Peter Behrens on his novel The Law of Dreams

Peter Behrens’ short stories and essays have appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, Tin House, Saturday Night, and The National Post and have been anthologized in Best Canadian Stories and Best Canadian Essays. He was born in Montreal and lives on the coast of Maine with his wife and son.

We talk here, at the Blue Metropolis Montreal International Literary Festival, among other things about voice and poetry in his debut novel The Law of Dreams, Winner of The 2006 Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction. It tells the story of a young man’s struggle to survive the Great Famine in Ireland of 1847. On his odyssey through Ireland and Britain, and across the Atlantic to Canada Fergus O’brien encounters death, violence, sexual heat, ‘boy soldiers, brigands, street toughs and charming, willful girls – all struggling for survival in the aftermath of natural catastrophe magnified by political callousness and brutal neglect. ‘ Think Dickens meets J.M. Coetzee.

The book has been hailed by many reputable media outlets including The New York Times and The New Yorker.