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Showing 1 - 20 of 34 items
By Anne Applebaum. 2003
Washington Post columnist documents the evolution of the Soviet Union's forced labour camp system - from its origins during the…
Bolshevik Revolution, expansion under Stalin, and its dissolution after the dictator's death. The chronicle also examines the lives of prisoners and the unique society they formed. Some descriptions of sex and violence. 2003.Ten well-planned major robberies reveal the ingenuity of the criminal mind, from Dan Cooper, who parachuted from a Boeing 727…
with $200,000, to the small band of Italians who stole the world-famous Mona Lisa. There are seven extra stories in the opening chapter, including that of the Parisian actor and civil servant who destroyed the files against his friends during the French Revolution - by eating them! Grades 5-8. Winner of the 2007 Red Maple Award. 2005.By Caroline Elkins. 2005
Recovers the lost history of the last days of British colonialism in Kenya. In the aftermath of World War II…
and the triumph of liberal democracy over fascism, the British detained and brutalised hundreds of thousands of Kikuyu - the colony's largest ethnic group - who had demanded their independence. Winner of the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for general non-fiction. Explicit descriptions of sex and violence, some strong language. 2005.By David G McCullough. 2001
Award-winning author chronicles the life and times of America's second president, New Englander John Adams (1735-1826). Examines his pivotal role…
as revolutionary, diplomat, and politician as well as his friendship - and rivalry - with Thomas Jefferson. Primary sources detail his relationship with his wife, Abigail, four children, and notable contemporaries. Pulitzer Prize winner. Bestseller. 2001.By David M Oshinsky. 2005
Account of the twentieth-century search for a polio vaccine and the rivalries that developed between competing medical researchers, notably Jonas…
Salk, Albert Sabin, and Hilary Koprowski. Traces the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis campaigns and the public health experiment involving Salk's vaccine. Evokes the widespread panic over the disease. Winner of the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for history. 2005.By Stephen Clarkson, Christina McCall. 1990
Examines the formative influences on Pierre Trudeau's childhood, his knight-errant youth, his charismatic ascent to the Liberal Party leadership, and…
his dramatic first decade as prime minister. Concludes with his bittersweet triumphs in fighting off the separatists in the 1980 referendum campaign and his battle with provincial premiers to patriate the Canadian constitution. Followed by "Trudeau and our times. v. 2: the heroic delusion". Winner of the 1990 Governor General's Award for Non-fiction. Bestseller. 1990.By Joan Didion. 2005
Writer reflects on her emotional response to the unexpected death of her husband, John Gregory Dunne, after a visit to…
their comatose daughter. Discusses the shock of suddenly facing a crisis, the memory of their time together as a family, and the meaning of marriage. National Book Award. Bestseller. 2005.By Tennessee Williams. 1986
Maggie the Cat fights for the lives of her damaged and drinking husband Brick, herself, and their unborn children in…
the revised version of the dramatization of Big Daddy's birthday and deathday party and family gathering. Winner of the 1955 Pulitzer Prize for drama.By Evelyn M Richardson. 1995
The author describes the life of her family as keepers of a lighthouse on the little island of Bon Portage…
off the coast of Nova Scotia. Though isolated, the family enjoyed the responsibilities and pleasures of island living, and the natural beauty around them. Winner of the 1945 Governor General's Award for Non-fiction. c1945, 1995.By John Vaillant. 2005
In 1997, when a shattered kayak and camping gear are found on an Alaskan island north of the Canadian border,…
they reignite a mystery surrounding a shocking act of protest. The author braids together the strands of this mystery and brings to life the historical collision of Europeans and the Haida and the harrowing world of logging. Canada Reads 2012. Winner of the 2005 Governor General's Award for Non-fiction. Bestseller. 2005.By Karen Levine. 2002
In March 2000, a suitcase arrived at a children's Holocaust education centre in Tokyo, Japan, with the name Hana Brady…
