Description:
Isabel, raised in a family of post-war Jewish immigrants in Canada, embarks on a journey to find love, purpose and home, navigating between Montreal and Jerusalem. In Here Is Still Here, Sivan Slapak explores human connection and identity with compassion and wit, reminding us that no matter how far you go, you remain yourself.
Brief description:
Sivan Slapak lived in Jerusalem for twenty years before returning to Canada in 2013. Since then, her short fiction and essays have been published by The New Quarterly, Montreal Serai, and carte blanche and in collections published by Véhicule Press and Guernica Editions. She was selected as a finalist for the CBC Quebec Writing Competition, won the Peter Hinchcliffe Fiction Award once and was shortlisted twice. She lives in Montreal, where she works in the arts and culture sector. HERE IS STILL HERE is her first book.
Review Quotes:
"An exquisite foray into place, memory and Jewish identity. At once intimate and grand, Here Is Still Here is the type of book that soon feels like a friend? --Mireille Silcoff, author of Chez L'arabe
"[These stories] speak to the delicate balance of anyone straddling (at least) two cultures, (at least) two languages, (at least) two ideas of "home," and (at the very least) overlapping and intersecting particulars, details, and truths that make individuals both individual and part of a community." --QWF Awards Jury
"Slapak's prose is pensive and resonating, touching on truths about aging, family, friendship, and what makes a life, offering these to us through Isabel's lens of traumatic history, self-doubt, and hope." --Montreal Review of Books
?There is a simmering quality to Slapak's work--issues percolating but not resolved. Emotions mentioned but not overly analysed, so their power is not dampened. One senses from Here is Still Here that life is a continuous search?for identity, love, belonging. One that has not ended.? --Ottawa Review of Books
?A collection of sure-footed short stories? --Montreal Guardian