After falling in love with and marrying a man two lifetimes older than her, Irving Layton’s last wife shares the story of her life with the acclaimed poet.While a student at Dalhousie University, Anna Pottier attended a poetry reading featuring Irving Layton. Walking out of the auditorium that night, she knew two things: she wanted more than ever to be a writer, and she wanted to be with Layton.At the age of twenty-three she became Layton’s fifth and final ...

Dan Sharp, a gay father and missing persons investigator, accepts an invitation to a wedding on a yacht in Ontario's Prince Edward County. It seems just the thing to bring Dan closer to his noncommittal partner, Bill, a respected medical professional with a penchant for sleazy after-hours clubs, cheap drugs, and rough sex. But the event doesn't go exactly as planned.When a member of the wedding party is swept overboard, a case of mistaken identity leads to confusion as the wrong pe...

CCBC's Best Books for Kids & Teens (Fall 2015) - CommendedThe life story of a painted mustang set against the backdrop of America’s Great Plains in the late 1800s.It’s the late 1800s. A Lakota boy finds an orphaned mustang foal and brings her back to his family’s camp, naming her Paint for her black-and-white markings. Boy and horse soon become inseparable. Together they learn to hunt buffalo, their fear of the massive beasts tempered by a growing ...

For the fifty years following the Second World War, Canada enjoyed a period of spectacular economic growth — the economy quadruple in size and the living standard of most Canadians steadily improved.However, in the years since, Canada has suffered from economic stagnation. Businesses keep closing, and Canadians find it harder to get and keep a good job. Increasingly, Canadians have relied on consumer debt to help mask the underlying problems, but for many even that temporary form o...

CCBC's Best Books for Kids & Teens (Fall 2015) — CommendedWhen Dani sets out to uncover her father’s past, she also discovers her own future.Raised by her mother, eighteen-year-old Dani Lancaster only had six weeks to get to know her father, Sam, before he lost his battle with cancer. It was long enough to love him, but not long enough to get to know him — especially since Sam didn't even know himself.Left on the doorstep of an elderly coup...

2016 Young Author's Award — ShortlistedCCBC's Best Books for Kids & Teens (Fall 2015) - CommendedInstead of writing in a diary, twelve-year-old Jo Waller secretly edits Wikipedia entries to cope with the worst year of her life.Jo Waller has three brainy friends, two mostly harmless parents, and one deep, dark secret: she edits Wikipedia for fun. But when her twenty-four-year-old brother moves back home with his pregnant girlfriend, Jo is for...

Undeniably, the 1990s were a period of crisis for the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF). Drastic budget reductions and a series of endless scandals all collided to form the perfect storm. The outcome of this was nothing short of the implosion of the Canadian Armed Forces Officer Corps.Stripped by the government of the right to regulate itself, the Officer Corps, which represented the nation’s stewards of the profession of arms, was forced to reform itself. Key to this transformation was ...

Nik is an eccentric art student obsessed with painting his dancer girlfriend, Jennifer. When one day she inexplicably disappears, Nik’s world is shattered. Determined to find her, he embarks on a cross-country journey following a scant trail of clues. He doesn’t anticipate how far he’ll have to travel, what he’ll do when he runs out of money, or the fact that an intimidating stranger is looking for Jennifer, too.Nik and Jennifer fade into the background of their own tale, surfacing...

Dani's mother is getting married -- again -- because that's what she does, and while she and her new husband jet around Europe for six weeks, 17-year-old Dani is sent to stay with an uncle she didn't know she had in a small community in Cariboo country she didn't know existed. It promises to be the summer from hell. But Dani's uncle turns out to be an okay guy. In fact, Dani really likes him. And she finds romance, too.Suddenly, a summer that had doom written all over it turns into...

It's the spring of 1898, and Dawson, Yukon Territory, is the most exciting town in North America. The great Klondike Gold Rush is in full swing and Fiona MacGillivray has crawled over the Chilkoot Pass determined to make her fortune as the owner of the Savoy dance hall. Provided, that is, that her twelve-year-old son, growing up much too fast for her liking; the former Glasgow street fighter who's now her business partner; a stern, handsome NWMP constable; an aging, love-struck ex-boxing c...

Marta Hendriks is onstage at the Metropolitan Opera in New York when she learns of her beloved husband's death in a house fire. Overcome, she collapses and has to be carried off the stage.Fast-forward two years and countless therapy sessions, and Marta is ready to resume her career. In a stroke of luck, she's hired at the last moment to sing Violetta for the Paris Opera. She manages to keep her emotions under tight control and triumphs in the opening-night performance. During one o...

Private investigator Dan Sharp searches the seamy underbelly of the city for a brutal killer.Following an anonymous tip, missing persons investigator Dan Sharp makes a grisly find in a burned-out slaughterhouse in Toronto’s west end. Someone is targeting known sex offenders whose names and identities were released on the Internet. When an iconic rock star contacts Dan to keep from becoming the next victim, things take a curious turn. Dan’s search for a killer takes...