New Titles

We should all be feminists

Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi, 1977-


"An Anchor Books original"--Title page verso. " ... first presented as a TED Talk given in the United Kingdom at TEDxEuston, in 2012"--Title page verso. Offers an updated definition of feminism for the twenty-first century, one rooted in inclusion and awareness.
Date Published:2015

The migrant rain falls in reverse : a memoir

Nguyen, Vinh (Associate professor)


Certainty -- The Migrant Rain -- Here -- Four Photos -- On the Back of a Tiger -- An Acute Accent -- Waiting -- Houston -- A Made-Up History -- The Last Emperor -- Decision to Leave -- A New Life Begins -- Kill Your Father -- Mother Narrator -- Flights --Falling in Reverse -- Chonburi. "With the Fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975, the war in Vietnam ended, but the refugee crisis was only beginning. Among the millions of people who fled Vietnam by boat was Vinh Nguyen, along with his mother and siblings, and his father, who left separately and mysteriously vanished in the open waters. Decades later, Nguyen goes looking for answers. What he discovers is a sea of questions and buried truths. To find his father--and anchor himself in the present--Nguyen must piece together the debris of history with family stories that have been scattered across generations and continents, kept for years in broken hearts and guarded silences. By returning to the past, Nguyen sheds light on the psyche of a grieving person who chases certainty and seeks resolution. As the fiftieth anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War approaches, Nguyen takes readers on a poignant tour of disappeared refugee camps, abandoned family homes and sinking boats. Along the way he examines strange reunions, stunted languages and unspoken conversations, and explores final films, migration photographs and impossible decisions. Part fractured reminiscence, part invented history and part fictional fabulation, Nguyen's story is about learning to live with what's already lost and the memories of what might have been.
Date Published:2025

Certainty -- The Migrant Rain -- Here -- Four Photos -- On the Back of a Tiger -- An Acute Accent -- Waiting -- Houston -- A Made-Up History -- The Last Emperor -- Decision to Leave -- A New Life Begins -- Kill Your Father -- Mother Narrator -- Flights --Falling in Reverse -- Chonburi. "With the Fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975, the war in Vietnam ended, but the refugee crisis was only beginning. Among the millions of people who fled Vietnam by boat was Vinh Nguyen, along with his mother and siblings, and his father, who left separately and mysteriously vanished in the open waters. Decades later, Nguyen goes looking for answers. What he discovers is a sea of questions and buried truths. To find his father--and anchor himself in the present--Nguyen must piece together the debris of history with family stories that have been scattered across generations and continents, kept for years in broken hearts and guarded silences. By returning to the past, Nguyen sheds light on the psyche of a grieving person who chases certainty and seeks resolution. As the fiftieth anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War approaches, Nguyen takes readers on a poignant tour of disappeared refugee camps, abandoned family homes and sinking boats. Along the way he examines strange reunions, stunted languages and unspoken conversations, and explores final films, migration photographs and impossible decisions. Part fractured reminiscence, part invented history and part fictional fabulation, Nguyen's story is about learning to live with what's already lost and the memories of what might have been.

Date Published:2025

The orphan master's son : a novel

Johnson, Adam, 1967-


Includes reader's guide (p. [449]-456). Part one. The biography of Jun Do -- Part two. The confessions of Commander Ga. The son of an influential father who runs an orphan work camp, Pak Jun Do rises to prominence using instinctive talents and eventually becomes a professional kidnapper and romantic rival to Kim Jong Il.
Date Published:2012

Best of all worlds

Oppel, Kenneth, 1967-


Xavier Oaks doesn't particularly want to go to the cabin with his dad and his dad's pregnant new wife, Nia. But family obligations are family obligations, and it's only for a short time. So he leaves his mom, his brother, and his other friends behind for a week in the woods. Only . . . one morning he wakes up and the house isn't where it was before. It's like it's been lifted and placed . . . somewhere else. When Xavier, his dad, and Nia go explore, they find they are inside a dome, trapped. And there's no one else around . . . Until, three years later, another family arrives. Is there any escape? Is there a reason they are stuck where they are? Different people have different answers -- and those different answers inexorably lead to tension, strife, and sacrifice.
Date Published:2025

