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A Minor Chorus
In Northern Alberta, a queer Indigenous doctoral student steps away from his dissertation to write a novel. He is adrift, caught between his childhood on the reservation and this new life of the urban intelligentsia. Billy-Ray Belcourt’s unnamed narrator chronicles a series of encounters: a heart-to-heart with fellow doctoral student River over the mounting pressure placed on marginalized scholars; a meeting with Michael, a closeted adult from his hometown whose vulnerability and loneliness punctuate the realities of queer life on the fringe. Amid these conversations, the narrator is haunted by memories of Jack, a cousin caught in the cycle of police violence, drugs, and survival. Jack’s life parallels the narrator’s own; the possibilities of escape and imprisonment are left to chance with colonialism stacking the odds. A Minor Chorus introduces the dazzling literary voice of a Lambda Literary Award winner and Canadian #1 national best-selling poet to the United States, shining much-needed light on the realities of Indigenous survival.
176 pages, Paperback
First published September 13, 2022
About the author
Billy-Ray Belcourt
9 books617 followersBilly-Ray Belcourt is a writer and academic from the Driftpile Cree Nation. His books are: THIS WOUND IS A WORLD (Frontenac House 2017; UMinn Press 2019), winner of the 2018 Griffin Poetry Prize, NDN COPING MECHANISMS (House of Anansi 2019), winner of the 2020 Stephan G. Stephansson Poetry Prize and longlisted for Canada Reads, A HISTORY OF MY BRIEF BODY (Hamish Hamilton and Two Dollar Radio 2020), finalist for the 2020 Governor General's Literary Prize for Non-Fiction and the 2021 Lambda Literary Award for Gay Memoir/Biography, and the forthcoming A MINOR CHORUS: A NOVEL (Hamish Hamilton and Norton 2022).
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 515 reviews
December 9, 2022
i stopped using the 5-star rating system but I’m leaving this here because I may or may not have had the elusive “profound experience of art” … this book f*cks
May 29, 2023
Now THAT would be an interesting Canadian contender for the Booker: In his autofictional debut novel, queer Cree poet Belcourt ponders the prisons we live in. The unnamed twenty-something narrator takes a break from finishing his doctoral thesis to travel from his new scholarly world in Northern Alberta back to the surroundings of his youth on the rez, thus turning from theory back to the practicalities of indigenous survival. The text is mainly made up of conversations turned into stories that reflect the lives of both the narrator and the people he talks to (the title-giving chorus where, to say it with Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, the subaltern speak), and the whole book is framed and haunted by the narrator's memories of his cousin Jack who, traumatized by police brutality, has turned to drugs.
This is a very smart novel about indigenous survival in a settler society, the effects of intergenerational trauma and the injustices indigenous communities are still facing today. Belcourt investigates these questions - as well as queer identity - by illuminating the destinies of several individuals that have their own individuality and dignity while also standing pars pro toto for larger societal issues, like the marginalization of non-white scholars in white spaces or self-harming survival tactics of groups marginalized by the reigning power. I really admired the captivating, individual storylines that so well serve to tell the narrator's story by seemingly not doing so (hello, Rachel Cusk).
The language is highly elegant and showcases the award winning poet's talent, while not being overly lyrical (a tendency that often overburdens novels written by poets) - instead, the intense precision of the descriptions and emotional movements really draw readers into the text.
A wonderful debut.
This is a very smart novel about indigenous survival in a settler society, the effects of intergenerational trauma and the injustices indigenous communities are still facing today. Belcourt investigates these questions - as well as queer identity - by illuminating the destinies of several individuals that have their own individuality and dignity while also standing pars pro toto for larger societal issues, like the marginalization of non-white scholars in white spaces or self-harming survival tactics of groups marginalized by the reigning power. I really admired the captivating, individual storylines that so well serve to tell the narrator's story by seemingly not doing so (hello, Rachel Cusk).
The language is highly elegant and showcases the award winning poet's talent, while not being overly lyrical (a tendency that often overburdens novels written by poets) - instead, the intense precision of the descriptions and emotional movements really draw readers into the text.
A wonderful debut.
March 30, 2023
Our unnamed narrator feels that his dissertation in critical theory has stalled, going nowhere. He wants to leave it and write a novel instead. He is deeply depressed and lonely, the purpose of his book perhaps a way of exploring his emotional state, and a means to finding happiness. The answers however prove elusive.
The title of the book alludes to what Belcourt is attempting with writing this novel. Instead of the narrator being one single person, he is portrayed as a collective voice. A voice that speaks about his indigenous culture, its subjugation by colonial powers. Writing as a “Minor Chorus”. This chorus is populated by “voices” from the town. His Aunt, whose grandson has just been jailed, his cousin, a middle-aged white man he finds online for casual sex.
I found the major theme of this novel to be minorities. The narrator is gay and indigenous, well qualified to express the feeling of being a minority. The novel explores the loneliness and oppression felt collectively as a minority group. Again we read about an indigenous population that was subjugated by invading colonial powers. Again, we read about how the indigenous population was mistreated, incarcerated on reserves.
This is not a happy book. You can feel the narrator’s depression, his loneliness, his desire to find answers through writing a novel and literature.
Belcourt’s writing is sublime and at times poetic. One passage in the book is a poem itself within the novel. In fact, I would say that the strength of this novel lies not with the characters or the narrative, but the writing. Having said that, it is still an enjoyable and rewarding read, opening my eyes to the indigenous Cree population of Canada.
The title of the book alludes to what Belcourt is attempting with writing this novel. Instead of the narrator being one single person, he is portrayed as a collective voice. A voice that speaks about his indigenous culture, its subjugation by colonial powers. Writing as a “Minor Chorus”. This chorus is populated by “voices” from the town. His Aunt, whose grandson has just been jailed, his cousin, a middle-aged white man he finds online for casual sex.
I found the major theme of this novel to be minorities. The narrator is gay and indigenous, well qualified to express the feeling of being a minority. The novel explores the loneliness and oppression felt collectively as a minority group. Again we read about an indigenous population that was subjugated by invading colonial powers. Again, we read about how the indigenous population was mistreated, incarcerated on reserves.
This is not a happy book. You can feel the narrator’s depression, his loneliness, his desire to find answers through writing a novel and literature.
Belcourt’s writing is sublime and at times poetic. One passage in the book is a poem itself within the novel. In fact, I would say that the strength of this novel lies not with the characters or the narrative, but the writing. Having said that, it is still an enjoyable and rewarding read, opening my eyes to the indigenous Cree population of Canada.
January 7, 2023
Outstanding.
Intelligent, beautifully written with grace and dignity. Billy-Ray Belcourt is clearly a young writer with immense promise.
I really wasn’t prepared for just how good this book is!
Intelligent, beautifully written with grace and dignity. Billy-Ray Belcourt is clearly a young writer with immense promise.
I really wasn’t prepared for just how good this book is!
