The Canterbury Trail

Original and entertaining. —Quill & Quire

This amounts to a gnarly, original fictional journey. Abdou’s second novel is not the first literary work to emulate Chaucer’s classic, but it could be the most uninhibited and most fun. —ABC Bookworld

The Canterbury Trail was a Mountain and Wilderness Literature finalist in the 2011 Banff Mountain Book Competition.

You don't need a grounding in Chaucer . . . to appreciate the cultural clashes, connections and revelations between the skiing pilgrims of The Canterbury Trail, or to relish the authentic suspense Abdou builds through a gradual but genuine investment in the wellbeing of the various characters. —Bookgaga Blog

An unlikely group is pushed together, Big Chillish-style, for a close encounter of the awkward kind. —January Magazine

In The Canterbury Trail Abdou walks a tightrope, balancing elements of comedy and tragedy with equal poise and shows herself an able inheritor of ribald Chaucerian tradition. —Reading for the Joy of It Blog

The Canterbury Trail solidified Angie Abdou as one of my favorite writers. —Lavender Lines Book Review Blog

Chaucer's friars, squires, merchants and summoners are substituted with ski bums, hippies, fish-out-of-water urbanites and rednecks from the fictional town of Coalton, B.C., who make a bizarre pilgrimage to a remote backwoods cabin [in The Canterbury Trail] —The Calgary Herald

The Canterbury Trail often seems like an anthropological study of those who’ve devoted their lives to the mountains, and Abdou doesn’t shy away from more unsavory aspects of ski culture. —Mark Medley, The National Post

[The] Canterbury Trail . . . is much more than a story about a ski town. Like all great novels, it is a 'story of life' that just happens to be set in snowy mountains, with all the characters traipsing around on skis. . . . It's a delightful, thought-provoking book and I recommend it highly. —Jon Turk, Powder Canada

The book has a distinctly unpredictable ending, so it might be worth reading this one to figure it out. An enjoyable jaunt into the world of back-country and downhill skiing, especially if you’re a novitiate. —The Inferno

The story is at once bleak and hopeful; the writing is clear, considered prose. Angie combines traditional writing skill with forward-thinking fun. A wonderful voice in Canadian literature. —Robin Spano, Advent Book Blog

The story is very well told, with very rich and tight prose and description. —Coreena McBurnie, Books & Other Creative Adventures Blog

The very best thing about the book is the ending. I LOVED IT! —Lindy Pratch, Lindy Reads and Reviews blog

Abdou's writing is concise and observant. Her attention to detail and awareness of the backcountry lifestyle is refreshing. But it's what's happening on a deeper level—the struggles of bridging a ski bum lifestyle with the necessities of a career, pragmatism and belonging—that are revealed like a ski carving through layers of bottomless snow. —Backcountry Skiing Canada

Abdou takes us ' . . . somewhere beyond words.' All we can do is sit back and admire. —Book Discovery Blog

[Angie Abdou] makes us care whether or not [her characters] find their magical chalice and make it back from their pilgrimage. —The Winnipeg Review

On every level I revelled in The Canterbury Trail, Angie Abdou’s new novel which reworks Geoffrey Chaucer’s 14th century Canterbury Tales to follow a group of people on a pilgrimage to a backcountry hut near the Canadian Rockies town of Coalton. —Straight Outta Dublin Blog

Each period in Canadian Literature has its bright lights, pre-confederation Canada has Susanna Moodie and Catherine Parr Trail; Ondaatje, Atwood, Laurence, and Munro all came to prominence in the 60s; and if I were to make a list of the great 21st century Canadian novelists to date, Angie Abdou would definitely be on the list. —The Canadian Book Review Blog