A Fatal Grace | A Chief Inspector Gamache Mystery, Book 2
Regular price $19.99Previously published as Dead Cold
A New York Times Bestseller
'Chief Superintendent Armand Gamache of the Quebec police isone of the most interesting detectives in crime fiction' The Times
Winter in Three Pines, and the sleepy village is carpeted in snow. It's a time of peace and goodwill - until a scream pierces the biting air. A spectator at the annual Boxing Day curling match has been fatally electrocuted. Despite the large crowd, there are no witnesses and - apparently - no clues.
Chief Inspector Armand Gamache discovers a history of secrets and enemies in the dead woman's past. But he has enemies of his own, and as he is frozen out of decision-making in the Surete du Quebec, he has to decide who he can trust...
'A cracking storyteller, who can create fascinating characters, a twisty plot and wonderful surprise endings' Ann Cleeves
Louise Penny is the number one New York Times bestselling author of the Inspector Gamache series, including Still Life, which won the CWA John Creasey Dagger in 2006. Recipient of virtually every existing award for crime fiction, Louise was also granted the Order of Canada in 2014 and received an honorary doctorate of literature from Carleton University and the Ordre Nationale du Québec in 2017. She lives in a small village south of Montreal.
A World of Curiosities | A Chief Inspector Gamache Mystery, Book 18
Regular price $39.99Chief Inspector Armand Gamache returns in the eighteenth book in #1 New York Times bestseller Louise Penny's beloved series.
It's spring and Three Pines is reemerging after the harsh winter. But not everything buried should come alive again. Not everything lying dormant should reemerge.
But something has.
As the villagers prepare for a special celebration, Armand Gamache and Jean-Guy Beauvoir find themselves increasingly worried. A young man and woman have reappeared in the Surete du Quebec investigators' lives after many years. The two were young children when their troubled mother was murdered, leaving them damaged, shattered. Now they've arrived in the village of Three Pines.
But to what end?
Gamache and Beauvoir's memories of that tragic case, the one that first brought them together, come rushing back. Did their mother's murder hurt them beyond repair? Have those terrible wounds, buried for decades, festered and are now about to erupt?
As Chief Inspector Gamache works to uncover answers, his alarm grows when a letter written by a long dead stone mason is discovered. In it the man describes his terror when bricking up an attic room somewhere in the village. Every word of the 160-year-old letter is filled with dread. When the room is found, the villagers decide to open it up.
As the bricks are removed, Gamache, Beauvoir and the villagers discover a world of curiosities. But the head of homicide soon realizes there's more in that room than meets the eye. There are puzzles within puzzles, and hidden messages warning of mayhem and revenge.
In unsealing that room, an old enemy is released into their world. Into their lives. And into the very heart of Armand Gamache's home.
ABCs of Biology
Regular price $14.99Fans of Chris Ferrie's ABCs of Science, ABCs of Space, and Rocket Science for Babies will love this introduction to biology for babies and toddlers!
This alphabetical installment of the Baby University baby board book series is the perfect introduction to science for infants and toddlers. It makes a wonderful science baby gift for even the youngest biologist. Give the gift of learning to your little one at birthdays, baby showers, holidays, and beyond!
A is for Anatomy
B is for Bacteria
C is for Cell
From anatomy to zoology, the ABCs of Biology is a colorfully simple introduction to STEM for babies and toddlers to a new biology concept for every letter of the alphabet. Written by two experts, each page in this biology primer features multiple levels of text so the book grows along with your little biologist.
If you're looking for the perfect science toys for babies, STEAM books for teachers, or a wonderful baby board book to add to a special baby gift basket, look no further! ABCs of Biology offers fun early learning for your little scientist!
Chris Ferrie is an award-winning physicist and Senior Lecturer for Quantum Software and Information at the University of Technology Sydney. He has a Masters in Applied Mathematics, BMath in Mathematical Physics and a PhD in Applied Mathematics. He lives in Australia with his wife and children. Cara Florance has a PhD in Biochemsitry from the University of Colorado Boulder and BS in Chemistry from Iona College. She enjoys cooking, fermenting, and experimenting in the kitchen, and she loves hanging out with her awesome, creative kids.