February 11, 2022
An absolutely dazzling confluence of big ideas and raw emotions, told in Billy-Ray Belcourt's singular poetic voice. A Minor Chorus is about loving, questioning, and fighting for your life, and it's as compelling a debut novel as I've read in years.
December 23, 2022
In the throes of Covid was perhaps not the best way to experience this complex book, but it was the library audiobook hold that came at the right time, so! This is an experimental novel / not really a novel by western conventional standards, as it is just as much a kind of academic theorizing and analysis as a narrative, linear or otherwise. I don't mean this as a critique, just an FYI.
On the sentence level I found a lot to love here, BRB is such an amazing wordsmith and poet. As a piece of fiction this is a meandering collection of conversations, self-reflection, and throughts that ask questions and broach topics with no answers or resolutions. If you like that kind of thing and gorgeous and smart poetic writing, read this. If you haven't read BRB before, I'd recommend starting with his poetry probably, not this book, unless you are into academic theory!
On the sentence level I found a lot to love here, BRB is such an amazing wordsmith and poet. As a piece of fiction this is a meandering collection of conversations, self-reflection, and throughts that ask questions and broach topics with no answers or resolutions. If you like that kind of thing and gorgeous and smart poetic writing, read this. If you haven't read BRB before, I'd recommend starting with his poetry probably, not this book, unless you are into academic theory!
September 28, 2022
Sigh. At first, I wasn’t sure about this, but then it seduced me big-time. Chapter 3 “ A Familiar Face” and Chapter 4 “People Were Crying” were breathtaking and heartbreaking. This book is filled with moments of stunning beauty.
March 12, 2023
I really wasn't sure about this book at first. It's described as a novel, but I felt like it barely qualified as that - or it really wasn't much more of a novel than Belcourt's previous book A History of My Brief Body. But enough semantics.
In this book the narrator (who is Belcourt, but never gets mentioned by name I don't think). He's studying for his PhD and decided to take a break and go back north to his hometown, a reservation in Northern Alberta (a 4 hour drive from Edmonton). There he interviews his aunt (who's adopted son Jack was recently arrested), Jack, and a few other old friends and family members. There's not really a plot - its more an exploration of his being in the world and that of his peers.
The narrator is queer and a Cree and his meditations on living in a body "absorbed into the misery machine called life under white supremacists capitalist heteropatriarchy" makes up the majority of the first half of the book. Highlights include him hooking up with a white guy on Grindr. Readers of Belcourt's previous books know what to expect.
The second half becomes more interesting as we get the perspectives of other Cree people (mostly straight) and still living on the Rez. But it feels more like a journalistic document than a novel. I assume all the stories are real? But I'm unsure. Jack's story, that he tells the narrator from jail, makes up the final arc of the novel and is quite interesting. You get the sense of how residential schools; a broken family life; lack of education/parentalization of drugs, alcohol, and teenage sex; systemic racism and classism in the policing system; etc. sets these young people up for failure.
I could be wrong, but I felt like Belcourt's prose got much stronger as the book progressed. The first chunk it felt like he was being poetic and some statements didn't even make sense. I had to roll my eyes at some of the sentences that could only be formed by a progressive English major. The later half where his musings get more down to Earth I felt like his prose was strong.
Anyways, this is all to say I quite enjoyed this book! I look forward to Belcourt's next project. It's super cool to read a modern novel like this - one that talks about tweeting, online dating, and has a character with They/Them pronouns. Odd, but I think this is the first novel I've read with a non-binary character.
In this book the narrator (who is Belcourt, but never gets mentioned by name I don't think). He's studying for his PhD and decided to take a break and go back north to his hometown, a reservation in Northern Alberta (a 4 hour drive from Edmonton). There he interviews his aunt (who's adopted son Jack was recently arrested), Jack, and a few other old friends and family members. There's not really a plot - its more an exploration of his being in the world and that of his peers.
The narrator is queer and a Cree and his meditations on living in a body "absorbed into the misery machine called life under white supremacists capitalist heteropatriarchy" makes up the majority of the first half of the book. Highlights include him hooking up with a white guy on Grindr. Readers of Belcourt's previous books know what to expect.
The second half becomes more interesting as we get the perspectives of other Cree people (mostly straight) and still living on the Rez. But it feels more like a journalistic document than a novel. I assume all the stories are real? But I'm unsure. Jack's story, that he tells the narrator from jail, makes up the final arc of the novel and is quite interesting. You get the sense of how residential schools; a broken family life; lack of education/parentalization of drugs, alcohol, and teenage sex; systemic racism and classism in the policing system; etc. sets these young people up for failure.
I could be wrong, but I felt like Belcourt's prose got much stronger as the book progressed. The first chunk it felt like he was being poetic and some statements didn't even make sense. I had to roll my eyes at some of the sentences that could only be formed by a progressive English major. The later half where his musings get more down to Earth I felt like his prose was strong.
Anyways, this is all to say I quite enjoyed this book! I look forward to Belcourt's next project. It's super cool to read a modern novel like this - one that talks about tweeting, online dating, and has a character with They/Them pronouns. Odd, but I think this is the first novel I've read with a non-binary character.
August 23, 2022
3.5 stars
I absolutely loved Belcourt’s memoir earlier this year and was so excited when he announced a novel.
A Minor Chorus is actually more of a novella, and Belcourt’s strong writing is what makes the book for me. the story itself is actually quite similar to his memoir, which makes me believe the protagonist was inspired by himself and it honestly made the story feel a bit like deja vu at times. I really enjoyed this for the writing but it’s definitely a character driven novel as opposed to anything plot heavy, and I didn’t quite connect with the character as much as I hoped. still a solid read and will definitely pick up from him again. I’d love to see a full length novel from Belcourt in the future
I absolutely loved Belcourt’s memoir earlier this year and was so excited when he announced a novel.
A Minor Chorus is actually more of a novella, and Belcourt’s strong writing is what makes the book for me. the story itself is actually quite similar to his memoir, which makes me believe the protagonist was inspired by himself and it honestly made the story feel a bit like deja vu at times. I really enjoyed this for the writing but it’s definitely a character driven novel as opposed to anything plot heavy, and I didn’t quite connect with the character as much as I hoped. still a solid read and will definitely pick up from him again. I’d love to see a full length novel from Belcourt in the future
December 1, 2022
For the love of all that is holly. It’s the first time ever that I come upon a book where I wan to underline and remember EVERY SINGLE SENTENCE. Billy-Ray Belcourt, do me a favor. Next time you write a novel, give a call to Hanya Y and she’ll tell you how to write doorstoppers. I wish you book had never ended. Absolutely phenomenal.
January 7, 2023
4.5, only because I felt it cut itself short! Wished this was longer, I would have happily read more and more and more
December 12, 2022
I loved the writing in this book, reminding me of Ocean Vuong's "On Earth...", or maybe Anne Carson's "Autobiography of Red". Constantly beautiful sentences with thoughtful meaning that made me THINK and reflect. I need to read everything Billy-Ray Belcourt puts on paper!
