Product Description

Lynn Coady's Strange Heaven burst on the literary scene in 1998. Fresh, raw and utterly original it shot onto the best seller lists across the Canada and drew critical praise for its author. The book is now available in a new GLE Library Edition. Bridget Murphy, almost eighteen, has come to Halifax from industrial Cape Breton, had her baby, and given it up for adoption. Transferred to the psych ward of the children's hospital, she's incarcerated with five seriously disturbed teenagers and a flock of wan children.

At Christmas, Bridget is sprung from the hospital by her Uncle Albert. They return to her small Cape Breton home town joining family and friends that make the psych ward inhabitants look like the poster children for mental health. Bridget's grandmother raves and prays from her bed, her father communicates in bellows punctuated by profanity and her mentally disabled Uncle Rollie spends his time making religious folk art to sell to tourists. Add to the mix her boozy friends and pesty ex-boyfriend and Bridget begins to realize that she has entered a place crazier than the one she left.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1907485 in Books
• Published on: 2000-10-15
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 198 pages

Review
"A stellar first novel . . . both nightmarish and laugh-out-loud funny." -- - Quill & Quire

"Both hilarious and heart-breaking, and one of the most astonishing fictional debuts I have read . . . authentic and unforgettable." -- - The Globe and Mail

"Unforgettable . . . her work is among the most noteworthy in the country." -- - The National Post

From the Publisher
Winner, 1998 Canadian Authors' Association Air Canada Award for the most promising writer under 30,

Winner, 1999 Atlantic Booksellers' Choice Award, and 1999 Dartmouth Book Award

Finalist, 1998 Governor General's Award for Fiction, and 1998 Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award

One of the top 100 books of 1998 - The Globe and Mail

One of the top ten books of 1998 - The Vancouver Sun, The New Brunswick Reader

About the Author
Lynn Coady grew up in Port Hawkesbury, an industrial town on Cape Breton Island. By the time she got her BA from Carleton University she knew she wanted to be a writer. After living for a year on a farm in Malagash, Nova Scotia, she spent a year each in Saint John, Sackville, and Fredericton, New Brunswick, working when she could.

While in Fredericton, Lynn wrote her first play, Cowboy Names, and most of Strange Heaven. In 1996, she moved to Vancouver to study creative writing at the University of British Columbia. Her thesis work, a play entitled Monster, was a finalist in 1996 Theatre BC's National Playwrighting Competition and premiered at the 1998 Kelowna Fringe Festival.

Lynn has published stories in Other Voices, Free Magazine, The Antigonish Review, and The Fiddlehead. She was the winner of the 1998 Canadian Authors' Association Award for the most promising writer in Canada under 30 years of age. Strange Heaven won the Dartmouth Book Award and the 1999 Atlantic Booksellers' Choice Award. In 1998 it was also nominated for the Governor General's Award for Fiction and the Thomas Raddall Fiction Prize. Her short story collection Play the Monster Blind was released in 2000.

Customer Reviews

Beautiful Chaos
A great read--Lynn Coady's text is rich and scattered with many humorous moments. The characters are fascinating and awful at the same time. This text deploys a 'strategic regionalism', that is, it challenges essentialist notions of Atlantic Canada; The people you encounter in this story are not your 'jolly, complacent folk' but are confused, often psychotic but nonetheless lovable characters. Coady speaks not only to the monotony of adolescent lives--Bridget and her 'friends' search for some kind of meaning through self-discovery--but also to feminist and religious politics. Ideals of Catholicism are subverted in this book, as are notions of the innocent virginal woman. Female characters in this book experience their bodies as a locus of betrayal.

No Mistake
You are making no mistake if you read this book. Lynn Coady has a cutting sense of humour that will make you laugh and wonder if you should be. Her portrait of a tourmented young girl is both accurate and saddening.