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Survivors!: true death-defying escapes
By Larry Verstraete. 2003
Think about your worst fears - being attacked by a wild animal, swept away by a killer storm, trapped in…
a wrecked car or a burning building. Here are 29 stories of real people who survived life-threatening situations. Each section includes Survival Tips that give readers essential information about what to do in dangerous circumstances. Some descriptions of violence. Winner of the 2004 Silver Birch Award. Grades 4-7. Bestseller 2005. 2003.Stowaways
By Ariel Gordon. 2014
In a series of smart and funny poems, 'Stowaways' careens between life as we-know-it on the Canadian prairies and the…
frayed yet familiar edges of what-if. What if a beluga from Churchill hooked up with a Gore-Texed tourist? What if knowing Morse Code would save your bacon during the zombie apocalypse? Half survival guide, half invasive species list, these are poems that stick to your socks. Winner of the 2015 Lansdowne Prize for Poetry. 2014.Strange ghosts: essays
By Darren Greer. 2006
From baseball to Picasso, Oscar Wilde to Tennessee Williams, post-modernism to American foreign policy, these essays are a mix of…
polemic, politics, memoir, travelogue, and literary theory. Greer relates how his mother's obsession with baseball is overshadowed by her distaste for the American invasion of Iraq, and in some travel essays, he recounts being in India during the height of the Pakistan nuclear crisis, his conversations with monks in Cambodia, and his spiritual revelations in Venice. Some strong language. Some descriptions of sex. Some descriptions of violence. c2006.Slick water: fracking and one insider's stand against the world's most powerful industry
By Andrew Nikiforuk. 2015
When Jessica Ernst’s well water turned into a flammable broth that even her dogs refused to drink, the biologist and…
long-time oil patch consultant discovered that energy giant Encana had secretly fracked hundreds of gas wells around her home, piercing her community’s drinking water aquifer. Since then, her ongoing lawsuit against Encana, Alberta Environment, and the Energy Resources Conservation Board has made her a folk hero in many places worldwide where fracking is underway. Winner of the 2016 Alberta Literary Award. 2015.Sex is a funny word: a book about bodies, feelings, and YOU
By Cory Silverberg, Fiona Smyth. 2015
A comic book for kids that includes children and families of all makeups, orientations, and gender identities, this is an…
essential resource about bodies, gender, and sexuality for children ages 8 to 10 as well as their parents and caregivers. Much more than the "facts of life" or "the birds and the bees," it opens up conversations between young people and their caregivers in a way that allows adults to convey their values and beliefs while providing information about boundaries, safety, and joy. The follow up to the Lambda-nominated "What Makes a Baby". Winner of the 2016 Norma Fleck Award for Canadian Children’s Non-Fiction. Grades 2-4. 2015.As oil prices soar and suburbs continue to sprawl, Grescoe hits the commuter road in a global quest to understand…
and illuminate the challenges of the post-automobile age. Ultimately, Straphanger’s subject is the city, and it offers a global tour of alternatives to car-based living, told through encounters with bicycle commuters, subway engineers, idealistic mayors and disillusioned trolley campaigners. Along the way, Grescoe meets libertarian apologists for the automobile, urbanists who defend suburban sprawl, champions of buses, rapid transit and light rail, and planners fighting to liberate cities from the empire of the automobile. Winner of the Quebec Writer's Federation Prize, 2012. Includes violence and strong language. 2012.Steal away home: one woman's epic flight to freedom-- and her long road back to the South
By Karolyn Smardz Frost. 2017
Fifteen-year-old slave Cecelia Reynolds made her dangerous bid for freedom from the United States, across the Niagara River and into…
Canada. Escape meant that she would never see her mother or brother again. She would be cut off from the young mistress with whom she grew up, but who also owned her. Cecelia found a new life in Toronto’s vibrant African American expatriate community. Her rescuer became her husband, a courageous conductor on the Underground Railroad helping other freedom-seekers reach Canada. Widowed, she braved the Fugitive Slave Law to cross back into the United States, where she again found love, and followed her William into the battlefields of the Civil War. Finally, with a wounded husband and young children in tow, she returned to the Kentucky she had known as a child. But her home had changed: hooded Night Riders roamed the countryside with torches and nooses at the ready. When William disappeared, Cecelia relied on the support and affection of her former mistress - the Southern belle who had owned her as a child. Winner of the 2018 Speaker's Book Award. 2017.Smiley: a journey of love
By Joanne George. 2017
Smiley, a most remarkable Golden Retriever, was born without eyes. He was rescued from a puppy mill and has become…
a superb therapy dog, providing therapy to people all over the world through social media and television. This is his story. Winner of the 2018 Silver Birch Express Award. Winner of the 2019 Red Cedar Information Book Award. Winner of the 2019 Hackmatack Award for non-fiction. Grades 4-6. 2017. Smiley, the therapy dog -- Smiley and Joanne -- Smiley and Joanne's new family -- St. John Ambulance therapy dogs -- Smiley, the blind therapy dog -- Smiley, the celebrity -- Ways you can help.Stormy seas: stories of young boat refugees
By Mary Beth Leatherdale. 2017
The plight of refugees risking their lives at sea has, unfortunately, made the headlines all too often in the past…
few years. This book presents five true stories, from 1939 to today, about young people who lived through the harrowing experience of setting sail in search of asylum: Ruth and her family board the St. Louis to escape Nazism; Phu sets out alone from war-torn Vietnam; José tries to reach the United States from Cuba; Najeeba flees Afghanistan and the Taliban; and after losing his family, Mohamed abandons his village on the Ivory Coast in search of a new life. Grades 4-7. Winner of the 2018 Silver Birch Non-Fiction Honour Book Award. 2017.Sit how you want
