Late Nights on Air

By Elizabeth Hay

The Scotiabank Giller Prize–winning novel from Elizabeth Hay.

Harry Boyd, a hard-bitten refugee from failure in Toronto television, has returned to a small radio station in the Canadian North. There, in Yellowknife, in the summer of 1975, he falls in love with a voice on air, though the real woman, Dido Paris, is both a surprise and even more than he imagined.

Dido and Harry are part of the cast of eccentric, utterly loveable characters, all transplants from elsewhere, who form an unlikely group at the station. Their loves and longings, their rivalries and entanglements, the stories of their pasts and what brought each of them to the North, form the centre. One summer, on a canoe trip four of them make into the Arctic wilderness (following in the steps of the legendary Englishman John Hornby, who, along with his small party, starved to death in the barrens in 1927), they find the balance of love shifting, much as the balance of power in the North is being changed by the proposed Mackenzie Valley gas pipeline, which threatens to displace Native people from their land.

With unforgettable characters, vividly evoked settings, in this award–winning novel, Hay brings to bear her skewering intelligence into the frailties of the human heart and her ability to tell a spellbinding story. Written in gorgeous prose, laced with dark humour, Late Nights on Air is Hay’s most seductive and accomplished novel yet.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Release date: Aug 20, 2010
• ISBN: 9781551994314

Reviews for Late Nights on Air

[lkernagh · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

There is something inherently intimate about radio. I am not talking about “shock jock” or talk radio where the sole purpose of the program is to brooch a controversial topic and get callers lighting up the switchboard to voice their opinions. I am talking about the late night deejays… the Venus Flytraps of the world with their silky voices, their sympathetic ears. Hay draws on her early work history as a Northwest Territories-based radio broadcaster for the CBC to weave an eloquently powerful Canadian novel. Hay stated during an interview that the starting point of this book for her was that real voices have fictional faces, that we make up what we think should be associated with the voice we hear. Hay’s makes use of this ‘disconnect’ to present a 1970's circa northern world at a cross roads, with sub-themes of a television station coming to encroach on radio country and a proposed gas pipeline that may threaten the wildlife habitat and native communities of the region. Hay’s characters are a motley crew. A straggling collection of humanity that, for reasons conscious or unconscious, have individually migrated to this remote hinterland. For this group, the radio station representing an outpost: a rest stop from their former lives before before heading on to their future. Essentially, this is a love story, or maybe a series of love triangles as the characters bob and weave through the motions of infatuation, seduction, smothering love and abandonment. In Hay’s deft, sympathetic hands, the reader experiences the poignancy of unrequited love and the unforgiving nature and striking beauty of the Yellowknife and the Barrens. Through her writing, one can feel Hay’s compassion for the human spirit – sadness, longing, tenderness – as well as a strong love and respect for the raw power and isolation of the far north. A richly poignant and deeply satisfying read. A well-deserved winner of the 2007 Giller Prize, IMO, and one of my favorite reads so far this year.

[clue_4 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

[Late Nights on Air] by [Elizabeth Hay] takes place in 1975 in Northern Canada and revolves around people who work at a radio station with very few listeners. The characters are primarily station employees. They include the beautiful, seductive and talented Dido, shy Gwen who drove 3000 miles through remote Canada alone looking for a job, and Eleanor who has been in Yellowknife the longest and is realizing it's time to move on. The employees think the first television station coming to Yellowknife will change their lives. Before that can happen, a canoe trip taken by four of the employees becomes a fateful turning point. I was impatient with the book at first but stayed with it and I'm glad I did. The characters are quirky and the ending unexpected. I like those things.

[laugal-2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A very good and memorable read. A glimpse at northern Canadian life.I would recommend this one.

[oldblack-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I liked this book and I think the most identifiable theme that engendered that liking was the idea of the arbitrary nature of our life's directions. People live long or they die young; they stay in one place, or they travel long distances; they have one good relationship, or none, or many. Which out of these possibilities will actually occur is decided by coincidence or in brief moments in time, or by 'luck', or by someone else's arbitrary action.I also liked the northwest Canadian setting of this story - so much beyond my experience (I live in Australia) that I just enjoyed exploring this (physical) world with Elizabeth Hay as my leader and guide. I reckon she is a great observer of the natural world as well as a fine writer. Perhaps I would have liked the book even more there had been more focus on one character, but maybe not....perhaps this superficiality helps to reinforce the essential nature of the book's message.