painted in white on the outside. The centre's curator searches for clues across Europe and North America to find out who Hana was and what had happened to her. Her journey takes her back through seventy years to a young Hana and her family, whose happy life in a small Czech town was turned upside down by the invasion of the Nazis. Winner of the 2003 Silver Birch Award. Winner of the 2003 CNIB Tiny Torgi Award. Grades 4-7. 2002.By Will Ferguson. 2004
The author has spent the past three years criss-crossing Canada, from Cape Spear on the coast of Newfoundland to the…
sun-dappled streets of Olde Victoria. He weaves his own experiences into those of the larger Canadian narrative. What he discovers along the way is that Canada is not so much a country as a collection of outposts - not only geographically, but culturally and linguistically. Some strong language. Winner of the 2005 Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal. 2004.By Rosemary Sullivan. 1995
Using the personal impressions of the poet's intimate friends, Rosemary Sullivan builds a composite portrait of Gwendolyn MacEwan, the Toronto…
poet who died in 1987 at the age of 46. The daughter of an alcoholic father and mentally ill mother, MacEwen's story is a painful one, yet the richness of her art and inner life redeemed the pain. Winner of the 1995 Governor General's Award for Non-fiction.By Heather Anne Pringle. 2001
After covering a conference of mummy experts, science reporter Heather Pringle became so intrigued with mummies that she spent a…
year circling the globe, visiting leading scientists in the field. She also investigated preserved Italian saints, Scandinavian mummies in bogs, and frozen Inca princesses. Pringle researched Egyptian embalmers, the past public craze for mummy unwrappings, and the Russians' attempts to preserve Stalin, and along the way learned what mummies have to tell us about ourselves. Winner of the 2002 CNIB Torgi Award. 2001.By Marq De Villiers. 1999
Everybody needs it to survive, but very few people give it any thought. Water, one of the most plentiful natural…
resources in the world, has the power to give life and to take it away. De Villiers examines the numerous uses of water, the changes that have occurred in the Earth's water supply, the folklore and myths surrounding water, and the future of water as a natural resource. Winner of the 1999 Governor General's Award for Non-fiction. 1999.By David T Suzuki, Amanda McConnell. 1997
With a focus on the oceans and the water which maintains life, Suzuki discusses the need for environmental conservation. He…
argues that too much water, from global warming, or water too foul from pollution, results in the destruction of all life. Winner of the 1999 CNIB Talking Book of the Year Award. 1997.By Warren Cariou. 2002
Cariou's memoir on growing up in Meadow Lake, Saskatchewan, where he witnessed the discrimination, anger and fear directed at the…
town's Cree and Métis populations by the European settlers. While he has absorbed these prejudices as his own, he is forced to confront the politics of race as an adult. Then, he discovers secrets that his family had kept hidden for generations, secrets that would alter forever his sense of identity and belonging in Meadow Lake. Winner of the Drainie-Taylor Biography Prize of the 2003 Writers' Trust of Canada Awards. 2002.By Margaret MacMillan. 2001
Analyzes the failure of the Versailles Peace Conference after World War I. Focuses on the nationalistic goals of American president…
Woodrow Wilson, French premier Georges Clemenceau, and British Prime Minister David Lloyd George - the author's great-grandfather - as they reorganized the defeated empires and created the League of Nations. Foreword by Richard Holbrooke. Bestseller. Winner of the 2003 Governor General's Award for Non-fiction. Canada Reads 2012. 2001. Uniform title: PeacemakersBy Vivien Bowers. 1999
12-year-old Guy keeps a journal as he tours Canada with his parents and younger sister, Rachel. Learn about each province…
and territory, with information about major cities along the way, and other fun Canadian facts in sections like "According to Mom/Dad", "Exceedingly Weird", and "Food I Was Introduced to for My Own Good". Also included is "Guy's Family Car Trip Survival Tips". Grades 3-6. 1999.By Laura Goodman Salverson, K. P Stich. 1981
Salverson's autobiography describes the struggles of a young Icelandic woman to rise above an early life of poverty, isolation and…
upheaval. It also depicts the sometimes agonizing process of the immigrant, adjusting to a life in a new country. It discusses the discrimination against women and ethnic minorities she encountered as she attempted to fulfill her own dreams. Winner of the 1939 Governor General's Award. (Social History of Canada ; 34)