A nameless MC starts in grad school. He is a queer Cree living in Alberta who wants to write specifically of his experience related to grief. As he takes a 'time-out' from grad school to get ideas, we are taken through a "Minor Chorus" of conversations and reflections as he goes on a trip north.
The first member of the minor chorus we meet, is with our MC talking to his 'effortlessly' queer indigenous friend of the same age, River, who is also in grad school. What a great friend that thinks completely in sync:
River: I think you should trust this impulse, go into it, go deeper into the joyfulness.
MC: "You're such an angel. I want to be like you when I grow up", I said finally, even through we were the same age.
We get many insightful quotes throughout this book from authors...
So it is better to speak remembering we were never meant to survive.
"A Litany for Survival" by Audre Lorde
MC: I was ad-libbing, but I was abuzz with the euphoria of something that felt like political transformation. I was like a character in a Virginia Woolf novel: There must be another life.
Another 'minor chorus' member he converses with next is his supervisor, Hannah
Of course it's okay. You have to protect your art, nourish yourself.
MC: I remember, for example, one session in which Hannah led us into the river valley to write little poems for and with the trees in the style of Yoko Ono's "Grapefruit". The point was to make use of a writing practice that was in concert with the earth, that wasn't about the singular "I" we'd been elsewhere instructed to pledge allegiance to the way one does a nation.
Reflecting with his hookups on Grindr that are in the 'chorus' too:
I thought the body was a human invention, a ruse, a story that's easy to digest.
As he leaves to go back to his home area in northern Alberta, he adds statements from authors
I decided to reread James Baldwin's Giovanni's Room to try to relive the awe I felt when I first read it; I'd written for hours after putting the book down. This time I was struck anew by Giovanni's assertion that homesickness is captivating only insofar as "home" is out of reach. The distance allows it to be imbued with inflated nostalgia. To return is to risk watching it explode.
More authors... (that are part of this Chorus too)
I am either lacerated or ill at ease
and occasionally subject to gusts of life.
Mourning Diary by Roland Barthes
Who am I? I'm just a writer. I write things down.
"Litany in Which Certain Things Are Crossed Out" by Richard Siken
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?
by Mary Oliver
A novel can be as complex as a city, with lanes and by-lanes.
by Arudhati Roy
The moral problem of the novel is the presumption one can inhabit another's consciousness.
by Rachel Cusk
I think a novel should be bold enough to attempt to define its own constructions in a new way.
by Edouard Louis
The novel is already at the door. Waiting, but just for a little. It is the lover again, impatient again. Wanting again for you to know everything.
by Alexander Chee
As our MC journey's back to 'home', we meet his great aunt Mary. She raised her grandson Jack per tough family circumstances, and Jack was best friends with our MC. So we hear both of these chorus stories.
Mary appeared to be encompassed by: Grief, like the dark, lifts eventually-by Carl Phillips
We hear Mary tell of how much fear the Indigenous people had living daily.
Growing up, Mary and her siblings and cousins weren't afraid of imaginary monsters. Everywhere lurked the more realistic threat of white men who they feared would snatch them away from their families and put them in one of the residential schools along the lake, or worse.
And Jack? He fell into this trap.
I thought about something Ocean Vuoun has articulated, which is that the hunted convert violence into a mundanity, into background noise. It becomes, against our will, but as a matter of survival, something as evident but suppressible as the presence of light.
Michael was the next person to be interviewed by our MC, in the continuing quest for book material and ideas. He was a newspaper publisher, that started as an unconventional teen (aka gay). A young relationship story for Micheal adds more realistic grief from this chorus member.
What this meant was that I was a gay man listening to a gay man who hadn't been listened to.
...
Michael's story reminded me of Judith Butler's observation that we sometimes choose to stay attached to what injures us rather then gamble with what it might feel like to be in the world without the attachment.
Damn! Michael's story hurt.
Next chapter begins:
I'd never had sex in rural Alberta.
(Lets just say the next 14 pages change that status!)
Graham has his own story here which adds perfectly to everything.
Writing is the method of using the word as bait.
"Aqua Viva" by Clarice Lispector.
We hear intermittently about Jack as this story progresses, through memories of our MC. Jack is a very important member of this Chorus!
The complications of family for Cree on the rez are explored more as memories of our MC's mother are revealed. Dionne Brand wrote in memorium to Toni Morrison how Morrison "changed the texture of English itself". Our MC watched the documentary "The Pieces I Am", then listened to her audiobook "Sula", which brought reflections from the poet Sonia Sanchez per Morrison's strength. Whew! (More I NEED to read!!)
I limp along through my mourning.
Since I've been taking care of her, the last six months in fact, she was 'everything' for me, and I've completely forgotten that I'd written. I was no longer anything but desperately hers.
"Mourning Diary" by Roland Barthes
democratization of the maternal function
by Maggie Nelson
Our MC connecst this: Mothering is about being with others in a context in which mutual flourishing is a shared goal.
MC: "I wanted to ask her everything:
Where were you?
What is your definition of love?
What sort of person were you in your twenties?
What is there to apologize for?
What do we do now?
Wow! Pause to think!
MC:
I thought of Kogonada's "Columbus" and how I watched it breathlessly. I waited for there to be a volatile confrontation between the protagonists and their respective parents (either in the past or the present), parents who so empirically diminished their child's happiness in the name of their own world-engulfing desires.
[Now, I had to put the DVD "Columbus" on hold at my local library to watch this, along with that Toni Morrison documentary (on Netflix). And don't forget all the author/books/poems I've been adding that I NEED to read now. This is all Billy-Ray Belcourt's fault!! haha]
We meet Donna, who was the young sister of our MC's mom, who helped raise our MC. His mom (her sister) get deeper thoughts. Donna understood our MC and had watched "Brokeback Mountain" with him, since she 'knew'.
A visit by our MC to the land of an old residential school.
It was one of dozens in Alberta intended to brutalize rather than educate. This was an era of horror so prolonged and systematic that it continued to permeate the larger Indigenous consciousness. We were still haunted by it.
We stumble into a 'Karen' who accuses our MC of trespassing, since this is campground land now.
It was becoming clear she wanted to pull me into a battle I could only lose, because the world, this small pocket of it, at the end of the day, was hers to claim against political reason.
In their youth, this was the open land that our MC and Jack loved.
Jack: You know, I don't think I'll ever leave here. I don't think there's anywhere nearly this beautiful.
MC:
I returned to my hotel room determined to write, but nothing happened. I remembered reading Auden, who said that poetry makes nothing happen. I felt like the poets in this regard, insofar as I wanted my future novel to be like a "valley of its making" - to not be seen as someone trespassing onto already stolen land.
Damn, again!! Catch my breath, again!
We next meet Robin, who was in a tangle of a marriage. He became radicalized-conservative.