[bookishjojo · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

elizabeth hay is an amazing writer. seriously beautiful with her prose.this story made me cry. twice. i don't tend to cry when i read books.but this is what happens to me when i read her books - i become soinvested in the plot and with the characters that it seems so very real.the triumphs and tragedies sit with me personally and occupy space in my heart.if you are one to time your reads to the seasons, this is a perfect winterbook.

[elalce_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A unique story with engaging characters, set against the backdrop of a key moment in Canadian and First Nations history, which is artfully woven into the narrative.

[timbazzett · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Where to even begin? Elizabeth Hay's eloquence and utter humanity has nearly struck me dumb. I loved this book, LATE NIGHTS ON AIR, so much that I didn't want it to end.Canadian writers have fascinated me for years, maybe because I'm always so amazed that many great and well-known authors in Canada are all but UNknown here in the U.S. I remember discovering the funny and oh-so-human SMITH novels of Paul St Pierre many years ago. And of course there is always Farley Mowat, who is pretty well-known down here in the 48, probably mostly for his memoir, NEVER CRY WOLF. But his other two memoirs, BORN NAKED and AND NO BIRDS SANG are equally good, and they are all but invisible here in this country.And there is Linden MacIntyre, the award-winning CBC journalist, with his Cape Breton novel trilogy and his lovely memoir of that region, CAUSEWAY. I simply can't understand how those books have not caught on here. But now here is Elizabeth Hay, who has obviously been around for quite a while now and won some prestigious literary awards, and I am just now discovering her. Or thought I was, until I remembered I had read A STUDENT OF WEATHER some years back, a book I found, sadly, in a remainder bin. (Where I often find some of the very best books.)LATE NIGHTS ON AIR is a literary gem, written from an omniscient point-of-view with love and care for its several main characters, who have all been turned and polished so that all of their facets and flaws are revealed under the light of careful and appreciative reading. And I did appreciate these fictional folks, make no mistake, all of whom worked at a small Northern Services radio station in Yellowknife, Northwest Territory, an historical settlement on the shore of Great Slave Lake.First there is Harry, a embittered veteran of radio who peaked early, tried TV and failed, and is now, in his mid-forties, back where he started twenty years before.The story unfolds in the mid-70s and begins with Harry hearing a voice on his own radio station, a late night radio voice that he hasn't heard before. The voice belongs to Dido Paris, a new hire, a beautiful young woman with a past and indeterminate sexual preferences, who leaves her lasting mark on Harry, as well as on all the other people whose lives she touches.There is Eleanor Dew, the station's receptionist, who has her own unusual story which includes a brief unconsummated marriage. And Ralph, the station's book reviewer and nature photographer. And Eddie, a Vietnam vet and the station technician, and Harry's rival for Dido's affections.But the novel's central character is Gwen, young and - mostly - innocent, still groping for her proper place in life, looking for a start in radio. Under Harry's guidance and Eleanor's friendship she gradually grows from a frightened young broadcaster into a confident and inventive late night radio personality with her own persona, 'Stella Round.'Also key to the novel's forward impetus is the story of the Canadian explorer of the Barrens, John Hornby. Harry, Eleanor, Gwen and Ralph are all so fascinated by this man's legend and tragic end that they embark on a summer canoe trip retracing Hornby's last journey. (Both Hornby's trip and the retracing of it by this novel's characters made me remember Jon Krakauer's bestseller, INTO THE WILD.) And there is also the subtheme of an ongoing study by a federally appointed judge of the effects a planned pipeline would have on the fragile arctic ecosystem.LATE NIGHTS ON AIR makes use of both of the most common themes in fiction: 'a new person comes to town' and 'someone goes on a journey.' And they are used and interwoven in a masterful manner. The book is filled with wonderful details that evoked so many memories and associations. The mention of Miles Davis' seminal album, KIND OF BLUE, made me remember my own introduction to that jazz masterpiece, at a remote army base in northern Turkey. The book's very title, and its theme, evoked memories of another more obscure but favorite album, Katy Moffatt's MIDNIGHT RADIO. And the description of the travelers' encounter with a massive herd of migrating caribou brought to mind Mowat's own similar experience in NEVER CRY WOLF. There is nothing forced or contrived in LATE NIGHTS ON AIR. It has elements of tragedy, humor, and pathos. But what shines through the strongest is its utter humanity. As I said earlier, I wanted the story to go on and on. But its ending, while certainly not a happily-ever-after conventional sort of ending, is richly, deeply, and profoundly satisfying. I loved this book and recommend it highly.

