Service Alert
Website maintenance April 24 10pm ET
On Wednesday April 24 at 10pm ET the CELA website will be unavailable for about 15 minutes for planned maintenance.
On Wednesday April 24 at 10pm ET the CELA website will be unavailable for about 15 minutes for planned maintenance.
Showing 1 - 20 of 12175 items
By Barbara Crossette. 1998
In 1997 this New York Times journalist traveled across Asia, visiting the classic hill towns built by several colonial powers.…
She recalls her journeys to these remote locations, discusses their history, and describes how each has evolved since being inherited by an independent nation. 1998.By J. L Granatstein. 1993
Granatstein's study of life at the top during the Second World War centres on the most senior ranks in the…
Canadian Army. Men like Andrew McNaughton, Harold Crerar, Thomas Burns and Guy Simonds had not only to win military campaigns, but also command the sympathies of bureaucrats and powerful politicians. None, however, forgot they were fighting a war, and that their decisions directly affected the lives of Canadian soldiers. 1993.By Jim Murphy. 1995
An account of the conflagration that levelled much of Chicago in 1871. Chronicles events from the fire's outbreak and rapid…
spread to its extinguishment by rain, as reported by survivors and in documents of the period. Examines the origins, circumstances, and official failures that contributed to the disaster. Grades 5-8. A 1996 Newbery Honor Book. c1995.By Jack Beeching. 1982
By Linda Spalding. 1998
The author recounts her expedition into the forests of Borneo in search of a reclusive primatologist, who has devoted her…
life to protecting orphaned orangutans. Describes the beauty of the island, the local society, and the despoilment of natural resources through poaching, deforestation, and misguided ecotourism. 1998.By Yadi Sharifirad. 2010
Sharifirad was shot down in the Iraqi-Iranian war in the early 1990s, saved by a group of local Kurds, and…
eventually returned to Iran where he became a national hero. The Ayatollah sent him to Pakistan as military attaché, but when he returned to Teheran, he was accused of being a CIA spy and was imprisoned, interrogated, and tortured. Upon his release, despite constant surveillance, he resolved to smuggle his family out of the country. Some descriptions of sex and violence, some strong language. 2010.By Larry Pynn. 1996
In 1992, Vancouver Sun journalist Larry Pynn decided to undertake an adventure. He followed the old Stikine Trail in the…
Yukon, by foot, horseback and canoe, to the Klondike. He discovered many relics, met colourful characters, and relived Canadian gold rush history.By C. J Chivers. 2018
Almost 2.5 million Americans have served in Afghanistan or Iraq since September 11, 2001. C.J. Chivers has reported from both…
fronts from the beginning, walking side by side with combatants for more than a dozen years. He describes the experience of war today as it is endured by those most at risk-the camaraderie and profound sense of purpose, alongside courage, frustration, and moral confusion mixed with technical precision. In these remote places where the reason for their presence is sometimes not clear, these young men kill or are killed, facing palpable and often constant threat of ambush or hidden bombs. They repeatedly return, rushing toward danger, often to rescue the wounded in wars that escalate around them as the Pentagon changes doctrines and plans. Weaving a history of the war through troops' experiences, the characters in The Fighters climb into an F-14 cockpit for the opening strikes after the attacks of 9/11, hunt for Osama bin Laden along the Pakistani border, chase insurgent rocket teams with helicopters alongside American bases, face snipers in a hostile city in Anbar Province in Iraq, and engage in deadly counterguerilla warfare in the soaring mountains of the Korengal Valley in Afghanistan. Some suffer terribly. All are changed. They return home, uncertain of their place in the world and what their wars have achieved. 2018.By Kyle Harper. 2017
The Fate of Rome is the first book to examine the catastrophic role that climate change and infectious diseases played…
in the collapse of Rome's power -- a story of nature's triumph over human ambition. Interweaving a grand historical narrative with cutting-edge climate science and genetic discoveries, Kyle Harper traces how the fate of Rome was decided not just by emperors, soldiers, and barbarians but also by volcanic eruptions, solar cycles, climate instability, and devastating viruses and bacteria. He takes readers from Rome's pinnacle in the second century, when the empire seemed an invincible superpower, to its unraveling by the seventh century, when Rome was politically fragmented and materially depleted. Harper describes how the Romans were resilient in the face of enormous environmental stress, until the besieged empire could no longer withstand the combined challenges of a "little ice age" and recurrent outbreaks of bubonic plague. A poignant reflection on humanity's intimate relationship with the environment, The Fate of Rome provides a sweeping account of how one of history's greatest civilizations encountered, endured, yet ultimately succumbed to the cumulative burden of nature's violence. 2017.By Rita Anton. 1979