Xavier Oaks doesn't particularly want to go to the cabin with his dad and his dad's pregnant new wife, Nia. But family obligations are family obligations, and it's only for a short time. So he leaves his mom, his brother, and his other friends behind for a week in the woods. Only . . . one morning he wakes up and the house isn't where it was before. It's like it's been lifted and placed . . . somewhere else. When Xavier, his dad, and Nia go explore, they find they are inside a dome, trapped. And there's no one else around . . . Until, three years later, another family arrives. Is there any escape? Is there a reason they are stuck where they are? Different people have different answers -- and those different answers inexorably lead to tension, strife, and sacrifice.

Date Published:2025

King : a life : young adult edition

Eig, Jonathan,


The early years -- The movement begins -- The movement expands -- Demands on Washington -- The fight for voting rights -- Uprisings and war -- Poverty and promise. Adapted from "the first full biography in decades, 'King' mixes ... research with brisk and accessible storytelling to forge the definitive life for our times"--
Date Published:2023

Out of the sun : on race and storytelling

Edugyan, Esi,


Two-time Scotiabank Giller Prize winner and internationally bestselling author Esi Edugyan delivers an incisive analysis of the relationship between race and art. History is a construction. What happens when we begin to consider stories at the margins, when we grant them centrality? How does that complicate our certainties about who we are, as individuals, as nations, as human beings? Through the lens of visual art, literature, film, and the author's lived experience, Out of the Sun examines the depiction of Black histories in art, offering new perspectives to challenge the accepted narrative.
Date Published:2021

Two-time Scotiabank Giller Prize winner and internationally bestselling author Esi Edugyan delivers an incisive analysis of the relationship between race and art. History is a construction. What happens when we begin to consider stories at the margins, when we grant them centrality? How does that complicate our certainties about who we are, as individuals, as nations, as human beings? Through the lens of visual art, literature, film, and the author's lived experience, Out of the Sun examines the depiction of Black histories in art, offering new perspectives to challenge the accepted narrative.

Date Published:2021

Pourin' down rain : a Black woman claims her place in the Canadian West

Foggo, Cheryl.


"First published in 1990, Pourin' Down Rain is a coming-of-age memoir about growing up in prairie communities with small Black populations. It thematizes the family, civil rights, and the learned art of Black Canadian storytelling. She drew much of the material from an unpublished manuscript called "The Story of My Father's Life," written by Daisy Smith Mayes Williams, Foggo's grandfather's sister. This manuscript remains in Foggo's personal archive. Pourin' Down Rain was a finalist for the Alberta Culture Non-Fiction Prize in 1990. A revised and updated 30th anniversary edition of Pourin' Down Rain is going to be released in 2020 by Brush Education and an audiobook is being released by ECW press as part of its Bespoke series of Canadian classics."--Provided by publisher.
Date Published:2020

"First published in 1990, Pourin' Down Rain is a coming-of-age memoir about growing up in prairie communities with small Black populations. It thematizes the family, civil rights, and the learned art of Black Canadian storytelling. She drew much of the material from an unpublished manuscript called "The Story of My Father's Life," written by Daisy Smith Mayes Williams, Foggo's grandfather's sister. This manuscript remains in Foggo's personal archive. Pourin' Down Rain was a finalist for the Alberta Culture Non-Fiction Prize in 1990. A revised and updated 30th anniversary edition of Pourin' Down Rain is going to be released in 2020 by Brush Education and an audiobook is being released by ECW press as part of its Bespoke series of Canadian classics."--Provided by publisher.

