• Five excellent books
  • Article by on February 28, 2011
  • Reading is sexy.   In fact, seeing a girl go through some quality Rushdie is stimulating to me in a way that my doctor and parents are starting to get worried about.   Unfortunately, if you don’t know where to look for reading material, you can get into trouble; every time you turn the page of a good book, fifteen boring ones get pumlped out.   So, taking upon a mantle of arrogance that’d get me punched   in real life, I wrote thise article to help people find that next excellent read, and share my love of books.   The scary, scary love.

    Generation  A

    Douglas Coupland

    It’s always a hit-or-miss with Douglas Coupland.   He can be brilliant (Hey! Nostradamus!) or a sitcom-writer (JPpod), but if you want a book where wit and insight spark off the pages, go for Generation A. It’s the near future and all the bees in the world have vanished—as a conseqeuence commercial farming is in dissarray, the world is on the slow course to famine, and no one seems to care.   But then, six people across the world are stung by six solitary bees. Generation A is the story of these six people—about their coming together, about their lives, and about the secret that’s out to get them.

    John Dies at the End

    David Wong

    John Dies at the End is one of the funniest, scariest books to come out of the indie publishing scene, or even the horror genre as a whole, in recent years.   The novel began as a story on the internet forum Pointlesswasteoftime.com and acquired a cult following before being printed by Permuted Press in 2007, and Thomas Dunne books in 2009. The novel follows the adventures of David and John, two pseudo-normal guys in a depressing American town.   Also there’s demonic shadows obsessed with penile humour, an interdimensional monster known as Korrok, and some of the cleverest deadpan humour since Terry Pratchett decided to stop being funny.

    The Sea of Fertility Teratology

    Yukio Mishima

    Mishima’s Sea of Fertility encompasses four novels: Spring Snow, Runaway Horses, The Temple of Dawn, and The Decay of the Angel.   It narrates the successive reincarnations of Kiyoyaki Matsugae—an aristocrat of 1910’s Japan—as observed by his friend Shigekuni Honda. Kiyoyaki and his reincarnations are tortured by their desires in a changing nation, and ruin themselves and those around them as they chase what they want.   There’s no hope.   No salvation.   Just suffering the slow grind of life and what comes after.   It’s bleak and beautiful and will rock your world.

    House of Leaves

    Mark Danielewski

    If you took The Blair Witch Project on VHS and taped the film to paper, you’d have ruined a perfectly good VHS.   You should have read House of Leaves instead; it’s scarier and no one will look at you funny.   The novel’s multiple narratives fold into each other a lot, sort of like those Russian dolls with the creepy painted eyes, but the main story you need to know is that of photographer William Navidson, his family, and the house they just moved into that’s larger by two feet on the inside than it is on the outside.   As Will investigates the house’s wieird proportions, some creepy stuff starts going down as physics and logic fall apart inside his home.   A dark hallway opens up in a room that shouldn’t be there, leading down into the earth, and into a labyrinth.   House of Leaves takes us into the labyrinth beneath the Navidson house, and shows us what comes out of it.   Scary stuff indeed.

    The Windup Girl

    Paolo Bacigalupi

    The Windup Girl is like Michelle Rodriguez socking you in the face with the butt of a laser gun: innovative, destructive, and quite arousing.   The novel takes us to Thailand after global warming, carbon fuels, and genetically enchanced plagues have levelled natural plant and animal populations.   The Thai kingdom is swimming in disease and corruption, with thieves and people who just don’t care.   The old world is collapsing, and nothing but a rebirth is going to save humanity.   But, as we learn from the book, this rebirth doesn’t come from returning to the simple times, it comes from going forward, out of the ashes, and into an uncertain future.   Also, the writing itself is just perfect.   Read the friggin’ book.

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  • Inside


  • Young entrepreneurs: Where are you?
  • Young entrepreneurs: Where are you?
  • Right off the bat, I’ll get right to the goods. Most young entrepreneurs suck: they are filled with lofty, unrealistic goals and typically serve a selfish or ego-driven hunger… usually to impress their friends on the fourth floor of the UTM library.

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  • The friend zone
  • The friend zone
  • Men are afraid of vampires, because they have potentially gay connotations (unless it is a she-vampire—then it’s a different story).

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  • Teleducation
  • Teleducation
  • Whoever said “television should be educational” was on to something—alright, maybe not Jersey Shore.

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  • Putting your best foot forward
  • Maybe the two of you will hit it off, or maybe this person will suck you into a vortex of never-ending small talk or hostility.

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  • Last chance for romance, also known as how Rich Aucoin stole Christmas
  • Last chance for romance, also known as how Rich Aucoin stole Christmas
  • Rich Aucoin started doing this and that, now he’s getting in trouble with Dr.Seuss and having a good time.

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  • Why we did it
  • Why we did it
  • What do you like?
    We must have asked over one hundred people that very question, and this magazine is the answer.

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  • This magazine probably comes as a surprise to most of you.
  • This magazine probably comes as a surprise to most of you.
  • As far as I know, The Medium never had one before, although other university papers do. Nor has there been a demand for it—try as I may, I can’t hear students clamouring for a Medium Magazine outside of this office.

    So why did we do it? Why now?

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  • Best of the nation
  • Best of the nation
  • As we enter a new decade, The Medium Sports Editor Andrew Tysiak takes a look back and recaps the top 5 Canadian athletes of the 2000s.

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  • About The Magazine
  • What do you like?

    We must have asked over one hundred people that very question, and this magazine is the answer.
    Newspapers can be limiting. You are obligated to write a certain way, to only cover certain things, and everything must follow a specific grid. Sometimes this can help foster creativity, being forced to work within parameters. But after 36 years of publishing, we feel that it’s time to step outside of the box.
    Producing a magazine was a no-brainer. We were free to write how we felt and to present it in a more accessible way.

    This magazine was composed with you in mind. That’s right. We went through a ton of ideas, picking out the good, trying to cater to everyone’s preferences and make it as approachable as possible. Hence this brand new website.

    We suggest you take a look around. You might find something unexpected.

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  • How confident are you?
  • How confident are you?
  • Take this questionnaire and discover whether you’re a shy, lonely individual, a confident person, or just a high-maintenance snob.

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  • And you’re all set
  • And you’re all set
  • You’ve somehow established the flimsy pretense of “watching a movie.” Don’t blow it by throwing on Schindler’s List. Now, it’s important to differentiate between a “make-out movie” and a “date movie.” “Date movies” are meant to be engaging, at least for one party.

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  • Top Feature

  • Featured Articles


  • How to plan a trip abroad: Student edition
  • How to plan a trip abroad: Student edition
  • You’ve actually got to plan this dream vacation, and though you won’t have it all figured out in a matter of days, you have to start somewhere.

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  • Young entrepreneurs: Where are you?
  • Young entrepreneurs: Where are you?
  • Right off the bat, I’ll get right to the goods. Most young entrepreneurs suck: they are filled with lofty, unrealistic goals and typically serve a selfish or ego-driven hunger… usually to impress their friends on the fourth floor of the UTM library.

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  • Jian Ghomeshi’s Real Cool World
  • Jian Ghomeshi’s Real Cool World
  • WAKING UP AT 6 A.M. FOR A 12-15 HOUR WORK DAY MAY SEEM CRAZY TO MOST OF US BUT TO JIAN GHOMESHI THAT’S A TYPICAL DAY AT THE OFFICE. An award winning broadcaster, the host and co-creator of the national daily talk program, Q, on CBC Radio One, Jian also manages the career of Canadian […]

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