Birdsong
Regular price $22.95A touching and thoughtful gift for the art lovers in your life.
BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: PUBLISHERS WEEKLY, SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL, KIRKUS, HORN BOOK, QUILL & QUIRE, GLOBE AND MAIL
WINNER OF THE TD CANADIAN CHILDREN'S LITERATURE AWARD
FINALIST FOR THE GOVERNOR GENERAL'S AWARD
AN AMERICAN INDIAN YOUTH LITERATURE HONOR TITLE
A BOSTON GLOBE--HORN BOOK HONOR BOOK
When Katherena and her mother move to a small town, Katherena feels lonely and out of place. But when she meets an elderly woman artist who lives next door, named Agnes--her world starts to change.
Katherena and Agnes share the same passions for arts and crafts, birds, and nature. But as the seasons change, can Katherena navigate the failing health of her new friend?
Award-winning author and artist Julie Flett's textured images of birds, flowers, art, and landscapes bring vibrancy and warmth to this powerful story, which highlights the fulfillment of intergenerational relationships, shared passions, and spending time outdoors with the ones we love.
Includes a glossary and pronunciation guide to Cree words that appear in the text.
"Cree-Métis author/illustrator Julie Flett's smooth and lyrical words and gorgeous... images truly capture the warmth and solidarity of the female protagonists in this tender intergenerational friendship story."-The Horn Book
"Cycling from spring to spring, [Julie Flett's] subtle, sensitive story delicately traces filaments of growth and loss through intergenerational friendship, art making, and changing moons and seasons." -Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Black Bear Red Fox: Colours in Cree
Regular price $12.00Winner of 2018 American Indian Youth Literature Award. Learn about animals in English and Cree with Julie Flett's second book with us. Each page features stunning illustrated animals alongside flower and colour words with a pronunciation guide in front. Soy based ink and water based protective coating. Made from paper sourced from sustainable forests.
Discovering Words: English * French * Cree
Regular price $10.00Neepin Auger’s colourful board books for infants have collectively sold well over 20,000 copies since they first appeared on the market. With more and more parents and educators looking for Indigenous resources, this paperback edition of Discovering Words will bring the experience of learning French and Cree to a whole new group of early elementary school-aged kids.
In addition to the English words presented, the French and Cree equivalents are also given, along with pronunciation support, making these some of the most dynamic and useful picture books on the market, perfectly suitable for the classroom, library, and playroom.
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Neepin Auger is a Cree artist, educator, and mother. Originally from the Bigstone Cree Nation in northern Alberta, she has been painting for over ten years, having studied art under her father, Dale Auger, a renowned First Nations artist and author of the award-winning children’s book Mwakwa – Talks to the Loon: A Cree Story for Children. Neepin graduated from the department of education and schooling at Mount Royal University and is now a full-time teacher. She is also mother to one daughter, Gracie, whom she believes is her greatest masterpiece. Neepin’s titles for children include Discovering Animals: English * French * Cree, Discovering Numbers: English * French * Cree, Discovering People: English * French * Cree, and Discovering Words: English * French * Cree. All of the titles in the series are available as boardbooks (newborn to age 3), paperbacks (ages 3–5), and ebooks. Neepin Auger lives in Calgary, Alberta.
Evolution for Babies
Regular price $14.99Fans of Chris Ferrie's Quantum Physics for Babies, ABCs of Science, and Organic Chemistry for Babies will love this introduction to evolutionary biology for babies and toddlers!
Help your future genius become the smartest baby in the room! It only takes a small spark to ignite a child's mind.
Written by an expert, Evolution for Babies is a colorfully simple introduction to evolutionary biology. Babies (and grownups!) will learn how organisms mutate, evolve, and survive. Co-written by Cara Florance, who has a PhD in Biochemistry and a BS in Chemistry with work experience in astrobiololgy and radiation decontamination. With a tongue-in-cheek approach that adults will love, this installment of the Baby University board book series is the perfect way to introduce basic concepts to even the youngest scientists. After all, it's never too early to become a scientist!
