A young Canadian marches over the Pyrenees and enters into history by joining the International Brigades—men and women from around the world who volunteered to fight against fascism in the Spanish Civil War. This new edition of Ted Allan’s novel, This Time a Better Earth, reintroduces readers to the electrifying milieu of the Spanish Civil War and Madrid, which for a short time in the 1930s became the epicentre of a global struggle between democracy and fascism. This Time a Be...

Originally published in the early 1950s, The Scalpel, the Sword celebrates the turbulent career of Dr. Norman Bethune (1890-1939), a brilliant surgeon, campaigner against private medicine, communist, and graphic artist. Bethune belonged to that international contingent of individuals who recognized the threat of fascism in the world and went out courageously to try to defeat it.Born in Gravenhurst, Ontario, Bethune introduced innovative techniques in treating battlefield i...

In a tight, dramatic, two-character, two-act play Ted Allan, one of Canada's best-known playwrights, challenges us to think again about love and guilt, about madness and normalcy. My Sister's Keeper was first produced at the 1976 Lennoxville Festival in Quebec. (an earlier version, entitled 'I've Seen You Cut Lemons,' had been directed by Sean Connery at the Fortune Theatre in London in 1970.) It is a play about sensitivity and about victims; about what we do to each other and particularly...

New York Times 'Notable Book'Literary Hub 'Best Novel of the Decade'Globe and Mail 'Top 100 Books'Saul Indian Horse is dying. Tucked away in a hospice high above the clash and clang of a big city, he embarks on a marvellous journey of imagination back through the life he led as a northern Ojibway, with all its sorrows and joys.With compassion and insight, author Richard Wagamese tr...

In the whirlwind of life with three young sons, an active member in her tight-knit community, Ruth Rakoff felt in supreme control of her wide world. But when a routine mammogram revealed a tumor, that world rapidly shrunk down to the size of one breast.And so begins the journey of biopsy, surgery, chemotherapy, all accompanied by tidal waves of anxiety and grief: how to tell the children? Should she consider having a healthy breast removed, in case the cancer returns? Will food eve...

To be successful in life, self-confidence and good communication skills are really important, and this applies to everything in life, from personal activities to your profession and even your self-image. It can be troublesome for you if you lack in even one of these qualities, and hey, even if you’re already good at these, it never hurts to get a good dose of boosted confidence, right? And if you could communicate so well that people would get influenced by you easily, how great would that...

**Now a docuseries from Ken Burns on PBS!The #1 New York Times bestseller from Walter Isaacson brings Leonardo da Vinci to life in this exciting new biography that is “a study in creativity: how to define it, how to achieve it…Most important, it is a powerful story of an exhilarating mind and life” (The New Yorker).**Based on thousands of pages from Leonardo da Vinci’s astonishing notebooks and new discoveries about his life and work, Walter Isaacson “deft...

Germaine Lauzon has won a million trading stamps from a department store. Her head swimming with dreams of refurbishing and redecorating her working-class home from top to bottom with catalogue selections ranging from new kitchen appliances to “real Chinese paintings on velvet,” she invites fourteen of her friends and relatives in the neighbourhood over to help her paste the stamps into booklets.Raucous, reckless and rude, the women shamelessly share their most secret hopes and fea...

Almighty Voice and His Wife shakes up a familiar story from the Saskatchewan frontier, reimagining it from the postmodern late twentieth century. The “renegade Indian story” transforms into both an eloquent tale of tragic love and an often hilarious, fully theatrical exorcism of the hurts of history. A modern classic about the place of First Nations people in Canada.

A National Jewish Book Award–winning biography: A look at the early years of Israel's statehood, experienced through the life of a pioneering nurse.During her extraordinary career, nurse Raquela Prywes was a witness to history. She delivered babies in a Holocaust refugee camp and on the Israeli frontier. She crossed minefields to aid injured soldiers in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War and organized hospitals to save the lives of those fighting the 1967 Six-Day War. Along...

Only Drunks and Children Tell the Truth is the emotional story of a woman’s struggle to acknowledge her birth family. Grace, a Native girl adopted by a White family, is asked by her birth sister to return to the Reserve for their mother’s funeral. Afraid of opening old wounds, Grace must find a place where the culture of her past can feed the truth of her present.Cast of 2 women and 2 men

Shortlisted for the ABIA Award (Biography of the Year) 2015A searingly honest memoir of family, cancer, love ... and unicycles by the founders of the Love your Sister charity, Connie and Samuel Johnson, that will inspire and they hope get people talking about boobs!Born a year apart, Connie and Samuel Johnson have always been close. Faced with the devastating news that they would soon be separated forever, they made a decision....