[ridgewaygirl · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Last year, I read Alone in the Classroom and fell in love with Elizabeth Hay's writing. The book itself wasn't great; forward momentum just disappeared in the second half, but the writing was lovely; clear and precise, with ordinary turns of speech mixed with astonishing metaphors. So I was all set for an enjoyable few evenings with her Giller Prize winner, Late Nights on Air. "I heard Abe Lamont talking about how to shape an interview and write for radio. It's not so different, is it? One thought in each sentence. Not too many adjectives. Simplicity. Intimacy. Directness. That's what I'm after, too."Late Nights on Air is written in that same clear style, which here reflects the setting of the book; the clear, thin northern air, without unnecessary decoration, but full of the magnificence of the breadth of the country. It concerns a group of co-workers, almost all recent transplants, at a radio station in Yellowknife in the Northwest Territories in the mid-1970s. Beginning when Dido Paris is hired by the station, the story follows the various broadcasters as they adjust to life in the north and as a judge conducts hearings on whether or not an gas pipeline should be built. Inspired by a radio play dramatizing the fate of John Hornby's final expedition to the Barrens, four of them set off on a canoe trip across the tundra. The story is intensely character driven, from Gwen, the uncertain neophyte, to Dido, the charismatic and volatile focus of many, to Harry, the jaded, but wise station manager, [Late Nights on Air] is all about how living north of the 60th parallel changes them and how their relationships changed or didn't change over time. I inhabited this book while I read it. I have a fascination for the northern wilderness and the canoe trip that forms the backbone of the book was beautifully described. Yellowknife was almost a character in the book, with so much based on the unique culture of the Canadian north.

[smits_52 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Not my normal choice of reading but had to read it as my brother gave it to me. He was moved by the references made by Dido to Nijmegan Holland which is where my parents grew up. Expessions like"you need a bicycle to get to the raisins" were used by my father growing up in our house.Still I did not really engage with the characters. There was too much forshadowing. What i did like was the descritions of winter weather and descriptions of the scenery during the canoe trip.

[kathyrichardson5 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Late Nights On Air was a good read, but didn't capture my full attention. I like the author's writing style, but felt the plot dipped in a few spots.

[lit_chick_2 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Having lived in Canada's far North, it was the fact that Late Nights on Air is set in Yellowknife which attracted me to the novel. I was impressed with the authenticity of Hay's portrayal of life beyond the tree line. The characters, all of whom are originally from somewhere other than Yellowknife, are original, well-drawn, and memorable. Indeed, the North is not for the faint of heart!

[bcteagirl_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The phrase I would use to describe this book is that it is smoother book. It is slower to get started, you don't feel the need to read large chunks for hours and hours on end, especially at the start. Yet it is an enjoyable and comfortable book. Not heavy reading, not chick lit. It does make you think, and eventually pulls you in, although it takes a bit longer to get to that point.This is the kind of book it is really fun to be reading when you have a few books on the go at any time. Best read in short bursts. I do think it s a book worth coming back to.The book centers around a small group working in a small radio station in the NWT. Aside from the people who have been there all their lives, most have come either fleeing something or looking for something. In most cases both. They are trying to find themselves in a landscape that is very different from what they have come from.The book does a great job of describing the summers of endless light. Since the focus is on the parts where they are outdoors, it tends to rush a bit over the winter. Given how long winter is in the NWT, I would have liked to experience more of that.The book really takes off once they start planning a canoe trip to see the remains of Hornby's cabin (He and his crew starved in the Barrens) and I loved reading about the trip. I also loved the references to other books, and growing up with books. I have written down a few titles that I am going to have to add to my ever-growing wishlist.I think this book is a bit like the north itself. A little bit different, perhaps a little bit slower or more subtle. But definitely very interesting and well worth the trip.