If you're looking for the perfect science baby gifts, science for babies, or evolution for kids, look no further! Evolution for Babies offers fun early learning for your little scientist!
Chris Ferrie is an award-winning physicist and Senior Lecturer for Quantum Software and Information at the University of Technology Sydney. He has a Masters in Applied Mathematics, BMath in Mathematical Physics and a PhD in Applied Mathematics. He lives in Australia with his wife and children. Cara Florance has a PhD in Biochemsitry from the University of Colorado Boulder and BS in Chemistry from Iona College. She enjoys cooking, fermenting, and experimenting in the kitchen, and she loves hanging out with her awesome, creative kids.
Good Morning, Canada
Regular price $8.99As the pages turn on bright scenes and changing seasons across the country, rhyming text cheerily greets the sights and sounds of a Canadian morning.
From a pair of moose spied through an open tent flap at sunrise to a gaggle of Canada geese at a school bus stop, a morning game of shinny on an outdoor rink, and checking the sap buckets at a maple syrup farm, these inviting pages capture a familiar Canada that will delight young readers.
Adorable children and animals fill the pages, with scenes to pore over again and again. Each spread includes a dog, a stuffed teddy bear, and a Canadian flag for readers to find. A perfect companion to Goodnight, Canada!
"A bedtime story, geography lesson, and puzzle book all in one . . . gentle and imaginative, [Goodnight, Canada] should be a hit among parents and young children, who will eagerly immerse themselves in this rich portrait of their native land." —Quill & Quire
"Young readers will enjoy the rhyming text and become absorbed in examining every detail of the rich illustrations that depict representative features of each province and territory." —CBC Parents
"Goodnight, Canada is a soothing story that will both delight and calm children . . . [it] is a wonderful story to share with young children at bedtime and will likely become a favourite of children and parents alike." —CM: Canadian Review of Materials
"A loving homage to all the provinces and territories of Canada. Her marvelous illustrations give the simple tale both warmth and heart . . . [they] make the book come alive with the whimsical details that reflect each place he says goodnight to." —Resource Links
Hotline
Regular price $21.95
A vivid love letter to the 1980s and one woman’s struggle to overcome the challenges of immigration.
It’s 1986, and Muna Heddad is in a bind. She and her son have moved to Montreal, leaving behind a civil war filled with bad memories in Lebanon. She had plans to find work as a French teacher, but no one in Quebec trusts her to teach the language. She needs to start making money, and fast. The only work Muna can find is at a weight-loss center as a hotline operator.
All day, she takes calls from people responding to ads seen in magazines or on TV. On the phone, she’s Mona, and she’s quite good at listening. These strangers all have so much to say once someone shows interest in their lives–marriages gone bad, parents dying, isolation, personal inadequacies. Even as her daily life in Canada is filled with invisible barriers at every turn, at the office Muna is privy to her clients’ deepest secrets.
Following international acclaim for Niko (2011) and The Bleeds (2018), Dimitri Nasrallah has written a vivid elegy to the 1980s, the years he first moved to Canada, bringing the era’s systemic challenges into the current moment through this deeply endearing portrait of struggle, perseverance, and bonding.