At a pow-wow, we meet cousin Lena, who is proud her daughter is participating in her first jingle dance. She has a boy that
might take after you, I think. She nudged me with her elbow. We watch that drag show together, she continued. I sometimes see him watching me, analyzing me for little clues as to whether or not I'll accept him. I will, of course. I've been using their slang: Yes god! We laughed again.
We meet a thankful man at a gas station that can see our MC is gay, and relates a story about his own son.
We conclude the book with a visit to Jack at the Remand Center (prison) in Edmonton. We get Jack to tell his story here, which is a culmination/accumulation of this chorus of life.
I find this writing so captivating to read. I am constantly googling things on my computer too, to better understand all the reference that keep coming up. I like that. It makes me think! We receive great social commentary via beautifully strung together language that drips everywhere with extra meanings.
Solid 5 for me.
A nameless MC starts in grad school. He is a queer Cree living in Alberta who wants to write specifically of his experience related to grief. As he takes a 'time-out' from grad school to get ideas, we are taken through a "Minor Chorus" of conversations and reflections as he goes on a trip north.
The first member of the minor chorus we meet, is with our MC talking to his 'effortlessly' queer indigenous friend of the same age, River, who is also in grad school. What a great friend that thinks completely in sync:
River: I think you should trust this impulse, go into it, go deeper into the joyfulness.
MC: "You're such an angel. I want to be like you when I grow up", I said finally, even through we were the same age.
We get many insightful quotes throughout this book from authors...
So it is better to speak remembering we were never meant to survive.
"A Litany for Survival" by Audre Lorde
MC: I was ad-libbing, but I was abuzz with the euphoria of something that felt like political transformation. I was like a character in a Virginia Woolf novel: There must be another life.
Another 'minor chorus' member he converses with next is his supervisor, Hannah
Of course it's okay. You have to protect your art, nourish yourself.
MC: I remember, for example, one session in which Hannah led us into the river valley to write little poems for and with the trees in the style of Yoko Ono's "Grapefruit". The point was to make use of a writing practice that was in concert with the earth, that wasn't about the singular "I" we'd been elsewhere instructed to pledge allegiance to the way one does a nation.
Reflecting with his hookups on Grindr that are in the 'chorus' too:
I thought the body was a human invention, a ruse, a story that's easy to digest.
As he leaves to go back to his home area in northern Alberta, he adds statements from authors
I decided to reread James Baldwin's Giovanni's Room to try to relive the awe I felt when I first read it; I'd written for hours after putting the book down. This time I was struck anew by Giovanni's assertion that homesickness is captivating only insofar as "home" is out of reach. The distance allows it to be imbued with inflated nostalgia. To return is to risk watching it explode.
More authors... (that are part of this Chorus too)
I am either lacerated or ill at ease
and occasionally subject to gusts of life.
Mourning Diary by Roland Barthes
Who am I? I'm just a writer. I write things down.
"Litany in Which Certain Things Are Crossed Out" by Richard Siken
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?
by Mary Oliver
A novel can be as complex as a city, with lanes and by-lanes.
by Arudhati Roy
The moral problem of the novel is the presumption one can inhabit another's consciousness.
by Rachel Cusk
I think a novel should be bold enough to attempt to define its own constructions in a new way.
by Edouard Louis
The novel is already at the door. Waiting, but just for a little. It is the lover again, impatient again. Wanting again for you to know everything.
by Alexander Chee
As our MC journey's back to 'home', we meet his great aunt Mary. She raised her grandson Jack per tough family circumstances, and Jack was best friends with our MC. So we hear both of these chorus stories.
Mary appeared to be encompassed by: Grief, like the dark, lifts eventually-by Carl Phillips
We hear Mary tell of how much fear the Indigenous people had living daily.
Growing up, Mary and her siblings and cousins weren't afraid of imaginary monsters. Everywhere lurked the more realistic threat of white men who they feared would snatch them away from their families and put them in one of the residential schools along the lake, or worse.
And Jack? He fell into this trap.
I thought about something Ocean Vuoun has articulated, which is that the hunted convert violence into a mundanity, into background noise. It becomes, against our will, but as a matter of survival, something as evident but suppressible as the presence of light.
Michael was the next person to be interviewed by our MC, in the continuing quest for book material and ideas. He was a newspaper publisher, that started as an unconventional teen (aka gay). A young relationship story for Micheal adds more realistic grief from this chorus member.
What this meant was that I was a gay man listening to a gay man who hadn't been listened to.
...
Michael's story reminded me of Judith Butler's observation that we sometimes choose to stay attached to what injures us rather then gamble with what it might feel like to be in the world without the attachment.
Damn! Michael's story hurt.
Next chapter begins:
I'd never had sex in rural Alberta.
(Lets just say the next 14 pages change that status!)
Graham has his own story here which adds perfectly to everything.
Writing is the method of using the word as bait.
"Aqua Viva" by Clarice Lispector.
We hear intermittently about Jack as this story progresses, through memories of our MC. Jack is a very important member of this Chorus!
The complications of family for Cree on the rez are explored more as memories of our MC's mother are revealed. Dionne Brand wrote in memorium to Toni Morrison how Morrison "changed the texture of English itself". Our MC watched the documentary "The Pieces I Am", then listened to her audiobook "Sula", which brought reflections from the poet Sonia Sanchez per Morrison's strength. Whew! (More I NEED to read!!)
I limp along through my mourning.
Since I've been taking care of her, the last six months in fact, she was 'everything' for me, and I've completely forgotten that I'd written. I was no longer anything but desperately hers.
"Mourning Diary" by Roland Barthes
democratization of the maternal function
by Maggie Nelson
Our MC connecst this: Mothering is about being with others in a context in which mutual flourishing is a shared goal.
MC: "I wanted to ask her everything:
Where were you?
What is your definition of love?
What sort of person were you in your twenties?
What is there to apologize for?
What do we do now?
Wow! Pause to think!
MC:
I thought of Kogonada's "Columbus" and how I watched it breathlessly. I waited for there to be a volatile confrontation between the protagonists and their respective parents (either in the past or the present), parents who so empirically diminished their child's happiness in the name of their own world-engulfing desires.
[Now, I had to put the DVD "Columbus" on hold at my local library to watch this, along with that Toni Morrison documentary (on Netflix). And don't forget all the author/books/poems I've been adding that I NEED to read now. This is all Billy-Ray Belcourt's fault!! haha]
We meet Donna, who was the young sister of our MC's mom, who helped raise our MC. His mom (her sister) get deeper thoughts. Donna understood our MC and had watched "Brokeback Mountain" with him, since she 'knew'.
A visit by our MC to the land of an old residential school.
It was one of dozens in Alberta intended to brutalize rather than educate. This was an era of horror so prolonged and systematic that it continued to permeate the larger Indigenous consciousness. We were still haunted by it.
We stumble into a 'Karen' who accuses our MC of trespassing, since this is campground land now.
