Specimen

A father rollerblading to church in his ministerial robes, a university student in a leotard sprinting through fog, a trespass notice from PaknSave, a beautiful unborn goat in a jar . . . In scenarios ranging from the mundane to the surreal, Madison Hamill looks back at her younger selves with a sharp eye. Was she good or evil? Ignorant or enlightened? What parts of herself did she give up in order to forge ahead in school, church, work, and relationships, with a self that made sense to others? With wit and intelligence, these shape-shifting essays probe the ways in which a persons inner and outer worlds intersect and submit to one another. It is a brilliantly discomfiting, vivid and funny collection in which peace is found in the weirdest moments. I never felt that I was looking at fine writing only at astonishing writing. Elizabeth Knox.