Stanley Park

by Timothy Taylor

A love story wrapped in a murder mystery.

Jeremy Papier is a Vancouver chef and restaurateur who owns a bistro called The Monkey's Paw. The novel uses a "Bloods vs. Crips" metaphor for the philosophical conflict between chefs such as Papier, who favour local ingredients and menus, and those such as his nemesis Dante Beale, who favour a hip, globalized, "post-national" fusion cuisine.

Papier also endures conflict with his father, an anthropologist studying homelessness in Vancouver's Stanley Park, who draws him into investigating the death of two children in the park.

Genres: Fiction, Canada, Literary Fiction, Book Club, Food, Mystery, Canadian Literature

432 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

Timothy Taylor is a Canadian novelist and short story writer. Born in Venezuela, he was raised in West Vancouver, British Columbia and Edmonton, Alberta. Taylor attended the University of Alberta and Queen's University, and lived for some years in Toronto, Ontario. In 1987 he returned to British Columbia. Taylor currently resides in Vancouver.

Taylor's short story "Doves of Townsend" won the Journey Prize in 2000. He had two other stories on the competition's final shortlist that year, and is to date the only writer ever to have three short stories compete for the prize in the same year. He subsequently served as a judge for the 2003 award.

His debut novel, Stanley Park, nominated for the Giller Prize and chosen to be the 2004 One Book, One Vancouver, was followed by Silent Cruise, a collection of eight stories and one novella.

Reviews

[Erin · Rating 2 out of 5]

So Timothy Taylor’s *Stanley Park* was on the list of books recommended to me when I moved to Vancouver. Not surprising, perhaps, as the book spends a lot of time describing the city: the disparity between rich and poor, the exceptional natural beauty, the pretension of the foodie-hipsters who live here and then, in great detail, the landscape of the largest park (and biggest tourist attraction), Stanley Park.
The protagonist, Jeremy, is an idealistic young chef who owns a hip restaurant and cooks (magnificent) locally sourced meals. The plot thickens as his restaurant struggles to maintain financial solvency, and thickens further as the plot detours to follow Jeremy’s father, “The Professor” who lives IN Stanley Park as part of an ethnographic study of homeless folks who live in the park AND investigating a cold case murder of two children.
I suppose there are some ways in which these two plot lines intersect: Jeremy visits his father in the woods, thematic parallels around local food and local/post-national belonging. But for this reader it felt very much like two plot lines jammed together without the necessary exposition making it clear why a murder mystery and foodie romance belong together. Indeed, even with careful reading I’m still unsure about who/how the murder was committed, why it was significant for Jeremy and what implications it had for The Professor.
So here’s how I take it:
The restaurant plot and Jeremy is great. The writing is decent, the descriptions of food and cooking are great and the questions around independent/small business v conglomerate are interesting and worth exploring.
The Stanley Park plot is terrible. The descriptions try so hard to be literary and poetic that it’s entirely unclear to this reader what is happening, to whom and why. More importantly, I still don’t know why I should care about this plot line. What does it have to do with the local food? with food security?
Hmm. I’ve been telling folks this is a great read (and it did help me past my “Let The Great World Spin” hangover) but in writing this I’m not sure its great so much as the one strand of the novel is great. Can part of a novel be great and the other part terrible and the sum be something like average? I don’t think so. I think it’s still worth reading for the gorgeous food bits, just don’t be surprised if you’re reading and wondering what the hell this Czech guy is doing living on Lion’s Gate Bridge. And maybe also don’t be surprised if you’re a little annoyed with the editor of this book who failed Taylor in not telling him that you can’t just jam two plot flavours together and hope for a satisfying read.

[Kate · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm not going to finish this. I don't care about the protagonist, the oh-so-passionate chef who wants to serve "high end rubber-boot food." (Seems like that describes about about half the chef population, but this is painted as some sort of laudable, novel goal.) I don't care about the secondary characters, especially his father, who lives in a public park as part of an anthropology project on the homeless and is enigmatically remote and weird. Pages and pages of description about how the author used to be in a band has so far not inspired me to care that the author used to be in a band. And I definitely, definitely do not care about the protagonist's devotion to local food. OH MY GOD shut up already. This was written in 2001, when the local food thing was perhaps not as thoroughly over-hyped as it is now. But it's 2009, and WE GET IT already. The book is taking itself very seriously. And the whole thing feels like a pre-write. It needs thinning.