Awards: Longlist - 2022 Scotiabank Giller Prize
Canada Reads Selection 2023
Praise:
“Nasrallah’s fourth novel, it takes his work to a new level of sophistication and constitutes a significant addition to the literary chronicling of the Canadian immigrant experience.” – Ian McGillis, Montreal Gazette
“Hotline intertwines hope and sorrow to create a moving story that sears the heart.” - Zeahaa Rehman, Quill & Quire
“I admire how Nasrallah plumbs new territory with each novel. That said, underlying themes and concerns thread through his oeuvre, such as emotional and geographic exile and ‘family.’" - Ami Sands Brodoff, Montreal Review of Books
“A quietly transformative story, one that takes your assumptions, twists them into a shape you didn’t initially see and casts them back at you in a really lovely way.” - Alison Manley, Miramichi Reader
"Fiction about immigrants tends toward melancholy and tragedy. Dimitri Nasrallah’s new novel delivers something different. Hotline suggests that immigrant literature may be able to navigate its own course between the Scylla of despair and the Charybdis of naïveté. The problems of bootstraps narratives aside, happy endings are still worth writing." – Amanda Perry, The Walrus
“Nasrallah’s fourth novel, it takes his work to a new level of sophistication and constitutes a significant addition to the literary chronicling of the Canadian immigrant experience.” – Ian McGillis, Montreal Gazette
“Hotline intertwines hope and sorrow to create a moving story that sears the heart.” - Zeahaa Rehman, Quill & Quire
“I admire how Nasrallah plumbs new territory with each novel. That said, underlying themes and concerns thread through his oeuvre, such as emotional and geographic exile and ‘family.’" - Ami Sands Brodoff, Montreal Review of Books
“A quietly transformative story, one that takes your assumptions, twists them into a shape you didn’t initially see and casts them back at you in a really lovely way.” - Alison Manley, Miramichi Reader
"Fiction about immigrants tends toward melancholy and tragedy. Dimitri Nasrallah’s new novel delivers something different. Hotline suggests that immigrant literature may be able to navigate its own course between the Scylla of despair and the Charybdis of naïveté. The problems of bootstraps narratives aside, happy endings are still worth writing." – Amanda Perry, The Walrus
How Well Do You Know Canada?
Regular price $18.00Oh Canada! Impress friends and family with your knowledge about Canada with this trivia quiz, with 140 multiple choice question cards. Answer questions across a variety of topics relating to Canada, including history and culture. Presented in a bright geometric print box. Full instructions included.
It's a Mitig!
Regular price $22.95Giizis—the sun—rises. What’s hiding in the trees?
It’s a Mitig! guides young readers through the forest while introducing them to Ojibwe words for nature. From sunup to sundown, encounter an amik playing with sticks and swimming in the river, a prickly gaag hiding in the bushes and a big, bark-covered mitig.
Featuring vibrant and playful artwork, an illustrated Ojibwe-to-English glossary and a simple introduction to the double-vowel pronunciation system, plus accompanying online recordings, It’s a Mitig! is one of the first books of its kind. It was created for young children and their families with the heartfelt desire to spark a lifelong interest in learning language.
Let's Go!
Regular price $23.95An extraordinary book that celebrates skateboarding, family, and community, from beloved artist and author Julie Flett, a winner of the New York Times / New York Public Library Best Illustrated Children’s Book Award.
Every day, a little boy watches kids pass by on skateboards, and dreams of joining them. One day, his mother brings a surprise: her old skateboard, just for him! haw êkwa! Let’s go! Together, they practice on the sidewalk, at the park, in Auntie’s yard—everywhere. But when it comes time to try the skatepark, the skateboarders crash down like a waterfall. Can he find the confidence to join them?
Let’s Go! features:
This fun and touching story is a tribute to family, friendship, and perseverance. Julie Flett’s renowned art and powerful text shows a community of support is all around, ready to help each other… go!
My First Wipe Clean: Games, Mazes, & Drawings
Regular price $15.95Bright, bold and full of fun activities, this book will help young children build early skills such as counting, matching, finding similarities and differences, sorting and selecting. The 14 large ereasable boards and the wipe-clean pen will allow children to start over if they make a mistake or just want to redo a fun activity over and over again.
The Paper Bag Princess
Regular price $7.95What if your imagination runs wild? New York Times bestselling creator Renata Liwska explores what if" scenarios from silly to serious, examining the curiosities of everyday life and celebrating the power of imagination. Ideal for children 3-7 who are stuck inside or learning to cope with new uncertainties, The Little Book of Big What-Ifs is perfect for fans of I Wish You More and The Quiet Book .
