My Thievery of the People by Leila Marshy

Reviewed by Tim Niedermann

In this, her first collection of short stories, author Leila Marshy takes the reader to far-flung places. From Newfoundland to the Middle East, with stops in Montreal and even Las Vegas, she provides intimate looks into vastly diverse men and women.

Originally from Newfoundland, Marshy now lives in Montreal. She is also partially of Palestinian descent and has spent time working in Egypt for the Palestinian Mental Health Association. Her familiarity with the Middle East, combined with a good eye for detail, allows her to bring out the inner concerns of people in the Middle East convincingly.

The title story has a man working for his brutish father, coming to terms with what happened to the mother he never knew. Another has a waiter on a restaurant boat on the Nile interacting with the antics of a Canadian family of tourists.

A couple of stories deal with the class system in Egypt, illustrating the striking differences in life’s expectations between the wealthy and those of modest incomes in that part of the world. In one, a woman offers a spoiled brat of a young woman a lift after the latter trashes her family’s car. In another, the younger sister of an Egyptian man who has become rich working in the Persian Gulf countries nervously awaits his return.

Marshy’s writing has an intimate quality. She doesn’t attempt broad strokes, instead she focuses on the personal. She is also good at bringing out the struggles of women in various situations. But there is some subtle humour: “How to: Your Very Own Life” consists of a wry checklist of a woman’s frustration with her relationship with her husband.

Several of the stories are deeply touching—In “Proper Ting” a woman fisherman in Newfoundland tries to explain life there to a visitor gathering fishing statistics. In two stories that take place in Montreal, an owlet turns up in an urban backyard, and a snowplow driver becomes obsessed with the possibility that he may have plowed a woman into a snowdrift.

And while most of her stories are down-to-earth portrayals of people’s lives and struggles, one story, “Not Blood,” which takes place in Israel shortly after its founding, has a spiritual quality that is quite moving, even unsettling.

This is a varied, compelling collection, one that presents the varied emotional responses to life people come to possess as they struggle to get through each day.

My Thievery of the People is published by Baraka Books.