[kateburt · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

is it possible that this book was marketed to the wrong crowd? that's the only thing i can think of that would explain all the poor reader ratings. this is easily one of my favorites.

[vanedow · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I liked this book so much more than I expected to. It was given to me by a friend who wanted to know if it was accurate, since I grew up in Yellowknife, NWT, where the book's events take place. Actually, the book is set in the 1970's, around the time when my parents would have moved to the 'knife. I'll have to send the book along to my mom and find out if her descriptions of what the town was like at this time are accurate. I can speak from my own experience that her descriptions of the landscape are both accurate and poetic.Hay's narrative style is compelling and insidious. I don't mean that in an entirely good way. Her style does have a certain pompous feel to it that I tend to find in "criticly acclaimed" novels. Early in the story, I kept noticing it and being annoyed. Within a few chapters, however, I was completely involved with her characters. She gets inside your head. Her understanding of character is such that the people in her books feel alive in all their glories and sorrows.This book really captures frontier feel of Northern life that is close to unique in the last 50 years. I recommend this book for anyone interested in Canada's North, and also for anyone who just loves a well-written tale. Side note: Late Nights on Air touches on many of the issues of the time, most notably land claims, native rights, and the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline. If you're going to read this book and you're not familiar with these issues, it might be worth hitting wikipedia before you crack open the book.

[nursejane_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A few thoughts:I found this book very romantic in a less conventional sense... Reminds me of Joni Mitchell's Case of You song. You might have to love Canada to love this book (though you may not love this book even if you do love Canada).Some passages were a little heavy handed... but I think that this book resonated so deeply with my sense of romance, adventure and Canadianism that I don't care at all.I think I'll read everything you ever write from now on, Elizabeth Hay

[sushidog · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I loved much of the writing of this book, but it felt unfocused. I kept having the question, who is this book about? Who can I identify with here? So much time was spent with Dido in the beginning and then she disappears. While we feel close to Harry in the first half, by the time we get to the camping trip that dominates the second half, he feels more like a supporting character, and Gwen more the centre. It was always shifting underneath me.

[swarkentin_3 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Great Canadian story. Vivid descriptions easily allows you to imagine, feel, see the settings.

[susannag_9 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The story of a young woman beginning her career in radio broadcasting in Canada in the 1970s. Not having much luck finding work at the CBC in Toronto, she finds her first position in Yellowknife where she meets an interesting mix of people. I found this book to be beautifully written and evocative of life in the North. I could easily relate to the main character and was drawn into the fast pace of the second half of the book.

[pinkcollar_1 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

The foreshadowing in this book is really clunky and terribly obvious, and for most of the book I felt like I was getting hit over the head with a CanCon stick. The last third of the book, the canoe trip, is better than the rest but still, I can't understand the selection for the Giller.

[katylit · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I truly enjoyed this book. Elizabeth Hay's writing captured the dichotomy of the Arctic, it's beauty and danger, how fragile the environment is, yet how enduring remnants from the past can be. The characters of the book were as fragile and enduring as their environment. This is a book I will definitely be re-reading, one from which I took many quotes. Beautifully written.

[cecilturtle · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Patience is essential to reading this novel. Sluggish, ill-focused and fraught with heavy-handed foreshadowing, it didn't grab my attention at any point and I had a really hard time plodding through it. It was poorly constructed: the main character Dido mysteriously disappeared half-way through the novel; the secondary character sort of took over but there was no growth in her relationship with others and the story finishes in a flourish in a desperate attempt to tie all the loose ends. A disappointment.

