Service Alert
CD service concludes July 31, 2025
CELA's audiobooks and magazines are available in Direct to Player and downloadable formats. We no longer mail out CDs. Please contact us for more information.
CELA's audiobooks and magazines are available in Direct to Player and downloadable formats. We no longer mail out CDs. Please contact us for more information.
Showing 1 - 4 of 4 items
By Andre Alexis. 2025
The award-winning author of Fifteen Dogs conjures up worlds – real, invented, uncanny – in this ingenious, electrifying collection.A Trinidadian…
Obeah man finds himself reborn, a hundred years after his death, in the body of a Canadian child. A writer takes up a seasonal job as the caretaker of a set of mysterious large sacks hanging from the rafters of the houses in a small town. A woman starts a relationship with the famous artist who painted portraits of her mother. The contents of a sealed envelope upend a woman’s understanding about a tragic crime she committed at the age of six.In this dazzling collection of stories, André Alexis draws fresh connections between worlds: the ones we occupy, the ones we imagine, and the ones that preceded our own. He introduces us to characters during moments of profound puzzlement, and transports us from 19th century Trinidad and Tobago to small-town Ontario, from Amherst, Massachusetts to contemporary Toronto.These captivating stories reveal flashes of reckoning, defeat, despair, alienation, and understanding, all the while playfully using a multitude of literary genres, including gothic horror and isekai, and referencing works from greats like Jane Austen, Jonathan Swift, Yasunari Kawabata, Witold Gombrowicz, and Tomasso Landolfi.Masterfully crafted, blending poignant philosophical inquiry and wry humour tinged with the absurd, here are worlds refracted and reflected back to us with pristine clarity and stunning emotional resonance as only André Alexis can.By Su Chang. 2025
By turns wry and lyrical, The Immortal Woman reveals an insider's view of the fractured lives of new Chinese immigrants…
and those they leave behind. A Chinese mother and daughter wrestle with the demons of their past. Lemei, once a student Red Guard leader in 1960s Shanghai and a journalist at a state newspaper, was involved in a brutal act of violence during the Tiananmen Square protests and lost all hope for her country. Her daughter, Lin, is a student at an American university, executing her mother's grand plan for her to become a true Westerner. Following China's meteoric rise, Lemei is slowly dragged into a nationalistic perspective that stuns Lin, leading to grave conflicts. Their final confrontation results in tragic consequences, exposing the constant tension Chinese immigrants face—the push and pull between the pressure of assimilation and the allure of Chinese nationalism. How does unresolved political trauma lead to internalized racism and eroded identities? And how do immigrants find true belonging in a world that feels increasingly divided? The Immortal Woman is a sweeping generational story of heartbreak, resilience, yearning, and ultimately, hope for a better futureBy Null Georgia Toews. 2012
A razor-sharp dramedy following a twenty-something comic as she navigates family grief, dysfunctional friendship, and a date gone very wrong.Virginia…
is twenty-three and a stand-up comedian. In between working the rounds of Toronto&’s small comedy club circuit and auditioning for paper towel commercials, she is tiptoeing around her depressed roommate and childhood friend, Haley, and having biweekly dinners with her bereaved stepdad, Dale, while trying to manage her own grief at the loss of her mother. She is also secretly working to get the green card that will be her ticket to LA and, she hopes, a glittering comedy career.But when Dale tells her that he wants to sell their family home, and when a date with a fellow comic turns into a shattering encounter, she is forced to confront the limits of comedy and friendship. Not every experience can be neatly packaged into a &“bit,&” and not every friendship is meant to last.By turns hilarious and heartbreaking, Nobody Asked for This reaches into the messy depths of love, friendship, grief, and trauma, and, like all the best jokes, is utterly unpredictable.By Andre Alexis. 2025
The award-winning author of Fifteen Dogs conjures up worlds – real, invented, uncanny – in this ingenious, electrifying collection.A Trinidadian…
Obeah man finds himself reborn, a hundred years after his death, in the body of a Canadian child. A writer takes up a seasonal job as the caretaker of a set of mysterious large sacks hanging from the rafters of the houses in a small town. A woman starts a relationship with the famous artist who painted portraits of her mother. The contents of a sealed envelope upend a woman&’s understanding about a tragic crime she committed at the age of six.In this dazzling collection of stories, André Alexis draws fresh connections between worlds: the ones we occupy, the ones we imagine, and the ones that preceded our own. He introduces us to characters during moments of profound puzzlement, and transports us from 19th century Trinidad and Tobago to small-town Ontario, from Amherst, Massachusetts to contemporary Toronto.These captivating stories reveal flashes of reckoning, defeat, despair, alienation, and understanding, all the while playfully using a multitude of literary genres, including gothic horror and isekai, and referencing works from greats like Jane Austen, Jonathan Swift, Yasunari Kawabata, Witold Gombrowicz, and Tomasso Landolfi.Masterfully crafted, blending poignant philosophical inquiry and wry humour tinged with the absurd, here are worlds refracted and reflected back to us with pristine clarity and stunning emotional resonance as only André Alexis can.