Would I be more invested if this story about local food were more local to me? If the main character's father were living in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park instead of Vancouver's Stanley Park? If the protagonist's precious "Monkey's Paw Bistro" (hello, annoying name) were located in SOMA? Maybe, but doubt it. Sorry to be so cranky. And in a way I'm sorry that I can't seem to drag myself through to the part where everything goes awry, and he gets bought out by Starbucks, and then solves a really old murder mystery. But life is short. Maybe I'll flip to the end.

[Ash Hiebert · Rating 2 out of 5]

Couldn't care less about any of the characters. They were all boring and flat. None of them had any depth or likeability to them. The stories all felt thrown together, none of them really took off or held my interest and yet I could see how there was a lot of potential it just never got there. Every story just kind of fizzled out.
And Jeremy hires a bunch of new kids to work the kitchen, tells them, at some point, that they are going to feed everyone at the restaurant opening poached animals from Stanley park including squirrels, raccoons, starlings and pond fish and yet the author doesn't include this conversation in the book?? Come on, that probably would have been the most interesting conversation to take place in the entire book and he just didn't even mention it.

I gave it two stars because I think all the subplots could actually be interesting if any of them were actually developed. Or any of the characters were enjoyable.

[Maayan K · Rating 1 out of 5]

I basically hated this book by the end of it. There's a lot of potentially interesting thematic stuff in it (homelessness in public parks, foodiness, groundedness/sense of place, Vancouver itself), but the whole thing is a hot mess that had me skimming just to get to the goddamn end by final quarter.

Jeremy Papier is a young and talented chef trying to make a farm-to-table restaurant float in crosstown in the late 90s when this was still a new thing. His father is an eccentric anthropologist living in Stanley Park with homeless people. As Jeremy struggles financially, he gets sucked into his father's life in the park at nighttime.

There are so many pointless side/back/off-stories that add nothing. Example: the main character's mother's history, the detailed backstory of homeless people in the park, an unsolved murder, a uncanny god-child, something about first nations people recolonizing the park? None of these things matter in the least. The dialogue is terrible. The late-nineties setting feels dated, and the stuff that should be cool just isn't anymore: "the Monkey's Paw Bistro"? ugh eew. Even the central love interest is romantic-comedy shallow: attraction, obstacle, resolution. The pacing of the book is horrible - you just want it to be over by the first main plot turn. The final denouement is the longest most drawn out piece of sappy pointlessness I've read in a while.

The most annoying thing about it stylistically is the faux-mysterious faux-cryptic "poetic" tone adopted at various passages, mostly as Jeremy is wandering around Stanley Park. Maybe the author thinks he's being edgy and cool by having bizarre non sequiturs or leaving simple chronological events mysteriously unfinished, but it is merely ridiculous and artificial. No, you cannot convince me that there is something 'deep' to be gleaned from all this - except maybe that this author tries very, very, hard.

The most successful parts of the book are around food, and take place in and around Jeremy's restaurant kitchen. Jeremy himself isn't a wholly uninteresting character (though pretty much everyone else is). A simpler story about a new restaurant in financial trouble and a complicated relationship with a father would have been so, so much better. This is a book where the flaws of form and content are deeply connected, and there's no easy fix - even an editor taking a hack at it wouldn't work because almost the whole thing is devoted to tangents with no beauty, no emotion, and no real stakes. Maybe very loosely-based movie could work.

[Andree]

DNFing this about 20% in. I could see this getting better, but am bit sure I'm invested enough to find out. I'm not clicking with the characters or the writing style. There may be some interesting ideas in this, but right now everyone feels a bit pretentious and out of touch, and not really like people I want to spend a whole book with.

