by JULIET WATERS

Ah fall… the gorgeous trees, the brisk temperatures, the comfy clothes, the newest soul-lurching reality shows, the crowning of the new Canadian Idol… yes you could spend forever sorting the beauty from the dying crap. Or you could be Cintra Wilson and find hilarious ways to combine them. There just isn't anybody who writes about pop culture as well and as viciously as she does in her essays for Salon.com or in her first book, A Massive Swelling: Celebrity Re-Examined as a Grotesque Crippling Disease and Other Cultural Revelations. This makes her first novel, Colors Insulting to Nature, one of the books I'm most looking forward to reading. There's even an autumn landscape on the cover - a nice contrast to the garish neon title.

Jeffrey Moore is a Montreal writer whose first novel, Prisoner in a Red-Rose Chain, won the Commonwealth prize, shocking all the critics in Canada who'd never heard of him. His second novel, The Memory Artists would seem to be another hilarious love story and intellectual quest set in Montreal. One of those rare writers who can combine wit with slapstick, Moore's been making a big impression overseas. Same can be said of Will Ferguson, who follows up the big international success of his novel, Happiness, with Beauty Tips from Moose Jaw, a collection of funny and insightful travel essays on some of the most interesting and strange destinations in our massive country. Just in case you're worried you might run out of sardonic, funny writing, there's a new title by Augusten Burroughs. If Magical Thinking is anything as good or successful as his previous memoirs, Dry and Running With Scissors, then David Sedaris may even get nudged down a few places on the best-seller list.

Lens on Liberia

For the more serious minded, Russell Banks, one of the biggest of the big American writers will be dropping by Montreal on a book tour to promote his new novel, The Darling. No stranger to our city, Banks visited often while Affliction, the movie based on his novel of the same name, was being filmed here. Long known as a brilliant chronicler of the American male psyche, Banks takes a different tack in a new novel set in Africa, creating a central female character navigating the impossible political landscape of Liberia of the '70s and '80s.

Human Capital by Stephen Amidon looks like a novel that will appeal to fans of the kind of readable, depressive realism best practiced by writers like Jonathan Franzen. Set in 2001, it tells the story of a father who chooses to speculate on human lives to save his suburban family from financial devastation.

Toronto writer Catherine Bush follows up her critically successful novel, The Rules of Engagement with a psychological thriller, Claire's Head. Claire Barber searches for an older sister, a medical journalist who has disappeared while on assignment in Montreal. Bush will no doubt be drawing on her experience living here while she was a creative writing prof at Concordia.

From the U.K., Toby Litt follows up Finding Myself and deadkidsongs with another haunting, imaginative novel, Ghost Story. And Catherine Sampson's debut Falling Off Air, about a single mother of twins who suddenly becomes the main suspect in a murder investigation, looks like a good bet for mystery thriller fans.

Finally, for hipster needle junkies lured into the dark craft last year with Knitting Pretty, there's a new hobby threatening to hook you. While knitting is all the rage, shocking stats show that hardcore crocheters actually outnumber knitters three to one. This will be no revelation to anyone faced with the choice between finishing a sweater or a clutch purse. True, you'll never crochet a satisfying pair of mittens and socks, but there's always the lure of that warm and funky afghan, which in my daydreams I'll be wrapped up in while reading Colours Insulting to Nature.