Robinson Davies has got to be both for me – wonderful humor and turn of phrase, but damn, he can be tedious.
I have to confess my disappointment at seeing the Deptford Trilogy mentioned so often, because that’s what I came here to post, and it leaves me with the impression that it might be Davies’ best work (I haven’t gotten around to reading any other, but have read Deptford twice).
*Alias Grace *would also be high on my list.
If I have to pick a worst, can I just say “Alice Munro” and leave it at that?
I love, love, love Guy Gavriel Kay and Paul Quarrington. I would have a heck of a time picking a favorite from either author.
I’m also not sure I could pick a least favorite, either. Findlay’s Not Wanted on the Voyage was meh, but I wouldn’t have remembered that had it not been mentioned already. And I find Atwoood preachy.
Wow - I have read surprisingly little Canadian literature, it seems. And here I thought I was well-read! I’ll have to remedy that!
I’ll say that I do enjoy Guy Gavriel Kay, and feel that Under Heaven is among the best books I’ve ever read.
One of the most disturbing for me was actually one written by an acquaintance…the story is very good, but I worry about how much of it is made up and how much of it is actually based on her life growing up. I’m not that close to her, so I can never ask, but damn. The book is Lullabies for Little Criminals by Heather O’Neill.
I don’t read a great deal of fiction any more, but I have recently taken a liking to the French-language novels of Patrick Senécal from Quebec. He writes horror, fantasy, and thrillers, and has been compared to Stephen King. I doubt they will be mistaken for great literature, but I can’t think of many novelists I more enjoy reading. His books kill two birds with one stone for me, because I like the stories and they help me improve my comprehension of written French. I’ve tried other French-language writers but I didn’t like any of them near as much. Sur le Seuil was good but a little too violent toward the end. I preferred Les sept jours du talion, which was also violent but less gratuitously so. Unfortunately his books are hard to find in the States and shipping costs from Canada or France are a bit steep.
I am reading No Great Mischief and it seems pretty good…I did not like Stone Angel. I am friends with Susie Moloney, but don’t know if she counts since her books are not all set in Canada
Ha! Watch the film if you wanna see a little too violent toward the end. It’s actually a very bad film.
It’s a bit sad to see the same names cropping up. I love Davies and Atwood, but jeez, people. Here are some of my other favorites:
The Time In Between, David Bergen. Takes place half in the BC interior, half in Vietnam.
Solomon Gursky Was Here, Mordecai Richler. From time to time, this is my choice for Great Canadian Novel.
River Thieves, Michael Crummey. Historical novel set in Newfoundland. Fascinating.
Nine Planets, Edward Riche. Great novel set in Newfoundland. Although not a comic novel, some hysterically funny passages.
Spanish Fly, Will Ferguson. Forget all his silly stuff about Canadians. This was a fun novel about Depression-era con men.
The Healer, Greg Hollingshead. Another one that isn’t a comic novel, but has some of the most awe-inspiring and laugh-inducing passages in Canadian lit.
Headhunter, Timothy Findley. Perhaps the wildest (and often most unappealing) mainstream novel in Can lit.
Icefields, Thomas Wharton. Love the ice and cold and the mountains.
Platinum Blues, William Deverell. Any Deverall novel is a hoot. Better than Grisham, in my opinion. I believe he’s Canadian, in any case.
I love that book.
Lets see, other Canadian favorites are:
A Fine Balance, by Rohinton Mistry
A Complicated Kindness, by Miriam Toews
The Book of Negroes, by Lawrence Hill
The Birth House by Ami McKay
As for least favorites, I have never been a fan of the Anne of Green Gables series, and I am currently reading Come, Thou Tortoise by Jessica Grant. Well lets say I am struggling to read it for my book club.
I have to put another plug in for Spider Robinson. (He was born American, but he married a Canadian and lives in BC so he counts in my book) I actually had a small spiritual awakening from his book Lifehouse, which is pretty amazing given I was a hardcore atheist. I like his other stuff too, but that one book is probably one of the ones that’s changed my life the most. It’s the only book I own two copies of so I can loan one out.
“Fifth Business,” by Robertson Davies.
For leasy favourite, “the Stone Angels” is a pretty good candidate. There was another depressing one about an immigrant who lives in the sticks and kills his horrible wife and later married another woman who’s just as miserable as he is but I cannot recall the title.
I wrote a kick-ass essay on “Who Has Seen The Wind” back in grade 9 that was made all the more impressive by virtue of the fact that I had only read the first 60 pages. Therefore, I will call that my favourite, although pretty well anything by Stephen Leacock would have to rate in that ballpark as well. 
I remember being irritated by Atwood’s “The Edible Woman” while reading it, but it may have been because I was being forced to read it as part of my first-year english curriculum at university. For the sake of argument, however, I will rate that as my least favourite until something else comes to mind.
No mentions of William Gibson? Author of Neuromancer? He was born in the US but emigrated to Canada and became a Canadian citizen, and I think he lives there now, so I’d say it counts.
An old favorite of mine from childhood is Two Little Savages by Ernest Thompson Seton. Partly takes place in Toronto!
I understand this point, but in my case, both Who Has Seen the Wind and Stone Angel were on the required reading list, so I don’t think that’s the reason.
I wouldn’t call them the greatest classics of literature or anything, but I’ve always liked Guy Gavriel Kay’s books.
Also, Stephen Leacock is funny as hell, and the National Film Board actually made short films of two of his stories. Here’s “My Financial Career”. “The Awful Fate of Melopenomeus Jones” was also made into a film but it’s not there for free on the website.
I love In the Skin of a Lion - first read it in high school (not required reading though) and have read it several times since. Every time I seem to find new things in it that I didn’t notice before.
I also liked Fall on Your Knees a lot, I haven’t seen that one mentioned in the thread yet.
Like a lot of others, apparently, I can remember reading and disliking The Stone Angel in school. We actually took a class trip to see it done as a stage play, and as I recall it wasn’t any better that way. We read something else by Margaret Laurence, too - maybe The Diviners? Whatever it was I hated it too.
He was my grandfather’s economics prof at McGill.
Really? That’s cool. Did your grandfather say if he ever managed to open that bank account?
Nope.
Given Robertson Davies’ body of work besides ‘Deptford’ and ‘Salterton’, he’s argueably one of North America’s best authors also.