[Susan · Rating 1 out of 5]

There were so many things that annoyed me about this book that I am surprised that I finished it, and wondering why I did, though I will admit to a fair amount of skimming. I will not list all of the parts of this book that I found aggravating because I have spent too much time on this book already, and it would likely exceed the GR character limits for reviews. So, here are the bigger points that made me want to throw my poor, innocent e-reader across the room - I did refrain, but reading BLARGH! this book was like rubbing my mind with sandpaper. So, here we go:

>So, Jeremy and his partner in the first restaurant adamantly refuse to have vegetarian options, in Vancouver BC, but then wonder why they are struggling to stay afloat without one vegetarian option ever, in **Vancouver are-you-kidding-me-no-vegetarian-options BC**
-they lose all of those many potential clients, and often their friends but then wonder why they are struggling
-they lose all of those potential, return-business locals because of that ignorant decision
-and seriously, it's VANCOUVER BC AND THEY HAVE NO VEGETARIAN OPTIONS!
-that is just bad business

>Oh, but then they often make off-menu special meals for people involved in the TV-movie industry
-people they know are unlikely to be return customers, and highly unlikely to pass the word on to others, especially others who might be regular clients

>One of the characters actually says something along the lines of 'can't eat tofu because everyone knows it is only f-word for gay people who eat the stuff'
-yes, the author spells out the f-word in the book
-and yes, the author chooses the two syllable version of the word
-yes, it was part of the author's heavy-handed indication that the person saying it was a bad guy but protagonist Jermey laughed along with evil-guy
-and seriously?!? the f-word for gay people?!?!?
-and seriously?!? it's what people are if they eat tofu?!?!?
-and seriously?!?! what about women?!?!?
-and seriously?!?! do people still engage in that level of misogyny and homophobia, and am I supposed to be impressed he crammed so much of each into one short sentence?!?!
-oh, and the book is set in the late 90's so it is not 'just the times'

>and really what about women?
-the men in this book were so shallow but also so overdone that they were almost caricatures rather than characters but they were at least persons.
-the women in this book on the other hand are not really characters at all. Here we have:
--the dead mother, mentioned but not really a character in her own right
--the past love/sex interest about whom Jeremy can wax nostalgic
--the one-who-got-away love/sex interest who ended up with the best friend, and about whom Jermey can wax wistful
--the can't-be-with-you-because-we're-business-partners love/sex interest about whom Jeremey can wax martyrdom
--the add-ahem-'interest'-through-inclusion-of-another-woman love/sex interest about whom Jeremey can wax lust
--a female waitress who make occasional appearances, but whose main scene is to show her man-hating, ranting about males side
--a female culinary school student that Jeremey hires with four young men in the same class
---she is either listed entirely as one of three names along with at least two of the male characters
---while two of the male characters have speaking roles and character - ahem - 'development' this woman remains one of a group
---her only speaking role is to become the butt of an inside joke that the author forces his reader to participate in by having this female character declare that when she opens a restaurant it will serve tofu, having no idea that, apparently in her world, only f-word for gay people people eat it. Blargh seriously?!??
---oh, the news/magazine writer who might have been interesting but only showed up for a couple of pages and ultimately, where she could have had an interesting or important role apparently got scooped by others who were not there (and so how did they get the information?), and ultimately despite her 'bombshell' served the purposes of the evil one who normally would have been harmed by it (so the author was sure to take away any power/standing she had in the book by giving it back to one of the men in it).
-the level of misogyny and sexism in this book was disturbing

>Somewhere around 80% of they way in the first and only decisively non-white character makes an appearance
-not much more than an appearance
-this is a man from Latin America, who is (as the author carefully points out) is very grateful that Jeremey gave him a minimum-wage job as a dishwasher at the new restaurant, because hey, why not also play that are-you-kidding-me stereotype card?

>that's not how homeless people do

>I hated Jeremy
-he is just so completely and utterly annoying, but also just completely and utterly stupid and dishonest and pretentious

and so on, but I am just so utterly done with this book that I refuse to spend any more time on it. I am glad I can return this one to the library and I will not be looking up anymore work by this author.

[Joanne Olszewski · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun book but one that you need a computer & wifi near so you can look up words

[Robin Riopelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rewinding the clock a little, I dove into Timothy Taylor’s Stanley Park after having read his brilliant and compelling (and later) Blue Light Project. Written in 2001, but set a few years earlier, Stanley Park is much more grounded in reality – until it isn’t.

