There’s something wonderful about a novel that succeeds in defining itself from the first sentence while also drawing you in, like this one from Samantha Harvey’s recent Booker Prize winner, Orbital (2024):

Rotating about the earth in their spacecraft they are so together, and so alone, that even their thoughts, their internal mythologies, at times convene.

It’s not just the confidence, though that is rare; rather, we might call it clarity of purpose, for lack of better phrasing, and at risk of running on.

As far as the state of the realm goes, enjoy this gentle primer on parliamentary prorogation from the Ottawa Citizen, Stephen Maher’s meditation on the outgoing prime minister from the Toronto Star, and Evan Dyer’s sharp CBC article about the ruling party’s “fuzzy” grasp of the threat of foreign interference on the forthcoming leadership race.