Every day is filled with opportunities to wonder . . . what if?
In this charming book of big questions for little readers, New York Times bestselling creator Renata Liwska explores scenarios that span the spectrum from silly to serious, gently examining both the anxieties and curiosities of everyday life.
Wondering what might happen helps expand our imaginations, whether the options are humorous or thought-provoking-or both!
So: what if . . . you turned the page? "
Renata Liwska lives and works in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. She is the illustrator of the New York Times best-selling and critically acclaimed picture book The Quiet Book written by Deborah Underwood. She has also illustrated a sequel The Loud Book, and the The Christmas Quiet Book . Other books include Places to Be by Mac Barnett, Boom, Snot, Twitty written by Doreen Cronin, and Once Upon a Memory written by Nina Laden. Renata has written and illustrated Red Wagon and Little Panda . Visit her at RenataLiwska.com.
The Sleeping Car Porter
Regular price $23.95WINNER OF THE 2022 SCOTIABANK GILLER PRIZE
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY TOP 20 LITERARY FICTION BOOKS OF 2022
OPRAH DAILY: BOOKS TO READ BY THE FIRE
THE GLOBE 100: THE BEST BOOKS OF 2022
CBC BOOKS: THE BEST CANADIAN FICTION OF 2022
When a mudslide strands a train, Baxter, a queer Black sleeping car porter, must contend with the perils of white passengers, ghosts, and his secret love affair
The Sleeping Car Porter brings to life an important part of Black history in North America, from the perspective of a queer man living in a culture that renders him invisible in two ways. Affecting, imaginative, and visceral enough that you’ll feel the rocking of the train, The Sleeping Car Porter is a stunning accomplishment.
Baxter’s name isn’t George. But it’s 1929, and Baxter is lucky enough, as a Black man, to have a job as a sleeping car porter on a train that crisscrosses the country. So when the passengers call him George, he has to just smile and nod and act invisible. What he really wants is to go to dentistry school, but he’ll have to save up a lot of nickel and dime tips to get there, so he puts up with “George.”
On this particular trip out west, the passengers are more unruly than usual, especially when the train is stalled for two extra days; their secrets start to leak out and blur with the sleep-deprivation hallucinations Baxter is having. When he finds a naughty postcard of two queer men, Baxter’s memories and longings are reawakened; keeping it puts his job in peril, but he can’t part with the postcard or his thoughts of Edwin Drew, Porter Instructor.
"Suzette Mayr’s The Sleeping Car Porter offers a richly detailed account of a particular occupation and time—train porter on a Canadian passenger train in 1929—and unforcedly allows it to illuminate the societal strictures imposed on black men at the time—and today. Baxter is a secretly-queer and sleep-deprived porter saving up for dental school, working a system that periodically assigns unexplained demerits, and once a certain threshold is reached, the porter loses his job. Thus, success is impossible, the best one can do is to fail slowly. As Baxter takes a cross-continental run, the boarding passengers have more secrets than an Agatha Christie cast, creating a powder keg on train tracks. The Sleeping Car Porter is an engaging and illuminating novel about the costs of work, service, and secrets." – Keith Mosman, Powell's Books
“Mayr’s prose is vivid but never overwrought, capturing the surrealism of intense fatigue in constant motion … Readers will be captivated.” – Publishers Weekly, starred review
"In 1929, being a passenger train porter was fraught with challenges...Baxter’s own sleep deprivation is perhaps the most intriguing character of the book. It leads to hallucinations, questionable decisions, and borderline supernatural suggestions."– Kirkus Reviews
"Suzette Mayr’s novel The Sleeping Car Porter an artfully constructed story that moves, beguiles, and satisfies." – Brett Josef Grubisic, The Toronto Star
"Suzette Mayr brings to life –believably, achingly, thrillingly –a whole world contained in a passenger train moving across the Canadian vastness, nearly one hundred years ago. As only occurs in the finest historical novels, every page in The Sleeping Car Porter feels alive and immediate –and eerily contemporary. The sleeping car porter in this sleek, stylish novel is named R.T. Baxter –called George by the people upon whom he waits, as is every other Black porter. Baxter’s dream of one day going to school to learn dentistry coexists with his secret life as a gay man, and in Mayr’s triumphant novel we follow him not only from Montreal to Calgary, but into and out of the lives of an indelibly etched cast of supporting characters, and, finally, into a beautifully rendered radiance." – 2022 Scotiabank Giller Prize Jury