Set in post-Expo, pre-Olympics Vancouver – a time when I also lived in the city and was deeply involved in civic history projects – the novel circles around notions of rootedness. Following the string of connectedness back to whatever it’s tied to is financially-challenged Jeremy Papier, a red-hot up and coming chef with a string of maxed out credit cards and an unacknowledged crush on his culinary partner. Also following what turns out to be a not-so-different string is Jeremy’s grieving and estranged father, The Professor, a self-declared immersive-anthropologist ostensibly studying the homeless in Stanley Park, but perhaps closer to both home and homelessness than his son thinks.

For those unfamiliar with Vancouver, Stanley Park is the green heart of the city, less accessible and wilder than NYC’s Central Park, but alike in its stubbornness to be commoditized at the break-neck speed of the rest of one of North America’s most expensive cities. Established in 1888, it’s completely surrounded by water, except for a slender isthmus; it is connected to the city’s north shore by the spectacular (if crumbling) Lion’s Gate Bridge (if you were ever wondering where Lion’s Gate Films got its name from). The park is a piece of land worth a gazillion dollars and it’s actually pretty easy to get lost if you stray from the paths. The park, with its legends and its history, is profoundly “local”, a theme that comes up again and again in Tayor’s story of passion, regret, and – food.

Oh, yes, there’s food. Fellow foodies, keep in mind that this story is set well before the farm-to-table movement was in full swing. Jeremy’s devotion to what is seasonal and local – and not disguising it with painful fusion-for-fusion’s-sake acrobatics – was crisp at the time this novel is set, and possibly at the time it was written.

I savoured the ecstatic descriptions of walk-in freezers. Indulgent discussion of knife work, bordering on fetishism? Oh, yes, please. And rather like The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover (remember that movie?), the chef ends up with the last laugh, in ways that are better described than imbibed.

The “Babes in the Woods” story of Stanley Park is (mostly) true. What many people don’t know is that the skeletal remains of two children found in the park in the 1950s are only two of the many bodies that turn up in the park every so often. It’s that kind of park, and Taylor deftly weaves their story with the Professor’s deep reconnaissance mission to understand a cast of intriguing (and mostly male) homeless people.

In the end, food and home – and the mystery of the murdered children – all come together in one unforgettable evening.

Is Taylor’s vision of homelessness and the top chef restaurant world an exercise in gritty realism? Hell, no. But it doesn’t really matter. Although this is definitely a page-turner, some of Taylor’s phrases stopped me in their tracks with their beauty and their sharp observation. Jeremy’s emotional state as he fast forwards into ruinous debt is described as a “chain of open links, waiting for some critical slackening of tension to disassociate themselves one from another…” With writing like this, the occasional lapses are more noticeable, perhaps. Dante Beale, the grain-fed epitome of corporate greed, is too on-the-nose. He owns a coffee chain called Inferno. He plays chess. And he’s called Dante, for pete’s sake. Likewise, some lesser characters veer into caricature, but Taylor’s right on the money for the important bits.

It’s not really a ‘slice of life in Vancouver circa 1996’; it’s a fabulist’s tale of youthful folly, understanding fathers and father figures, and what back to the land really means.

[Paula Dembeck · Rating 5 out of 5]

In his debut novel, Timothy Taylor gives readers an original storyline, complex and quirky characters, a little humour and important themes to consider. Although an accomplished writer recognized for his short stories, this was Taylor’s first novel, which gained critical recognition when it was shortlisted for the prestigious Giller Prize in 2001.

Jeremy Papier is around thirty. He recently returned from France, arriving in his hometown of Vancouver where he hoped to fulfil his dream and start his own restaurant. A confident young man, he is full of ideas of what he wants his new place to be, ready to put in the work needed to create menus based on using local ingredients. After arranging for a bank loan backed by wealthy family friend and next-door neighbour Dante Beale, Jeremy opened The Monkey’s Paw Bistro in the Downtown Eastside. The area had the kind of shifting, multicultural client base Jeremy favored, although not everyone is comfortable in that section of town and avoids it. Jeremy is also in love with Jules, who shares his dream and serves as his pastry and sous-chef. They care deeply for each other, but have wisely decided to put their personal relationship on hold until they get the restaurant up, running and making a profit.