Date Published:2020

The tiger and the cosmonaut : a novel

Boudel Tan, Eddy, 1983-


"Casper Han grew up the dutiful son of immigrants who never felt entirely welcome in their remote corner of British Columbia. Now an adult, living in Vancouver with a boyfriend whose privilege he quietly resents, Casper rarely returns to his hometown, the site of a grief his family doesn't discuss: the loss of his twin brother, Sam. Over twenty years have passed since Sam went missing, and a crisis brings Casper and his siblings back. Their father has vanished, only to be found wandering the vast woods beyond the family home, confused and clutching a pair of scissors, seemingly trapped in the memory of that tragic night. In order to move forward, the Han family must finally confront the past and untangle the mystery of what really happened to Sam."--Back cover.
Date Published:2025

"Casper Han grew up the dutiful son of immigrants who never felt entirely welcome in their remote corner of British Columbia. Now an adult, living in Vancouver with a boyfriend whose privilege he quietly resents, Casper rarely returns to his hometown, the site of a grief his family doesn't discuss: the loss of his twin brother, Sam. Over twenty years have passed since Sam went missing, and a crisis brings Casper and his siblings back. Their father has vanished, only to be found wandering the vast woods beyond the family home, confused and clutching a pair of scissors, seemingly trapped in the memory of that tragic night. In order to move forward, the Han family must finally confront the past and untangle the mystery of what really happened to Sam."--Back cover.

Date Published:2025

The little frog's guide to life

Eequay, Maybell,


The little frog is back! Brimming with affirmations to live by and pearls of wisdom, the internet's most adorable amphibian returns to help you move through your days with self-love and kindness. Whether you're looking for hope, motivation or encouragement, let the little frog inspire you to embrace life - with all its ups and downs - and fill your world with the people and things that bring you joy.
Date Published:2025

The little frog is back! Brimming with affirmations to live by and pearls of wisdom, the internet's most adorable amphibian returns to help you move through your days with self-love and kindness. Whether you're looking for hope, motivation or encouragement, let the little frog inspire you to embrace life - with all its ups and downs - and fill your world with the people and things that bring you joy.

Date Published:2025

The future

Leroux, Catherine, 1979-


Translation of: L'avenir. In an alternate history of Detroit, the Motor City was never surrendered to the US. Its residents deal with pollution, poverty, and the legacy of racism—and strange and magical things are happening: children rule over their own kingdom in the trees and burned houses regenerate themselves. When Gloria arrives looking for answers and her missing granddaughters, at first she finds only a hungry mouse in the derelict home where her daughter was murdered. But the neighbors take pity on her and she turns to their resilience and impressive gardens for sustenance. When a strange intuition sends Gloria into the woods of Parc Rouge, where the city’s orphaned and abandoned children are rumored to have created their own society, she can’t imagine the strength she will find.
Date Published:2023

Translation of: L'avenir. In an alternate history of Detroit, the Motor City was never surrendered to the US. Its residents deal with pollution, poverty, and the legacy of racism—and strange and magical things are happening: children rule over their own kingdom in the trees and burned houses regenerate themselves. When Gloria arrives looking for answers and her missing granddaughters, at first she finds only a hungry mouse in the derelict home where her daughter was murdered. But the neighbors take pity on her and she turns to their resilience and impressive gardens for sustenance. When a strange intuition sends Gloria into the woods of Parc Rouge, where the city’s orphaned and abandoned children are rumored to have created their own society, she can’t imagine the strength she will find.

Date Published:2023

Word problems : poems

Williams, Ian, 1979-


It is possible to move on without moving forward -- I will never leave thee nor forsake thee -- Word problems -- Midas -- Corrections -- Affect. Poems that use the language of math problems to ask ethical questions.
Date Published:2020

