By Kaylie Seed
Megan Gail Coles’ debut novel Small Game Hunting at the Local Coward Gun Club (Small Game Hunting) was first published in February of 2019. This piece of literary fiction takes place in Newfoundland, Canada during a winter storm on Valentine’s Day from morning until night while also peppering in each of the character’s past so that the reader can have a deeper understanding of them. Coles touches on a lot of heavy topics throughout Small Game Hunting including infidelity, sexual assault, homelessness, poverty, drug and alcohol abuse, and racism. At the beginning of Small Game Hunting, the publisher, House of Anansi, has a disclaimer to let readers know about potentially triggering themes, something that all books with potential triggers should include.
Small Game Hunting is extremely character driven and because of that the reader needs to be focused on what they’re reading or they will miss what is happening in the story. Coles doesn’t use quotation marks to show when a character is speaking yet still manages to have the reader understand when someone is talking and still gives each of the characters a distinct voice. Coles also goes back and forth between characters using an omniscient narration style so that the reader always knows what is going on even if focused on a new character. In Small Game Hunting, Coles moves from a character in the present to something that has happened in that character’s past. What is interesting about this is that Coles manages to tie all of the characters together – those that had never met before may still have been impacted by one another prior to this stormy February night.
Coles included some graphic scenes, something that readers should be aware of before diving into Small Game Hunting. There are times when the reader may need to put the book down so that they can collect themselves before continuing on because Coles does go into specific detail and does not shy away from these heavy topics. Coles has written a story that embodies the culture and diction of Newfoundland while also bringing up difficult-to-discuss topics. Small Game Hunting has amazing prose and Coles’ effortless writing style is bound to impress readers who enjoy literary fiction. While slow in the beginning, Small Game Hunting picks up and ends on a climactic note while also leaving readers with some unanswered questions; however this makes sense as Small Game Hunting only follows these characters for a single day and only so much can be known in that time. I am interested to see what Coles writes next as this stunningly written piece of literary fiction was a fantastic debut novel.
Readers who enjoy the works of Margaret Atwood would enjoy Megan Gail Coles writing.