Jeremy has always had an uneasy relationship with his father and that rift deepened after the sudden and premature death of his mother Helene with whom he was very close. His father, always referred to simply as The Professor, is an unusual character, a respected writer currently doing research for his next book on the homeless. He is deep into what he calls “participatory research”, living in Stanley Park and becoming part of a community who have sought refuge in its trails and forest. He is reaching out to these people, among them the delusional, the alcoholic, the paranoid and the bipolar, trying to understand their lives and record their stories. By living among them, his presence has become less artificial and distracting, allowing him to gain a more accurate glimpse of their world.

Jeremy is not comfortable with any of this and feels guilty seeing his father living among these dispossessed people, unshaven, filthy and surviving by eating food from dumpsters or catching ducks, squirrels, raccoons and starlings. He offered his father his home, but The Professor refused, choosing to stay where he was to complete his work. Jeremy also worries his father may be slowly becoming mentally unstable, slipping into a madness from which he will not return. He rarely sees him and when he does, he is called to meet him at a pre-appointed location by a man name Caruzo, one of the mentally frail young men in the Park community.

Jeremy and Jules have no difficulty creating a menu they are proud of, but the start up costs for the new restaurant are enormous and Jeremy, who has no idea how to manage money, quickly falls into serious debt. The bank relentlessly hounds him and after he tries to get cash using a ridiculous scheme at Canadian Tire, he ends up in legal trouble, forced to turn over the restaurant to Dante, the wealthy entrepreneur of Inferno International Coffee, who guaranteed his loan. Dante owns a large string of high-end coffee shops (think Starbucks) that are scattered all over the world, are popular and earn him big money.

Beale quickly dismantles everything Jeremy had created, renaming the restaurant and turning it into something else entirely, based on his research of what customers wanted and what would be profitable. His creation is the antithesis of everything that Jeremy believes in and stands for and he finds himself trapped in a world he hates.

Alongside this fictional story, is the true story of a crime that took place in Stanley Park years ago which has become part of The Professor’s research. In January 1953, the skeletons of two young children who were brutally murdered were discovered by a groundskeeper. They were never identified and their their killer never caught. The Professor asks for Jeremy’s help getting information about the case from the library as Caruzo, is obsessed with the crime and The Professor wants to know everything he can about that event.

Taylor is an excellent writer He provides detailed descriptions of Stanley Park with its sights, sounds and its place in the city. And the food! What can I say, except to advise readers not to pick up this novel when they are hungry. He writes about the various textures, tastes and colors and how every meal is plated. Jeremy’s menus combine foods you might never think to put together, describing them so well, they are easy to visualize. The action he describes in the kitchen leading up to the opening night under the new administration, are simply masterful and are some of the best in the book. Readers will feel they are right there in the confusion of a working kitchen, as the cooks work to create meals for waiting customers. Opening night proves to be a chaotic event, filled with excitement, humour and grounded with a startlingly and original menu.

Taylor’s dialogue scenes are also remarkable. The more deeply Jeremy wanders into Stanley Park, the more he understands his father who has always believed they were both working on parallel projects. Their interactions as they repair their relationship make for powerful and affecting scenes as they tentatively take steps towards a reconciliation based on their common connection to the land.

The characterizations of Jeremy, The Professor and Jules are well drawn, giving readers a sense of what drives them and their approach to life. Dante, the symbol of wicked corporate capitalism, is simply presented, more a caricature than a fully fleshed character. He comes off flat, devoid of personality, depth or complexity, just as “the insensitive bad guy”, only interested in money.

Taylor’s narrative is not without its inherent wit; the names of the characters and the restaurants provide tongue-in-cheek comments, complementing the content of the narrative.

As an update, readers will be interested to know that when this book was published in 2001, the identity of the children’s bodies was still unknown. In February 2021, seventy years after they were found, new DNA techniques helped identify the children as two boys, Derek and David Alton, aged seven and six respectively. As an aside, I did not find this sub-plot worked well, although I understand why Taylor chose to include it; it could have been eliminated without compromising the story or the novel’s messages.

This story of a young, independent entrepreneur with artistic vision, forced to compete with large corporations, is one repeated in the marketplace every day. Independent book sellers close, replaced by huge big box stores and small hot dog and ice cream stands simply fade away, replaced by large food franchises that dot every small town. The corner grocer is long gone as are all the small stationery, card and hardware stores. Big corporations operate efficiently benefitting from economies of scale and have the resources to weather the down times in the economy. But they are also lifeless, presenting the same face and mundane merchandise in every town.