It was becoming clear she wanted to pull me into a battle I could only lose, because the world, this small pocket of it, at the end of the day, was hers to claim against political reason.
In their youth, this was the open land that our MC and Jack loved.
Jack: You know, I don't think I'll ever leave here. I don't think there's anywhere nearly this beautiful.
MC:
I returned to my hotel room determined to write, but nothing happened. I remembered reading Auden, who said that poetry makes nothing happen. I felt like the poets in this regard, insofar as I wanted my future novel to be like a "valley of its making" - to not be seen as someone trespassing onto already stolen land.
Damn, again!! Catch my breath, again!
We next meet Robin, who was in a tangle of a marriage. He became radicalized-conservative.
At a pow-wow, we meet cousin Lena, who is proud her daughter is participating in her first jingle dance. She has a boy that
might take after you, I think. She nudged me with her elbow. We watch that drag show together, she continued. I sometimes see him watching me, analyzing me for little clues as to whether or not I'll accept him. I will, of course. I've been using their slang: Yes god! We laughed again.
We meet a thankful man at a gas station that can see our MC is gay, and relates a story about his own son.
We conclude the book with a visit to Jack at the Remand Center (prison) in Edmonton. We get Jack to tell his story here, which is a culmination/accumulation of this chorus of life.
I find this writing so captivating to read. I am constantly googling things on my computer too, to better understand all the reference that keep coming up. I like that. It makes me think! We receive great social commentary via beautifully strung together language that drips everywhere with extra meanings.
Solid 5 for me.
January 26, 2024
"Writing is a fundamentally social act. I write because I've read and been moved into a position of wonder. I write because I've loved and been loved. I want to find out what 'we' or 'us' I can walk into or build a roof over. To hold hands with others, really. To be less alone."
Every sentence of this novel is so beautiful and meaningful. A Minor Chorus is about a queer Indigenous student who decides to pause his phd program to write a novel about his reservation and community. We go through a few conversations/interviews with people he revisits from childhood and encounters during his travels.
Most of the time I did love the poetic language, but sometimes I just wanted a break. It felt like the author overcomplicated some things that could have been just as or more meaningful if they were simplified. The same is true of a lot of the dialogue - it was very poignant and flowery, which did not seem realistic for some of the characters.
Read this if you love poets turned novelists, if you love to write, if you want to feel more connected to your community!
Every sentence of this novel is so beautiful and meaningful. A Minor Chorus is about a queer Indigenous student who decides to pause his phd program to write a novel about his reservation and community. We go through a few conversations/interviews with people he revisits from childhood and encounters during his travels.
Most of the time I did love the poetic language, but sometimes I just wanted a break. It felt like the author overcomplicated some things that could have been just as or more meaningful if they were simplified. The same is true of a lot of the dialogue - it was very poignant and flowery, which did not seem realistic for some of the characters.
Read this if you love poets turned novelists, if you love to write, if you want to feel more connected to your community!
February 4, 2023
Beautiful prose and a very well crafted and uniquely written novel. It feels so much like a memoir as you read it. It reflects on the prisons of which we live; those that we impose on ourselves, and those that which people cannot escape because of deeply imbedded racism and prejudice. At times, the story fell flat and redundant. I wanted and wished for more from its narrator, and found myself in a plateau of interest throughout. In the last quarter of the book, it began to get very interesting. It was up and down in this way throughout, but the last fourth was the strongest. I would give this a 3.6-3.8/5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️
May 23, 2023
Belcourt’s prose cut so deep they break your heart beautifully. He writes with an urgency that compels you to dig within yourself alongside the unnamed narrator.
‘A Minor Chorus’ explores indigenous survival, love, loss, and collective consciousness all while grappling with the problem of narrative form in academia.
I highly recommend this short autofiction/literary fiction to those who enjoyed:
Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin
In The Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado
Outline by Rachel Cusk
‘A Minor Chorus’ explores indigenous survival, love, loss, and collective consciousness all while grappling with the problem of narrative form in academia.
I highly recommend this short autofiction/literary fiction to those who enjoyed:
Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin
In The Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado
Outline by Rachel Cusk
June 18, 2022
write poems, eat ass, & dismantle private property
Like a post-sex convo w your MA hookup, where he's probing his emotional foundations through the oxytocin haze and his cum dries on your chest.
BRB undertakes the act of novel-writing in a way that only he can — exchanging traditional narrative frameworks with a self-reflexive investigation on the "we" behind community storytelling and the soul that feeds it, while always considering its influence on the narrative of his intimate life.
They were boys who knew only how to fail at boyhood … It was like an ethnographic spectacle.
Every other sentence in every BRB book I own is underlined lmao
Like a post-sex convo w your MA hookup, where he's probing his emotional foundations through the oxytocin haze and his cum dries on your chest.
BRB undertakes the act of novel-writing in a way that only he can — exchanging traditional narrative frameworks with a self-reflexive investigation on the "we" behind community storytelling and the soul that feeds it, while always considering its influence on the narrative of his intimate life.
They were boys who knew only how to fail at boyhood … It was like an ethnographic spectacle.
Every other sentence in every BRB book I own is underlined lmao
February 13, 2023
I must be honest and say that this book was too literary for me, and that's on me, not the book. There were individual moments and lines that made me sit up and reach for a pen to underline, but the overall framing/voice of the book didn't work for me. However, if you are currently or have ever considered dropping out of a PhD program, returning to your small home town, and trying to process your entire community's grief and joy in one 150 page book, this one might just the read for you!
March 2, 2023
I read 25% of A Minor Chorus and set it aside because it didn't engage me. But there was something else about it that was needling me so I tried again. Still the prose felt stiff and not what I expected from a celebrated poet. The story seemed to view the world through the lens of queer and indigenous persons only and the lack of connection with the broader culture seemed limiting. You cannot help it if others stereotype you but the greatest damage comes from putting yourself in the box and then engaging in one giant pity party.
Often as I was reading I felt scolded, the same way I feel when someone heaves the blame for slavery onto later generations. I realized that I wasn't highlighting sentences I found beautiful but those I found offensive and it seemed to me that what posed as psychological insight at times bordered on personal delusion. On the positive side, it certainly provoked an emotional response from me and I spent considerable time trying to process where it was coming from. Maybe that was the point?
So, A Minor Chorus obviously didn't work for me but most readers think it is brilliant and that's fine.
I received a drc from the publisher via Netgalley.
Often as I was reading I felt scolded, the same way I feel when someone heaves the blame for slavery onto later generations. I realized that I wasn't highlighting sentences I found beautiful but those I found offensive and it seemed to me that what posed as psychological insight at times bordered on personal delusion. On the positive side, it certainly provoked an emotional response from me and I spent considerable time trying to process where it was coming from. Maybe that was the point?
So, A Minor Chorus obviously didn't work for me but most readers think it is brilliant and that's fine.
I received a drc from the publisher via Netgalley.