Generation dread : finding purpose in an age of climate crisis

Wray, Britt,


Climate and environment-related fears and anxieties are on the rise everywhere. As with any type of stress, eco-anxiety can lead to lead to burnout, avoidance, or a disturbance of daily functioning. In Generation Dread, Britt Wray seamlessly merges scientific knowledge with emotional insight to show how these intense feelings are a healthy response to the troubled state of the world. The first crucial step toward becoming an engaged steward of the planet is connecting with our climate emotions, seeing them as a sign of humanity, and learning how to live with them. We have to face and value eco-anxiety, Wray argues, before we can conquer the deeply ingrained, widespread reactions of denial and disavowal that have led humanity to this alarming period of ecological decline. Weaving in insights from climate-aware therapists, critical perspectives on race and privilege in this crisis, ideas about the future of mental health innovation, and creative coping strategies, Generation Dread brilliantly illuminates how we can learn from the past, from our own emotions, and from each other to survive and even thrive in a changing world.
Date Published:2023

Climate and environment-related fears and anxieties are on the rise everywhere. As with any type of stress, eco-anxiety can lead to lead to burnout, avoidance, or a disturbance of daily functioning. In Generation Dread, Britt Wray seamlessly merges scientific knowledge with emotional insight to show how these intense feelings are a healthy response to the troubled state of the world. The first crucial step toward becoming an engaged steward of the planet is connecting with our climate emotions, seeing them as a sign of humanity, and learning how to live with them. We have to face and value eco-anxiety, Wray argues, before we can conquer the deeply ingrained, widespread reactions of denial and disavowal that have led humanity to this alarming period of ecological decline. Weaving in insights from climate-aware therapists, critical perspectives on race and privilege in this crisis, ideas about the future of mental health innovation, and creative coping strategies, Generation Dread brilliantly illuminates how we can learn from the past, from our own emotions, and from each other to survive and even thrive in a changing world.

Date Published:2023

Pick a colour : a novel

Thammavongsa, Souvankham, 1978-


Ning is a retired boxer, but to the customers who visit her nail salon, she is just another worker named Susan. On this summer's day, much like any other, the Susans buff and clip and polish and tweeze. They listen and smile and nod. But beneath this superficial veneer, Ning is a woman of rigorous intellect and profound depth. A woman enthralled by the intricacy and rhythms of her work, but also haunted by memories of paths not taken and opportunities lost. A woman navigating the complicated power dynamics among her fellow Susans, whose greatest fears and desires lie just behind the gossip they exchange. As the day's work grinds on, the friction between Ning's two identities—as anonymous manicurist and brilliant observer of her own circumstances—will gather electric and crackling force, and at last demand a reckoning with the way the world of privilege looks at a woman like Ning.
Date Published:2025

Ning is a retired boxer, but to the customers who visit her nail salon, she is just another worker named Susan. On this summer's day, much like any other, the Susans buff and clip and polish and tweeze. They listen and smile and nod. But beneath this superficial veneer, Ning is a woman of rigorous intellect and profound depth. A woman enthralled by the intricacy and rhythms of her work, but also haunted by memories of paths not taken and opportunities lost. A woman navigating the complicated power dynamics among her fellow Susans, whose greatest fears and desires lie just behind the gossip they exchange. As the day's work grinds on, the friction between Ning's two identities—as anonymous manicurist and brilliant observer of her own circumstances—will gather electric and crackling force, and at last demand a reckoning with the way the world of privilege looks at a woman like Ning.

Date Published:2025

Dear Sir, I intend to burn your book : an anatomy of a book burning

Hill, Lawrence, 1957-


Co-published by Canadian Literature Centre/Centre de littérature canadienne.
Date Published:2013

Playground

Powers, Richard, 1957-


When two brilliant misfits bond at an elite Chicago private school--one a white legacy kid named Todd Keane and the other, Rafi Young, a Black scholarship student from the South Side--their friendship seems as boundary-breaking and limitless as the 3,000-year-old board game that brings them together. For a time, not even simultaneously falling in love with Ina Aroita, who grew up in naval bases across the Pacific, shakes them. Until finally it does, with a betrayal that launches all three of them on radically different paths. Rafi disappears into literature, and Ina into art. Todd, who once dreamed of escape into the world beneath the surface of the ocean, revealed to him by the legendary Canadian diver and marine biologist Evie Beaulieu, becomes instead one of the most powerful tech billionaires on the planet whose social media empire, Playground, is remaking the global order with its AI breakthroughs. But not even wild success can insulate Todd from mortality. As illness eats away at the brain that built it all, he dreams of the life that could’ve been and the relationships he should never have let go. Before Todd’s final act is up, past loves and present ambitions collide on the ravaged Polynesian island of Makatea, where an unnamed corporation hopes to build the first floating, autonomous city on the open sea.
Date Published:2025