This is an excellent novel that confronts the reader with several important themes, including a criticism of food fashion, the ties of community, our connectedness to the earth and a warning about globalization. I really enjoyed it.

[Jessica · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love food? Love Vancouver? Love gentle-to-moderate satire? Read this book. The main character's split of the food world into Crips (fusion-fancy-tower of exotic ingredients) vs. Bloods (local-rustic) is alone worth it.

[Chelsea · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was slow and boring. I live in Vancouver so I thought it would be interested in the location, but it could have been set in any city and would have felt the same to me. So glad I can move on from this one.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Since I see this book on the to-read list of a few of my friends here, I will recommend skipping it. I found it disappointing and hard to follow the whole second plot line on the "babes in the woods" and his father in Stanley Park. In reading other reviews, it seems this reaction is common.

[Charlayne · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of my favorite books of all time. It captures the local food culture of Vancouver and changed the way I think about cusine, eating and the art of cooking.

[Cassienerdgirl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wish I could give a 4.5. It was really, really good. Wonderful to be able to really "see" the places in Vancouver, and think about a Stanley Park that I've never seen. Definite recommend.

[Victoria Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Timothy Taylor's Stanley Park was not at all the book I was expecting and I'm so pleased!

I live near and work in Vancouver, British Columbia. I have visited the city neighbourhoods, and Stanley Park many times. So, when I first picked up this book, it was out of a sense of loyalty to a BCer and what I thought would be a mutual understanding of the landscape I'd be entering. That was my misjudgment; I fell for the bait - peanut butter, epoxy and sinker.

The main character, Jeremy, is a swaggering, cowboy boot-wearing chef who trained in a small restaurant in France. He has come back to Vancouver, full of ideals, with his gifted, expensive chef knife, passionate about serving local produce, fish, and game. So he starts a small restaurant - The Monkey's Paw - that embodies his ideals and quickly racks up tremendous debt. The build of this debt - and all of Jeremy's behaviour around it - is very uncomfortable to read about. But there are just enough moments of respite to keep you reading - memories of France, interactions with his dad, the Professor, (an anthropologist?) who is living homeless by choice in Stanley Park doing research for a book. The Professor has become ingrained in the secrets of the Park. He has come to know and care for a few genuinely homeless characters who hide there. From them, he has learned how to hunt wild game - squirrel, sparrow, duck, etc for his meals. He also tries to unearth the mystery of the two young children's bodies found there in the 50's - the Babes in the Wood. (This is not a mystery novel, by the way. That is never resolved.)

Jeremy becomes gradually absorbed by his father's world there. I enjoyed Jeremy's escapes into Stanley Park, the connections he makes there, along with the slow mending of his relationship with his father. Simultaneously, I had a hard time understanding where it was leading.

But back at the restaurant, just when you think you can't read about Jeremy's mounting debt anymore, the sneering devil-villain lurking in the shadows, Dante Beale, bails him out. Dante owns a hip, new, internationally successful cafe chain called Inferno. We learn that Dante had been hunting Jeremy all along and set a trap to acquire him. And so, Jeremy finds himself a pawn in Dante's hypocritical, greedy game.

But then Jeremy sets up his own elaborate trap! When I realized what he was doing, I couldn't put it down at that point. I was both amused, excited and a tad disgusted with what the story was building up to.

This Stanley Park - this Vancouver - was not the book or place I thought I was entering. While I recognized buildings (the library), neighbourhoods, local cultural references/parodies (X Files), I was taken right off the map, down some winding paths and ended up a little confused and thrust into a satirical landscape. But who cares! I enjoyed the ride! Yes, Stanley Park begins as a "copious" incongruous mix of stuff. But, in the end, we're served a simple plate, with mostly identifiable and complimentary ingredients.

[Richard]

Regarding the time, it is very much the 1990s Vancouver that is at the forefront. The X-Files were largely shot around that city, but Last Chapter aka X-Files is a surface level reading, the same as Dante with his inferno, and that he was probably “somewhere underground” (hint: hell) when Jeremy could not contact him.