Following her husband's death in 1976, Anton spent several years in India as a volunteer Jesuit Lay Missionary. Having travelled…
extensively in India, she presents a realistic look at this nation in transition. 1979.By Taras Grescoe. 2003
Taras Grescoe plunges into the ruts where the tourists are thickest, starting at the tip of Spain's Land's End and…
finishing, nine months later, on the soldier-patrolled beaches of China's End of the Earth. Along the way, he crosses the entire Eurasian landmass, experiencing all sorts of travel such as all-inclusive resorts, pilgrimages, and bus tours. Some descriptions of sex and violence, some strong language. 2003.By Michael Grant. 1980
Author reviews the latest scholarly thinking about the Bronze Age origins and subsequent development of civilization in Etruria. A major…
section of the book deals with the geographical and cultural history of the major Etruscan city-states and their territories at the height of their power. 1980.By Chris Bonington. 1987
At the age of 50, the author, one of the world's best-known mountaineers, reached the summit of Mount Everest in…
1985 after four attempts. He chronicles his Everest expeditions and the ascent of Mount Vinson in the Antarctic with Frank Wells. 1987.By Lewis H., ed Lapham, Peter T Struck. 1997
Selections from letters, memoirs, reports, and a few imaginary portrayals, presenting first-person descriptions of human tragedies. Illustrates the impact of…
disasters on society, recounts instances of extreme brutality inflicted on groups and communities, explores the capacity for regeneration, and cites examples of people's responses to doomsday scenarios. 1998, c1997.By Tom Drodge, Grover Cleveland Hodge. 2018
On December 10, 1942, at the height of the Second World War, a crew of seven men boarded the bomber…
plane Time's A Wastin' and departed the American base at Narsarsuaq, Greenland, on their way back to the United States via Goose Bay, Labrador. After crossing the Davis Strait between Greenland and Labrador, the B-26 ran into rough weather and crashed at Saglek, Labrador. All of the crew survived. As per their training, they stayed with the wreck to wait for rescuers--but rescue never came. This is their incredible story, as related by the diary kept by the pilot, First Lieutenant Grover Cleveland Hodge. 2018.By Robert W Ferguson. 2003
The Aral Sea, once the fourth-largest inland body of water, has lost over half its surface area and 80 percent…
of its volume since 1960, due to poorly planned irrigation systems. In January 2000, Canadian Rob Ferguson went to Uzbekistan to work on an environmental project to save the Aral Sea. After a year of dealing with corrupt officials, not only had the project gone nowhere, but Ferguson was under suspicion of murder. Some strong language. 2003.By Sean Rossiter. 2002
From the dawn of aviation, Canada has produced intrepid pilots of renown. Learning their craft in some of the most…
difficult conditions anywhere, many of these flyers became expert pilots, navigators and mechanics. These great Canadians pilots were among the highest-scoring Allied aces of both world wars. 2002.By Otto Dietrich. 2010
When Otto Dietrich was invited in 1933 to become Adolf Hitler's press chief, he accepted with the simple uncritical conviction…
that Adolf Hitler was a great man, dedicated to promoting peace and welfare for the German people. At the end of the war, imprisoned and disillusioned, Otto Dietrich sat down to write what he had seen and heard in twelve years of the closest association with Hitler. c2010. Uniform title: 12 Jahre mit Hitler.By Kevin Callan. 2007
A compendium of basic wilderness instruction and well-tested campsite advice from one of North America's top canoeing and outdoors experts.…
Learn how to plan your trip, pack only what's needed, and beat the bugs, stake a tent, build a fire, ward off unwanted wildlife, and paddle a canoe. Also includes using maps and a compass, camp cooking, camping with dogs and kids, bruises, blisters and Band-Aids, and cold-weather camping. 2007, c2005.By Jerry Kobalenko. 2002
Ellesmere Island lays a mere 450 miles from the North Pole and has the highest peaks in the Western Hemisphere…
east of the Rockies. For more than a decade, Kobalenko has traced the routes of explorers and Inuits, and broken many new trails across the frozen terrain of Ellesmere Island. He investigates the motives and mistakes of the island's first explorers, searches for clues to the mysterious disappearance of scientist-explorer Dr. Hans Kruger and the murder of an Inuit guide. 2002.