Kate Black’s nonfiction debut, Big Mall: Shopping for Meaning (Coach House), ponders the magnetic pull of the behemoth spectacle that is West Edmonton Mall—or “West Ed,” as it is sometimes known—and the ways in which malls have transcended their function as places to buy things. Through personal essay and academic study, Black is endlessly curious about the mall she grew up in, an alluring site where, despite its countless attractions over the years—we’re talking dolphins and hockey-playing chimps, rollercoasters and waterslides, submarines and pirate ships and lagoons—something never felt quite right. Beginning with a history of the modern mall, Black launches into an investigation of mall culture, covering topics such as late-capitalism distress, resource extraction, the ethics of zoos, the fear of teenagers, vapourwave aesthetics and the pursuit of self-invention, to name just a few. Black’s self-reflective writing style is engaging and relatable. As she tries to understand her place in West Ed, her role in capitalism, and her yearning for the mall’s amusements, she reveals the mall for what it is: a place where suicides and deaths occur, where miserable animals are put on display, where people take shelter, where you never truly find yourself. For all these reasons a sense of dread pervades Big Mall, which Black articulates when writing about West Ed’s art installations, such as the brass right whale, creeping toward extinction, or the dozens of glass oil droplets that dangle from the mall’s ceiling onto three men drilling for oil. Whether you’ve visited West Ed or not, Black’s personal reflections and examinations of mall culture will entertain and educate. It’s a book that speaks to that overwhelming sensation you get in the mall—nestled right beside the insatiable desire for more, more, more—that something transformative is taking place. Big Mall lingers in that feeling, wants to put a finger on what it might be, and it’s all a bit awe-inspiring, all a bit off-putting.

—Kendra Heinz

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