[mielniczuk · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Started paging through this and was immediately captivated by the quality of the writing. Started reading and stayed up most of a night in order to stay wrapped in the author's splendidly crafted environment and characters.

[autumnc_12 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

First, I love public broadcasting. The relationships that Hay portrays in this story are REAL, they are so reflective of the actual familial development that happens in a small radio station. Second, I love (the idea) of adventure travel. So traveling with this group on the Barrens was only amazing to me. I was wrapped up in this. I absolutely loved it.

[piefuchs · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This Giller Prize winner is, quite appropriately, the quintessentially Canadian book. Hay describes royal commissions, canoe trips, aboriginal rights, the North, CBC radio, radio plays, and ice fishing, all in ways that are both boring and appealing. The book starts as a young woman moves to Yellowknife, hoping to discover the North and finds a career in radio drama. At the radio station she discovers a group of people who share her obsession with the North, a love of radio, and a history of running away. In the background, Yellowknife, and its Dene peoples are trying to use a sympathetic Royal Commission to block the building of a pipeline through the pristine northern wilderness. The climax of the book is a canoe trip trough the Yukon backwaters as the people of the radio try to recreate the journey of a famous explorer. Parts of the book are wonderfully written and one is particularly moved by the language Hay uses to describe the barren, north landscape. The one weakness of the book, however, is that the cast of characters is too large, and one fails to care even when disaster strikes. Similarly, while I deeply enjoyed the way the story of the canoe trip provided a climax, the author to visit the characters in later life, provided unnecessary, and seemingly trivial, closure to the book.

[ldvoorberg · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

For an award winning book (Giller Prize 2007), I was surprised at how "normal" the plotline and writing style are. By that I mean the plot is linear, the POV is thirdperson though varies as to whose perspective is shown. It's fairly normal, as far as novels go. But don't let that fool you -- this book is layered and very well written.Descriptions are strong without wordiness; the characters have depth and experience growth; the 1970's Yellowknife Radio Station setting is unique, too. Plus the integration of the debate over putting up a gasline through the region and the potential consequences to the land and the people native to the region makes for a great story.

[niecierpek · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Good, effortless reading. The story revolves around a group of people connected to the CBC radio station in Yellowknife in 1970s, and centers on their relationships. The people come and go, seem transient, don't want to stay there, but the bonds they form there endure.I felt the North was there in a bigger capacity than just the background, and not only in terms of nature, even though it was its most prominent role there no doubt; it endured too, but also in the snippets of everyday northern life, native issues and current events like the work of the Berger Commission.

[hannahholborn · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A character in Elizabeth's book describes good script writing as having simplicity, directness, and intimacy. Late Night on Air achieves all three. Whether we love or hate the main characters by the end of the book, we also know them as well as our own skin. And we know something of the north--its timeless fragility, and its ability to both save and destroy those who venture there.

[shelion_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Great sense of place as well as interesting characters, make this book a delightful read.

[lynnb_64 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This is the Giller Prize Winner for 2007. It is the story of a group of people, mostly whites from southern Canada, who are working at a Yellowknife radio station in the 1970s. It tells a bit of their past lives and what brought them to the North, and delves into their relationships with each other, and with finding or running away from themselves.I liked the sparsely written style of the book. I was very interested in the characters and how they turned out, but wasn't deeply affected by any of them -- even deaths and lost love lacked a sense of poignancy. I think the inordinate amount of overt foreshadowing dulled any sense of shock or surprise I might otherwise have felt. The background story of the real-life Berger Inquiry into northern development was well done and added a lot of context about attachments to place and to wanting to control your way of life.

[dorag_947572 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Following the intimate interrelationships of a group working at the local radio station in Yellowknife. This book has a placid, easy pacing to it, allowing you to dip your toe in, as it were, to the lives and insights of the characters. I felt compelled to read this book, and thought about it often while i wasn't reading it, but I never connected emotionally with anyone. There were two major death incidents that didnt affect me emotionally, nor did I feel any sense of resolution when the book finished. I did however feel that the book was honest, and beautifully written.