The 1990s are now often viewed as the “apolitical decade”, a time of relative stability when masculine gender roles also eventually redefined themselves or failed to do so. The moment at the end of the chapter “Babes in the Wood”, when Jeremy breaks down and starts crying in the restaurant, while probably intended to be a sad moment, and a wholesome moment when Caruzo is cheering him up, is also a typical moment of “men crying alone” (at least until Caruzo comes). But he starts crying alone because he tries to do all the things alone. Perhaps he had tried to protect Jules or keep her out of his troubles because of his masculine belief to be able to handle everything alone – which is perhaps a mix of surface level and deeper level reading of the text.

[Barbara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mildly intriguing but not compelling and a little disturbing. There's too many subplots that don't connect at all, or even make sense. Needed a better editor to tell him these flavors don't go together. (See what I did there?) Too bad because there could have been a really good story in there. The best parts were the detailed descriptions of the gourmet restaurant cooking and how a commercial kitchen is created. Got this when we visited Vancouver, but it alone wouldn't make me want to visit again!

[Catherine · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really struggled to get into thjs novel. I found the story arc strangely stunted and difficult to engage with over a long period of time. It took me a week to stick it through in the end and it was the kitchen scenes more than Stanley Park which the book is named for that I enjoyed.

[JuliannaM · Rating 2 out of 5]

There were some genuinely interesting concepts to this book, but I found the author's style spmehow draggy and disjointed at the same time.

[Cara M · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book took me a few years to read which led to a rather disjointed effect, and in the end, what I was told by the person who recommended it was that 'it's one of those odd Canadian books that I quite enjoyed by the end' turned out to be a perfect description.

Yes. I did quite enjoy the end of this book, but it was rather slow going until about pg 325.

My main issue with it was that the main POV, Jeremy, was very anodyne. Described by an external POV as a merry prankster made me go -- what???? -- because he was the blandest Faust I'd encountered. There was no sense of anything merry or pranksterlike about him.

A lot of the early sections were about the languid descent into debt and poor choices. They were tiring to get through, and I always felt distant from the POV so his decisions never actually convinced me. It meant that although I enjoyed the denoument, I still felt it could have been sharper and better. The descriptions of food were lovely, but not visceral. I did not experience them, I was told about them.

I was rather put off by the way Jeremy interacted with the female characters also. It was like a list of people he had/should have/could have had a romantic relationship with, rather than people he did have a relationship with, colleagues and friends. Regardless of his 'sticking it to the man' approach, he did nothing but the very minimum to try to make up to Jules of Ruining Something Important to her, and there is no way he deserved her attention at all.

My favorite character of all was Kiwi Frederique, who _was_ a merry prankster, and was so delighted by the Events of The End that I was delighted along with her.

Oddly, though the book is called Stanley Park and it spends a lot of time in Stanley Park, I never got a good sense of the sort of space Stanley Park is. It needed a bit more grounding for the non-Vancouverites in the audience.

Also, as a final note, the review on the back of the book that compares this book favorably to Anthony Bourdain is Full Of Garbage. Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly had what this book lacked in spades, clarity, vividness, the sense of an experience of eating food, and personality, and that was his journeyman work. RIP. <3

[Kyle · Rating 3 out of 5]

My book club mission was to read this Vancouver-set story in time to discuss with others on campus, and it was down to the wire - literally reading the final pages in my car (while chowing down on a locally-produced hamburger) moments before rejoining the alumni book club. Part of me was fascinated with the setting, particularly with the indigenous and immigrant cultures populating Stanley Park. The other part of me was put off by the turn-of-the-millennium references to foodies, so 2001! Being a part of the put-upon culture of foodism, with ground zero located in the towers of Yaletown, it seems like a less lethal addiction than crack, alcohol or cellular phones. However, my experience with the with the Blood and Crip-camps visiting local restaurants was just as toxic, especially if you thought of food merely as a source of nourishment. Jeremy's relation to the Blood-style of serving was just as irritating as I imagined, but his "centaur's feast" near the end plays havoc on the corporate Devil who wants to repackage the 100-mile diet on a post-national scale.

Lots of more to write about the Lost Lagoon "boys" and will have to get back to this blurb soon.

[Dawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

After the first few chapters I thought for sure that this book was going to be a struggle to finish. It was bizarre and crazy. But somehow those weird characters, strange ideas and curious happenings turned into an enthralling read.
The author really knows Vancouver. He caught the attitudes of the hippie vs. hipster vs. corporate vs. homeless that made it obvious he's lived and been a part of this city.
The entire story revolves around the son and his cooking. Which kind of makes it sound like a foodie story but I found it good even though I am not usually a fan of food descriptions (I don't cook and don't care to learn, thus not making me very interested). The characters include the homeless (maybe crazy), a corporate bigwig, chefs, a librarian and lots of credit (trust me it's almost a character).
The nemesis Dante, his business and his attitude were a favorite part for me. He's a successful creep and I wonder who he's based on because he kinda reminds me of Chip Wilson (lululemon founder).
Somehow a jumble of people and stories managed to be cohesive and engaging.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

When about half of the way through this book I would have given it a 3-star rating but an interesting (if somewhat predictable) ending bumped my score up a bit. The novel, a Canada Reads selection in 2007, is about an innovative young Vancouver chef's financial struggles, his eccentric anthropologist father - currently living in the city's famous Stanley Park investigating the Vancouver homeless and a mysterious murder from the 50's - and a number of other interesting characters. Other reviewers have complained about the lengthy descriptions of food and its preparation, but I found this aspect of the book to be very enjoyable and educational. I lived in Vancouver for a few years and I think the novel really captures the food (and coffee!) culture of the Pacific Northwest quite well, including the struggle of the small business owners against the big corporations (e.g. Starbucks).

[Rogue Reader · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hilarious satire on the sustainable food movement with a dark mystery thrown in. The Monkey's Paw Bistro is wildly successful but a financial disaster - there's no cost consideration in sourcing or presentation. The protag is forced to sell out, and therein is the tale. The narrative is accelerated by the protag's father, an academic who loses himself studying the homeless of Stanley Park where the natural extremes of locavore living are the norm.

"Dark, slightly crazed, and black-and-blue funny," says The Seattle Times. Nice blurb extends the ideas: "Mystery, romance, scaldingly funny satire of the urban 'fooderati'"

A must read for anyone interested in food, cooking and restaurants. Thank you Knopf Canada for this marvelous book!

--Ashland Mystery

[Brenda Leadlay · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved reading about the invisible life of Stanley Park and the challenges of being a high profile chef in a city full of restaurants.

[Glen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book a lot, but then I'm a foodie myself. We had some good dining experiences in Vancouver when we visited several years ago (time to go back!), though none quite as...er...local as the penultimate one depicted in this novel. Some good characters drawn, such as Dante Beale and the Professor, but I was left feeling that the motif of the two murdered children was forced and left dramatically unresolved, not that I was expecting the murder mystery to be explained further or anything that droll, but the connection of the babes in the woods to the main plot line was left hanging and essentially dropped well before the end of the book with no return. That is really my only complaint, otherwise I recommend this read highly.

[rabbitprincess · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm abandoning this book after 123 pages. Sorry Jim. I do like the concept and appreciate the themes underlying the narrative, but I feel somewhat detached from the protagonist and am not really in the right mindset to be invested in his situation. So this one goes back to my mum's shelf unfinished (although apparently she didn't finish it either). I think this is the only Canada Reads book that I've left unfinished so far (I don't read all of them, just the ones I think are interesting).

[Greta · Rating 3 out of 5]

Due to our recent weekend in Canada, I came home with several new books by Canadian authors or stories set in Canada, including this one: Stanley Park. If we hadn't had such a great time visiting Vancouver and Stanley Park, then I might not have enjoyed this story as much as I did. There just wasn't enough excitement, mystery, romance or adventure for my taste, and the food descriptions sometimes made me feel ill. Oh well, check it out, if you love Vancouver, BC.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars.
Great concept that never gets realized; buried under tedious descriptions of tacky fashion, tacky design, and food that sounds amazing but never comes to life. I didn't recognize my city in these pages, even though it was written for insiders who know street and place names. The characters and their relationships never felt real. It was a confusing journey through 423 pages that didn't take me far.

[Heep · Rating 1 out of 5]

I did not finish this book. In fact, I barely got started on the audio CD version when I had to stop it. The dramatization is painful. Perhaps this is unfair. Maybe the book is quite good and it is the dramatization that brings it down. Maybe its the other way around. I just could be bothered. It is not worth the time.