By Robin Richardson. 2018
Plane crashes and automobile mishaps are the backdrop for female narrators who grapple with terror, anxiety, and powerlessness: "When I…
say I'm fine I mean the sky has opened / like an old wound under scurvy." In their grim wit, sinister straight talk, and sometimes violent bawdiness, Richardson's poems work as counter-charms against the lingering trauma of abusive relationships, both familial and romantic. The book embodies a belief in poetry as an instrument of change, a tool for transforming pain into exuberant verbal energy: "It is the thrill of ruination / makes us innovate." Winner of the 2019 Trillium Book Award for Poetry. 2018.Steal my rage: new native voices
By Joel T Maki. 1995
An anthology of poetry, short stories, and essays by aspiring Native writers from across the country. Topics range from spirituality,…
traditional values, and the recovery of aboriginal languages, to self-government, urban life, and healing. 1995.Starting from Ameliasburgh: the collected prose of Al Purdy
By Al Purdy, Sam Solecki. 1995
A collection of essays, anecdotes, travel pieces, and criticism by Canadian poet Al Purdy. The pieces are divided into essays…
on encountering the world through Canadian sensibilities, opinions on other writers like Charles Bukowski, Margaret Atwood, and Bliss Carman, and reviews of poets like bill bissett and Russian Anna Akhmatova. 1995.At nine years old, Eugenie Clark developed an unexpected passion for sharks after a visit to the Battery Park Aquarium…
in New York City. At the time, sharks were seen as mindless killing machines, but Eugenie knew better and set out to prove it. Despite many obstacles in her path, Eugenie was able to study the creatures she loved so much. From her many discoveries to the shark-related myths she dispelled, Eugenie made wide scientific contributions that led to her being nicknamed Shark Lady. Winner of 2018 Forest of Reading The Blue Spruce Award. Grades K-3. 2017.Shirley Jackson: a rather haunted life
By Ruth Franklin. 2016
Still known to millions only as the author of the "The Lottery," Shirley Jackson (1916-1965) remains curiously absent from the…
American literary canon. A genius of literary suspense, Jackson plumbed the cultural anxiety of postwar America better than anyone. Biographer Ruth Franklin reveals the tumultuous life and inner darkness of the author behind such classics as 'The Haunting of Hill House' and 'We Have Always Lived in the Castle'. Placing Jackson within an American gothic tradition of Hawthorne and Poe, Franklin demonstrates how her unique contribution to this genre came from her focus on "domestic horror" drawn from an era hostile to women. With its exploration of astonishing talent shaped by a damaged childhood and a troubled marriage, this is the definitive biography of a generational avatar and an American literary giant. Winner of the 2017 Edgar Award for best critical / biography book. 2016.Stalin's daughter: the extraordinary and tumultuous life of Svetlana Alliluyeva
By Rosemary Sullivan. 2015
Born in the early years of the Soviet Union, Svetlana Stalin spent her youth inside the walls of the Kremlin.…
Communist Party privilege protected her from the mass starvation and purges that haunted Russia, but she did not escape tragedy--the loss of everyone she loved, including her mother, two brothers, aunts and uncles, and a lover twice her age, deliberately exiled to Siberia by her father. As she gradually learned about the extent of her father's brutality after his death, in 1967 Svetlana shocked the world by defecting to the United States. But she could not escape her father's legacy; her life in America was fractured; she moved frequently, married disastrously, shunned other Russian exiles, and ultimately died in poverty in Spring Green, Wisconsin. Winner of the 2015 Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction, the 2016 British Columbia National Award for Canadian Non-Fiction, and the 2016 RBC Taylor Prize. Bestseller. 2015.Stephen Harper
By John Ibbitson. 2015
Stephen Harper has made government smaller, justice tougher, and provinces more independent. Those who praise Harper point to the Conservatives'…
skillful economic management, the reformed immigration system, the uncompromising defence of Israel and Ukraine, and the fight against terrorism, while critics accuse the Harper government of being autocratic, secretive and cruel. Ibbitson explores Harper’s suburban youth, the forces that shaped his tempestuous relationship with Reform Leader Preston Manning, how Laureen Harper influences her husband, his devotion to his children--and his cats. Ibbitson explains how this shy, closed, introverted loner united a fractured conservative movement, defeated a Liberal hegemony, and set out to reshape the nation. Bestseller. Winner of the 2015 Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing. 2015.Spiritus mundi: essays on literature, myth, and society
By Northrop Frye. 1976
This collection of essays reflects Frye's personal views and the experiences in his life which fostered them. The essays are…
divided into three sections: Contexts of literature; Mythological universe; and Four poets, which are studies of John Milton, William Blake, William Butler Yeats and Wallace Stevens.Social studies
By Fran Lebowitz. 1981
Collection of 26 humorous essays on apartment hunting in the city, cigarette smoking, diets, pet owning, and other behaviour of…
the American species near the end of the 20th century. c1981.Snakecharmers in Texas: essays 1980-87
By Clive James. 1988
Clive James has produced a collection of essays on subjects which he claims to have a great interest in. James'…
obvious intelligence, imagination and irreverence known to many millions across the world is used to great effect in comprehending and aiding the reader to understand what makes human beings tick. His Australian patriotism comes through in his naming of the first part "Australian sons". Includes strong language. 1988.Slouching towards Bethlehem
By Joan Didion. 1990
A collection of essays which captures the mood of late 1960s America, especially the center of its counterculture, California. Keynoted…
by a report on San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury, they all reflect that, in one way or another, things are falling apart, "the center cannot hold." 1990.