October 24, 2022
2.5
في كتاب قرأته مرة عن الكتابة تحذير من استخدام شيء اسمه ال moralization على ما أذكر، وهو مما فهمت استعطاف القراء بزيادة. لكن يبدو أن الأمر صعب تجنبه في الكتابة، أراه يتكرر مرة بعد مرة في الروايات، خاصة عند الحديث عن العنصرية في الروايات الأجنبية
هذا مع الأسف يأتي للكاتب بنتيجة عكسية، أكون معه وأؤيده ثم أمتعض حين يبدأ بالنواح
هذا أول وأوضح خطأ في هذه الرواية، والثاني هو الحوارات الرهيبة، يسأل البطل شخصا سؤالا ما بسيطا فيجيب الآخر ويا سبحان الله بكل ما أراد الأول أن يعرفه وبنفس أسلوب البطل في الكلام
هذه الأخطاء التي استطاع عقلي المتواضع التقاطها، أما الفلسفة والرواية مليئة بها، عن طبيعة الكتابة مثلا، فلم أستسغها
الرواية يوجد الكثير منها هذه الأيام، ليست مميزة في شيء إلا الناس الموجودين فيها، ال cree، جماعة سكان أصليين في كندا (هنود على رأي القاموس) يعانون من العنصرية
في كتاب قرأته مرة عن الكتابة تحذير من استخدام شيء اسمه ال moralization على ما أذكر، وهو مما فهمت استعطاف القراء بزيادة. لكن يبدو أن الأمر صعب تجنبه في الكتابة، أراه يتكرر مرة بعد مرة في الروايات، خاصة عند الحديث عن العنصرية في الروايات الأجنبية
هذا مع الأسف يأتي للكاتب بنتيجة عكسية، أكون معه وأؤيده ثم أمتعض حين يبدأ بالنواح
هذا أول وأوضح خطأ في هذه الرواية، والثاني هو الحوارات الرهيبة، يسأل البطل شخصا سؤالا ما بسيطا فيجيب الآخر ويا سبحان الله بكل ما أراد الأول أن يعرفه وبنفس أسلوب البطل في الكلام
هذه الأخطاء التي استطاع عقلي المتواضع التقاطها، أما الفلسفة والرواية مليئة بها، عن طبيعة الكتابة مثلا، فلم أستسغها
الرواية يوجد الكثير منها هذه الأيام، ليست مميزة في شيء إلا الناس الموجودين فيها، ال cree، جماعة سكان أصليين في كندا (هنود على رأي القاموس) يعانون من العنصرية
November 18, 2022
I wanted to like this book! I liked the idea of the book but the actual book was definitely not for me! I like my stories to be that: stories. Call me old fashioned and boring, that is fine. For me, this was not a story. It was an experimental piece of art painted with overblown words that felt like they were put on airs, narration interruption, couldn't decide if it wanted to be a novel or a memoir, and detailed sex. Please! I am not a prude but I don't want to read details about character's sexual antics, hetero, homo, or whatever. If I wanted that I would read erotica and not have to put up with a book that didn't use quotation marks (another pet peeve of mine). For the first time in a long time I debated DNFing a book. But at 176 pages I felt I could struggle through it if only for insight into the First Nations people. I am not sure I even got that.
June 24, 2023
Struggled with this one, but it came together beautifully at the end. I liked the narrator best when he was telling other people’s stories. When he was reflecting on his own life it felt like he was trying too hard to be poetic & deep.
December 30, 2022
The Publisher Says: A debut novel from a rising literary star that brings the modern queer and Indigenous experience into sharp relief.
In the stark expanse of Northern Alberta, a queer Indigenous doctoral student steps away from his dissertation to write a novel, informed by a series of poignant encounters: a heart-to-heart with fellow doctoral student River over the mounting pressure placed on marginalized scholars; a meeting with Michael, a closeted man from his hometown whose vulnerability and loneliness punctuate the realities of queer life on the fringe. Woven throughout these conversations are memories of Jack, a cousin caught in the cycle of police violence, drugs, and survival. Jack’s life parallels the narrator’s own; the possibilities of escape and imprisonment are left to chance with colonialism stacking the odds. A Minor Chorus introduces a dazzling new literary voice whose vision and fearlessness shine much-needed light on the realities of Indigenous survival.
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
My Review: When one reads the book description, there's very little doubt that most of us will be reading this as autofiction...as Billy-Ray Belcourt using the antique roman à clef to give us the keys to the kingdom. But that's never said anywhere. It's not part of the interviews I've read or listened to. I think, in fact, that's a quiet and much-thought-over means of demonstrating how identities are forced on us. Are forced by us, the readers of a novel, onto the author of the novel.
Indigeniety is an indignity of an identity. "Indigenous" is a label of Otherness, much as is "Queer" or "Gay" or "Two-Spirit." Labels are the source of stories, though, and the world's words were invented to make stories so us gossipy apes could make Othering a thing. Assigned by others, Othering is a burden many of us bear and many of us bear multiple ways. We aren't, as it unfolds, allowed much in the way of access to the main character's self-ness; he's collecting data, having copious amounts of sex, and eliciting intimacy from people still carrying horrible scars from being abandoned as children, being addicted to substances, being belittled and having their characters besmirched for queerness or Indigeniety. Or both. No one in this mill-race of ideas and images is in sharp focus. It's that fact that ate a star off my rating...if I have only misty-edged portraits to look at instead of vibrant, violent even, alive people, I respond without the visceral burst of passion I seek in novel-reading as I read their stories.
Author Belcourt being a tyro novelist, and his profession being a poet, this is completely understandable as a technique. It felt chosen, selected for its effect, not as though he simply didn't know how to do any different. That's why that fourth star is still there. I'm forgiving of first-novel mistakes or overreaches but I note them and grade my responses accordingly. I did not get that "oops" sensation from these memory-speaking characters, despite the fact that I wanted to know more about them. More was not to be offered. That is, as I realized, part of the point: What the reader wants is what the colonial master wants, more! more! always more! where Author Belcourt isn't offering it.
There is, then, a subtlety of reflection in this examination of the gulfs between striving and surviving; between surviving and thriving. The novel's structure and style are offers of mirror time. See what this world's demands cost? The price that some must pay while most will never even realize it's exacted on their behalf?
It's a delight of a read. It speaks its truth honestly and makes its voice honey-sweet.
But it is here to tear the tape off your eyes and yank the sock from your mouth.
In the stark expanse of Northern Alberta, a queer Indigenous doctoral student steps away from his dissertation to write a novel, informed by a series of poignant encounters: a heart-to-heart with fellow doctoral student River over the mounting pressure placed on marginalized scholars; a meeting with Michael, a closeted man from his hometown whose vulnerability and loneliness punctuate the realities of queer life on the fringe. Woven throughout these conversations are memories of Jack, a cousin caught in the cycle of police violence, drugs, and survival. Jack’s life parallels the narrator’s own; the possibilities of escape and imprisonment are left to chance with colonialism stacking the odds. A Minor Chorus introduces a dazzling new literary voice whose vision and fearlessness shine much-needed light on the realities of Indigenous survival.
