The Seaboard Review of Books
Volume 3, Issue 3 of The Seaboard Review of Books, January 19, 2026
In this issue:
Oxford Soju Club by Jinwoo Park (Fiction)
Wild Life by Amanda Leduc (Fiction)
Vessel: The Shape of Absent Bodies by Dani Netherclift (Non-Fiction)
Beyond Ken Dryden: A Memoir by Oren Safdie (Non-Fiction)
Mouths, Squares, Rooms: Review of Gillian Sze’s An Orange, A Syllable (Poetry)
Winter Count: Embracing the Cold (Non-Fiction, Art)
Thanks for reading this issue of The Seaboard Review of Books!
James M. Fisher, editor-in-chief
Fiction
Oxford Soju Club by Jinwoo Park
Oxford Soju Club is a spy novel that also operates as an examination of displacement, loyalty, and the relentless effort required to inhabit multiple identities. Set largely in Oxford and anchored in a Korean restaurant, the novel follows three central figures: Yohan, a North Korean agent; Jihoon, a South Korean immigrant; and Yunah, a Korean American C…
Wild Life by Amanda Leduc
Amanda Leduc weaves a tapestry of the fantastic in her newest novel, Wild Life. The novel feeds on the reader’s appetite for transformation. And for answers. But Wild Life isn’t about concrete answers or certainty; instead, it questions the nature of transformation itself. It’s not always about becoming more, sometimes, what you need is less.
Non-Fiction
Vessel: The Shape of Absent Bodies by Dani Netherclift
The body of a drowned man is not a poem, and yet his body can be transformed into words...
Beyond Ken Dryden: A Memoir by Oren Safdie
In Beyond Ken Dryden: A Memoir, Oren Safdie takes us back his childhood in the 1970s, when the Montreal Canadiens, backstopped by the stellar goaltending of Ken Dryden, won six Stanley Cups in a nine-year period. Safdie gives us a young fan’s perspective on life in Montreal, and the importance of the Canadiens franchise.
Poetry
Mouths, Squares, Rooms: Review of Gillian Sze’s An Orange, A Syllable
Gillian Sze’s An Orange, A Syllable is a cycle of lyric prose poems in a collection so distilled yet supple and lustrous, in terms of its language, thematic matter, intra- and intertextuality, that one can’t but come away convinced of Sze’s prodigious gifts. This book is seemingly about the exhausting experience of caring for an infant, later a toddler,…
Northern Lights, Ma Peinture c’est l’hiver
Winter Count: Embracing the Cold, the title of this lavishly illustrated book from Goose Lane, refers to a Lakota (Saskatchewan) tradition of visually recording each year’s most significant events onto animal hide or cloth. These winter counts serve as a means of survival through storytelling and community bonding.
The Fiddlehead invites you to celebrate the launch of Issue 306 on Saturday, February 7, 2–3 PM Atlantic Time, both in person at the Fredericton Public Library and online via Zoom. Join us for an afternoon of readings by Ariadne Asho, winner of the 2025 Fiction contest, along with fellow issue 306 contributors, John McNeil and José Teodoro! To attend the readings virtually, email thefiddlehead@gmail.com with your name to receive the Zoom link.
TSR Contributor Spotlight
Bryn Robinson (she/her) lives in Saint John, New Brunswick, where she looks for new angles to old views through photography and poetry. She has previously published poetry in Soliloquies (Concordia University) and the Facing Goodbye Anthology (Wee Sparrow Poetry Press), as well as on this website. Bryn also contributes book reviews for The Seaboard Review of Books (usually poetry, short stories, and non-fiction).
When not reading and writing, She’s exploring the New Brunswick forests and seascapes, camera in hand. Her website: https://brynphd.com/
The Seaboard Review of Books is proud to be a sponsor of The New Brunswick Book Awards!