be higher than his IQ. | www.anthonybiondi.com Jess Wind somehow managed to earn two degrees by writing about zombies. She holds a BA in Creative Writing from UFV and an MA in Communication from Carleton University in Ottawa. Jess is an ex-editor of The Cascade, is published in The Louden Singletree and has been known to blog about entertainment media and culture. She likes her coffee black, her video games retro, and her sports local. Katie Stobbart is a writer and editor from Abbotsford. She has edited The Cascade newspaper, Louden Singletree literary magazine, and the Pacific Rim Review of Books. She is also a proud co-founder of QuiQuill Communications. A selection of her poems will appear in a co-authored chapbook soon to haunt local library shelves, dentists’ offices, and hotel lobbies: It looks like a chicken. Katie is also working hard to improve her patio gardening game. Martin Castro is an emerging poet and proud purveyor of hip-hop, rap, and music generally. He hails from Mission, which, in the glow of sunset, is perhaps perfect fodder for a Bob Ross painting. Martin is the current Arts in Review Editor of The Cascade, the University of the Fraser Valley’s student newspaper, as he completes his Bachelor of Arts degree in English. Christopher Towler just finished his Master of Arts in Communications & New Media. He is an avid roleplayer, board and video gamer, (surprised?). He is also a writer, musician, and really into improv theatre. He’s also the owner of a rad pug-familiar named Oscar!
Raspberry magazine is a monthly Fraser Valley magazine devoted to arts, culture, and community life. Established in June 2016, Raspberry publishes reviews, event coverage, and other arts-friendly content online as we work toward our goal of publishing in print. You can follow us on social media for updates on our progress, information and insights on the Fraser Valley arts and culture scene, and fresh arts coverage.
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