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
My Review: When one reads the book description, there's very little doubt that most of us will be reading this as autofiction...as Billy-Ray Belcourt using the antique roman à clef to give us the keys to the kingdom. But that's never said anywhere. It's not part of the interviews I've read or listened to. I think, in fact, that's a quiet and much-thought-over means of demonstrating how identities are forced on us. Are forced by us, the readers of a novel, onto the author of the novel.
Indigeniety is an indignity of an identity. "Indigenous" is a label of Otherness, much as is "Queer" or "Gay" or "Two-Spirit." Labels are the source of stories, though, and the world's words were invented to make stories so us gossipy apes could make Othering a thing. Assigned by others, Othering is a burden many of us bear and many of us bear multiple ways. We aren't, as it unfolds, allowed much in the way of access to the main character's self-ness; he's collecting data, having copious amounts of sex, and eliciting intimacy from people still carrying horrible scars from being abandoned as children, being addicted to substances, being belittled and having their characters besmirched for queerness or Indigeniety. Or both. No one in this mill-race of ideas and images is in sharp focus. It's that fact that ate a star off my rating...if I have only misty-edged portraits to look at instead of vibrant, violent even, alive people, I respond without the visceral burst of passion I seek in novel-reading as I read their stories.
Author Belcourt being a tyro novelist, and his profession being a poet, this is completely understandable as a technique. It felt chosen, selected for its effect, not as though he simply didn't know how to do any different. That's why that fourth star is still there. I'm forgiving of first-novel mistakes or overreaches but I note them and grade my responses accordingly. I did not get that "oops" sensation from these memory-speaking characters, despite the fact that I wanted to know more about them. More was not to be offered. That is, as I realized, part of the point: What the reader wants is what the colonial master wants, more! more! always more! where Author Belcourt isn't offering it.
There is, then, a subtlety of reflection in this examination of the gulfs between striving and surviving; between surviving and thriving. The novel's structure and style are offers of mirror time. See what this world's demands cost? The price that some must pay while most will never even realize it's exacted on their behalf?
It's a delight of a read. It speaks its truth honestly and makes its voice honey-sweet.
But it is here to tear the tape off your eyes and yank the sock from your mouth.
October 4, 2022
Full-disclosure: Billy-Ray Belcourt is my favorite poet. His writing is elegant and forthright with a resonant voice that is beautifully his own while brilliantly harmonizing with the chorus of voices and experiences that made him. In his first novel, he sifts through the layers of his own identity to unearth deep-rooted ties that both bind and free him. As an Indigenous Queer Canadian, he is multi-marginalized and yet he has been able to accomplish so much at only 23 years of age. With A Minor Chorus, Belcourt is addressing his own dichotomies and contradictions through a plotless meditation into autofiction that is effortlessly stunning and intellectually curious. He seems to be grappling with his own position as a poet, scholar and author while also belonging so intrinsically to communities that are largely blocked out of those worlds. How can he remain authentic to who he is when the vast majority of those who he represents are still oppressed and neglected?
There is no surprise in finding Belcourt's prose in this novel is absolutely breathtaking and his explorations into theory and social dynamics are razor sharp in their incisiveness. What did take me off-guard, however, was how different this novel is from his previous work. Contrasting with his poetry and essays, A Minor Chorus is bracingly vulnerable and tender with an almost self-conscious lens that was emotionally unguarded and genuinely self-effacing. He openly interrogates his own talent and success in the literary landscape while considering the desecration of the land and people that he belongs to. Through an unnamed narrator, Belcourt struggles to find the purpose and importance in writing a novel when there is so much that the form may be unable to contain or reconcile. How can he best utilize the gifts that he has been given while still acknowledging and honoring those that those gifts are not attributed to? Is he leaving them (and ultimately himself) behind by participating in a world of gate-keeping, capitalism and colonialism? All of these questions are fascinating and devastatingly real. In aiming his insightful intelligence squarely at himself, Belcourt still somehow manages to force us all to consider ourselves and our own culpability in the process.
Though the characters are kept in a soft focus that never fully solidifies and the story itself is loose and languid, the author's glorious way with words and his layered approach to language allow the overall effect of the novel to be a moving and memorable journey through existential thought and generational trauma. Belcourt has truly crafted a deeply introspective testament to his People. A Minor Chorus might actually be more of a subversively radical document that is just subtle and beautiful enough to convince you that it's a novel.
There is no surprise in finding Belcourt's prose in this novel is absolutely breathtaking and his explorations into theory and social dynamics are razor sharp in their incisiveness. What did take me off-guard, however, was how different this novel is from his previous work. Contrasting with his poetry and essays, A Minor Chorus is bracingly vulnerable and tender with an almost self-conscious lens that was emotionally unguarded and genuinely self-effacing. He openly interrogates his own talent and success in the literary landscape while considering the desecration of the land and people that he belongs to. Through an unnamed narrator, Belcourt struggles to find the purpose and importance in writing a novel when there is so much that the form may be unable to contain or reconcile. How can he best utilize the gifts that he has been given while still acknowledging and honoring those that those gifts are not attributed to? Is he leaving them (and ultimately himself) behind by participating in a world of gate-keeping, capitalism and colonialism? All of these questions are fascinating and devastatingly real. In aiming his insightful intelligence squarely at himself, Belcourt still somehow manages to force us all to consider ourselves and our own culpability in the process.
Though the characters are kept in a soft focus that never fully solidifies and the story itself is loose and languid, the author's glorious way with words and his layered approach to language allow the overall effect of the novel to be a moving and memorable journey through existential thought and generational trauma. Belcourt has truly crafted a deeply introspective testament to his People. A Minor Chorus might actually be more of a subversively radical document that is just subtle and beautiful enough to convince you that it's a novel.
January 19, 2024
4.5
BEAUTIFUL
BEAUTIFUL
March 18, 2023
Not a novel in the conventional sense.
More a collection of shared memories broken down and refashioned into a fluid flow reminiscent of the beat era. Billy-Ray's introspection into every day moments is both sad and hopeful.
I highly enjoyed this and found myself grabbing quotes all over the place.
Favourite quote:
"It is the duty of all of us, I thought, to rebel against the beautification of violence."
Much love to Penguin Random House Canada & Goodreads for my giveaway win!
More a collection of shared memories broken down and refashioned into a fluid flow reminiscent of the beat era. Billy-Ray's introspection into every day moments is both sad and hopeful.
I highly enjoyed this and found myself grabbing quotes all over the place.
Favourite quote:
"It is the duty of all of us, I thought, to rebel against the beautification of violence."
Much love to Penguin Random House Canada & Goodreads for my giveaway win!
January 18, 2023
3,5
I admire authors who own a large gearbox of metaphores and poetry, yet write christal clear sentences. I admire authors who write close at heart and very personal, yet create something universally approachable. He is both.