When two brilliant misfits bond at an elite Chicago private school--one a white legacy kid named Todd Keane and the other, Rafi Young, a Black scholarship student from the South Side--their friendship seems as boundary-breaking and limitless as the 3,000-year-old board game that brings them together. For a time, not even simultaneously falling in love with Ina Aroita, who grew up in naval bases across the Pacific, shakes them. Until finally it does, with a betrayal that launches all three of them on radically different paths. Rafi disappears into literature, and Ina into art. Todd, who once dreamed of escape into the world beneath the surface of the ocean, revealed to him by the legendary Canadian diver and marine biologist Evie Beaulieu, becomes instead one of the most powerful tech billionaires on the planet whose social media empire, Playground, is remaking the global order with its AI breakthroughs. But not even wild success can insulate Todd from mortality. As illness eats away at the brain that built it all, he dreams of the life that could’ve been and the relationships he should never have let go. Before Todd’s final act is up, past loves and present ambitions collide on the ravaged Polynesian island of Makatea, where an unnamed corporation hopes to build the first floating, autonomous city on the open sea.

Date Published:2025

Learned by heart : a novel

Donoghue, Emma, 1969-


Learned by Heart is the long-buried love story of Eliza Raine, an orphan heiress banished from India to England at age six, and Anne Lister, a brilliant, troublesome tomboy, who meet at the Manor School for young ladies in York in 1805 when they are both fourteen.
Date Published:2023

Hullabaloo in the guava orchard

Desai, Kiran, 1971-,


Sampath Chawla was born in a time of drought into a family not quite like other families, in a town not quite like other towns. After years of failure at school, failure at work, of spending his days dreaming in tea stalls, it does not seem as if Sampath is going to amount to much--until one day he climbs a guava tree in search of peaceful contemplation and becomes unexpectedly famous as a holy man, sending his tiny town into turmoil. A syndicate of larcenous, alcoholic monkeys terrorizes the pilgrims who cluster around Sampath's tree, spies and profiteers descend on the town, and none of Desai's outrageous characters goes unaffected as events spin increasingly out of control.
Date Published:2025

Sampath Chawla was born in a time of drought into a family not quite like other families, in a town not quite like other towns. After years of failure at school, failure at work, of spending his days dreaming in tea stalls, it does not seem as if Sampath is going to amount to much--until one day he climbs a guava tree in search of peaceful contemplation and becomes unexpectedly famous as a holy man, sending his tiny town into turmoil. A syndicate of larcenous, alcoholic monkeys terrorizes the pilgrims who cluster around Sampath's tree, spies and profiteers descend on the town, and none of Desai's outrageous characters goes unaffected as events spin increasingly out of control.

Date Published:2025

Tinkers

Harding, Paul, 1967-


An old man lies dying. As time collapses into memory, he travels deep into his past where he is reunited with his father and relives the wonder and pain of his impoverished New England youth.
Date Published:2009

The polished hoe : a novel

Clarke, Austin, 1934-2016,


When Mary-Mathilda, one of the most respected women of the island of Bimshire (also known as Barbados) calls the police to confess to a crime, the result is a shattering all-night vigil that brings together elements of the island's African past and the tragic legacy of colonialism in one epic sweep.
Date Published:2004

The let them theory : a life-changing tool that millions of people can't stop talking about

Robbins, Mel, 1968-


Learn how to be free from the opinions, drama, and judgments of others and the exhausting cycle of trying to manage everything and everyone around you.
Date Published:2024