"Mayr’s new novel, through painstaking historical research, reconstructs the workdays of a Black, lower-class, closeted gay man." – Reinhold Kramer, The Winnipeg Free Press
"Baxter works the trains as they run from Toronto to Winnipeg, through Calgary and Banff to Vancouver. Passengers on board wrestle with the details of their lives: hats and weddings, books and paperwork, drinks and cigars, childhood loss and bad telegrams, boots to be shined, a scrutinized pocket watch, communication with the dead. Baxter continuously serves them, ever watchful, needing perfection. Ten more demerits will get him fired, and a black man hiding his desire for other men has plenty of reasons to fear being targeted by whites with money. Endless patience is required to be a sleeping car porter. He's always exhausted, but it's a job, and he's saving, determined to pay for school and become a dentist who will one day be important. Then he'll be the one riding. For now, his dreams keep him alive, and time spent with people shoved together in tight spaces can shake up whole worlds. In the end, it's a little girl who fully reveals him. She’s just lost her mother and won't sleep, clinging to Baxter instead. This is intensely researched historical fiction that doesn’t feel like history. It feels like heart." – Tim McCarthy, Boswell Book Company, Milwaukee, WI
"Mayr evokes the mystique of transcontinental travel and the tumult of lives on the margins in this much-anticipated period novel. All aboard!" – Oprah Daily
“I couldn’t help imagining what a film Wes Anderson might make of Suzette Mayr’s The Sleeping Car Porter. The novel’s main character is a gay Black porter riding the rails in 1920’s Canada, coping with a horde of difficult long-haul passengers, including a child who appears to have permanently attached herself to his leg. Terrified that a breach of one of the railway’s insanely restrictive rules will get him fired before he can save enough money for dental school, he amuses himself—and keeps awake on his grueling shifts—by imagining the medical horrors that lie behind the smiles (or grimaces) of his clientele.” – The New York Times
This is How I Disappear
Regular price $29.95An affecting glimpse into the ways millennials cope with mental health struggles
Clara's at a breaking point. She's got writer's block, her friends ask a lot without giving much, her psychologist is useless, and her demanding publishing job leaves little time for self care. She seeks solace in the community around her, yet, while her friends provide support and comfort, she is often left feeling empty, unable to express an underlying depression that leaves her immobilized and stifles any attempts at completing her poetry collection. In This Is How I Disappear, Mirion Malle paints an empathetic portrait of a young woman wrestling with psychological stress and the trauma following a sexual assault.
Malle displays frankness and a remarkable emotional intelligence as she explores depression, isolation, and self-harm in her expertly drawn novel. Her heroine battles an onslaught of painful emotions and while Clara can provide consolation to those around her, she finds it difficult to bestow the same understanding on herself. Only when she allows her community to guide her toward self-love does she find relief.
Filled with 21st century idioms and social media communication, This Is How I Disappear opens a window onto the lives of young people as they face a barrage of mental health hurdles. Scenes of sisterhood, fun nights out singing karaoke, and impromptu FaceTime therapy sessions show how this generation is coping, connecting, and healing together.
Mirion Malle is a French cartoonist and illustrator who lives in Montreal. She studied comics at the École Superieure des Arts Saint-Luc in Brussels before pursuing a master's degree in sociology specializing in gender and feminist studies, via Université Paris Diderot and the Université du Québec á Montréal. Malle has published three books. The League of Super Feminists was her first book to be translated into English and was nominated for the 2020 Prix Jeunesse at the Angoulême International Comics Festival.