On the other hand, for the time being I'm done with novels about the difficult process of writing a novel which at the end -surprise!- turns out to be the actual novel
I admire authors who own a large gearbox of metaphores and poetry, yet write christal clear sentences. I admire authors who write close at heart and very personal, yet create something universally approachable. He is both.
On the other hand, for the time being I'm done with novels about the difficult process of writing a novel which at the end -surprise!- turns out to be the actual novel
October 6, 2022
📚 Hello Book Friends! After reading A MINOR CHORUS by Billy-Ray Belcourt, I am an emotional wreck. The prose… the poetic voice… the raw emotions. I am bombarded with thoughts and feelings all at once. I would have not picked up this book if I had seen it on a bookshelf in my favourite bookstore. The cover is understated. I should have known that the threaded openings on the cover picture were an invitation to discover beauty. This beautiful story about a queer Indigenous doctoral student who steps away from his dissertation to write a novel will move you. A must read!
#bookstadog #poodles #poodlestagram #poodlesofinstagram #furbabies #dogsofinstagram #bookstagram #dogsandbooks #bookishlife #bookishlove #bookstagrammer #booklover #bookish #bookaholic #reading #readersofinstagram #instaread #ilovebooks #bookishcanadians #canadianbookstagram #bookreviewer #bookcommunity #bibliophile #aminorchorus #billyraybelcourt #dartfroggco #penguincanada #hamishhamilton #penguinrandomca #bookreview
January 27, 2023
If this is my new standard for 5 star reads, then I’d have to lower a bunch of my previous ratings. I didn’t wanted this book to ever end; I really tried to savor it, knowing it would be the first of many times I read it. My pen was almost never capped when I was reading this book. I had to stop myself from annotating to the point of treating the pages like a journal. There’s a lot of sentimental reflection I could write about this book, but I want to keep that contained within my experience reading it. This book felt radically personal, at times almost unbelievably so. I’ll be reading everything Belcourt writes.
———————————————————————————
“My voice shook as the words leapt from my mouth. I imagined I'd have to sweep them up later. If this were the case, I continued to imagine, what if anything would a twenty-something find important enough to say to warrant making a mess?”
“This was because sometimes it felt like yesterday was still ahead of him. It was as if someone had taken a Polaroid of him before he was an autonomous being, but it was taking years and years to develop. Not enough light had hit the surface, so he lived like negative space. By the time he caught a peek of himself, he had already faded.”
“I needed to insist on a form of gender that wasn't a natural disaster but rather a sprawling field where nothing was a coffin someone could fall into.”
———————————————————————————
“My voice shook as the words leapt from my mouth. I imagined I'd have to sweep them up later. If this were the case, I continued to imagine, what if anything would a twenty-something find important enough to say to warrant making a mess?”
“This was because sometimes it felt like yesterday was still ahead of him. It was as if someone had taken a Polaroid of him before he was an autonomous being, but it was taking years and years to develop. Not enough light had hit the surface, so he lived like negative space. By the time he caught a peek of himself, he had already faded.”
“I needed to insist on a form of gender that wasn't a natural disaster but rather a sprawling field where nothing was a coffin someone could fall into.”
Shelved as 'abandoned-dnf'
June 22, 2023DNF'd @ 20% - What is this? The first 20% (or more—it may have continued this way until the very end) was a disgruntled grad student trying to decide if he should take a break and write a novel, or not. To be honest, it reads not at all like a novel, but like an essay—a kind of existential commentary on Indigenous gay life. And there's nothing wrong with that, except I was hoping to read a novel.😕
December 7, 2023
READING VLOG
Less of a novel and more of a masturbatory love letter to fiction and the novel. What 𝘓𝘢 𝘓𝘢 𝘓𝘢𝘯𝘥 or 𝘉𝘪𝘳𝘥𝘮𝘢𝘯 is to cinema, this narrates the very struggle of beginning fiction.
With references from Cusk, Lispector, Ocean Vuong, and Chee, we get explorations into the why's in which we go into the practice of writing, finding out where it comes from.
Ahh but yes, this is every MFA student's dream, to pass this off as novel and really just write about writing.
Though the prose gets carried away at times, Belcourt is a voice that is doing incredibly important work for the unsung.
*I wish I had this in my undergrad, when I was still exploring voice and trying to understand where I fit into the world. But I'm a wonky cardboard crumble to a 1000-piece 𝘐 𝘚𝘱𝘺 puzzle set. There are questions and thoughts here that remind me of a lesson I learned somewhere in a 300 or 400 course. When asked about writing about a painful experience, I was asked 𝘞𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦? 𝘞𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘪𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘢𝘪𝘯 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮? 𝘍𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘪𝘯𝘴𝘪𝘥𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘣𝘰𝘥𝘺, 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦? And it's through this text do you see, operationally, where it hurts. From the queerness. From being a minority. For every kid who feels less-than in this world who submits themselves to the writer's path, this is an incredibly important text. Perhaps that's why the first part of this review may feel a bit better. Because Belcourt has gotten away with creating something like this and I haven't. Is there any space for me? At this age?
Well, if not for me, then for the future.
There is still hope for you. To any young writer out there, you will find your voice <3
*Please consider ordering the book through the link here which carries these words forward into all the book coverage I do!
Less of a novel and more of a masturbatory love letter to fiction and the novel. What 𝘓𝘢 𝘓𝘢 𝘓𝘢𝘯𝘥 or 𝘉𝘪𝘳𝘥𝘮𝘢𝘯 is to cinema, this narrates the very struggle of beginning fiction.
With references from Cusk, Lispector, Ocean Vuong, and Chee, we get explorations into the why's in which we go into the practice of writing, finding out where it comes from.
Ahh but yes, this is every MFA student's dream, to pass this off as novel and really just write about writing.
Though the prose gets carried away at times, Belcourt is a voice that is doing incredibly important work for the unsung.
*I wish I had this in my undergrad, when I was still exploring voice and trying to understand where I fit into the world. But I'm a wonky cardboard crumble to a 1000-piece 𝘐 𝘚𝘱𝘺 puzzle set. There are questions and thoughts here that remind me of a lesson I learned somewhere in a 300 or 400 course. When asked about writing about a painful experience, I was asked 𝘞𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦? 𝘞𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘪𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘢𝘪𝘯 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮? 𝘍𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘪𝘯𝘴𝘪𝘥𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘣𝘰𝘥𝘺, 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦? And it's through this text do you see, operationally, where it hurts. From the queerness. From being a minority. For every kid who feels less-than in this world who submits themselves to the writer's path, this is an incredibly important text. Perhaps that's why the first part of this review may feel a bit better. Because Belcourt has gotten away with creating something like this and I haven't. Is there any space for me? At this age?
Well, if not for me, then for the future.
There is still hope for you. To any young writer out there, you will find your voice <3
*Please consider ordering the book through the link here which carries these words forward into all the book coverage I do!
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