b"FIELDS OF LIGHT AND STONE GOOD CITIZENS NEED NOT FEARBy Angeline SchellenbergBy Maria RevaUniversity of Alberta Press 2020 Knopf Canada 2020ANGELINE SCHELLENBERG is a poet and MARIA REVA writes fiction and opera libretti. Marias micro-fiction writer in Treaty 1 territory (Winnipeg).writing has appeared in The Atlantic, McSweeneys, The Wall Her collection about raising children on the autismStreet Journal, Granta, and The Best American Short Stories. spectrum, Tell Them It Was Mozart (Brick Books,She won a National Magazine Award in 2019 and was a 2016), won three Manitoba Book Awards and was afinalist for the Writers Trust of Canada 2020 Fiction Prize.finalist for a ReLit Award for Poetry. Her chapbooksHer current musical collaborations include an opera are Roads of Stone (The Alfred Gustav Press), Dentedwith composer Anna Pidgorna (developed by Musique 3 Tubas (Kalamalka Press), Blue Moon, Red HerringFemmes in Montreal), as well as a song cycle with Shelley (JackPine Press), and Irises (Dancing Girl Press). Marwood. Past collaborations include an opera libretto for The Pushcart nominee has performed her poetryERATO Ensemble, texts for Vancouver International Song from Victoria to Halifax, including in Riding Mountain National Park asInstitutes Art Song Lab, and a script for City Opera Vancouver. Deep Bay artist-in-residence. With a love for encouraging fellow writers, Angeline hosts Speaking Crow, Winnipegs longest-running poetry open mic.Maria was born in Ukraine and grew up in New Westminster, British Columbia. She Having earned a Master of Arts in Biblical Studies, she is currently trainingreceived her MFA from the Michener Center for Writers at the University of Texas.as a spiritual director. An amateur photographer and potter, Angeline lives with her husband, two children, and rescue dogs. Fields of Light and StoneGOOD CITIZENS NEED NOT FEAR has (University of Alberta Press, 2020) is her latest book.a cast of unforgettable characterscitizens of the small industrial town of Kirovkathat FIELDS OF LIGHT AND STONE explores thepopulate Maria Reva's ingeniously entwined influence on the authors life of her Mennonitetales that span the chaotic years leading up grandparents. Her elegiac love letter to themto and immediately following the fall of the articulates her grief against the backdrop of theirSoviet Union in 1989. Weaving the strands involuntary emigration from Ukraine and Russia.of the narrative together is an unforgettable, She artfully captures the immigrant identitychameleon-like young woman named Zaya: vital to Canadian culture in poems that drawan orphan turned beauty-pageant crasher who on events both personal and global: war andsurvives the extraordinary circumstances of her famine, dementia and cancer, hidden sacrificechildhood through a compelling combination and secrets. Her poems captivate with themesof ferocity, intelligence, stubbornness, and wit.of ancestry, memory, resilience, and forgiveness. Fields of Light and Stone is a reflection on how family history shapes and moves us.A fascinating book, brutal, hilarious and completely bonkers. It embraces the grotesque and the absurd A good narrative flow makes for a very accessible andin a way which is reflective of a sensibility and dark well-crafted title in a beautiful package. A fantastichumor particular to post-Soviet nations.book of poetry which could be nominated for many KOBZAR Book Award Jury other awards.KOBZAR Book Award"