National Network for Equitable Library Service

When the dust settled after the restructuring of the Canadian forest industry at the beginning of the 21st century and many of the major players such as MacMillan Bloedel, Doman Industries and Slocan Forest Products vanished into memory, one feisty player remained standing, stronger than ever: Terminal Forest Products. Remarkably, Terminal was privately owned by one man, a Sikh immigrant and former labourer named Asa Singh Johal. Who was he and how did he succeed so brilliantly in a field where so many others failed?

The inspiring story of how an urban woman came to own and operate a remote fishing lodge nestled deep in the British Columbian wilderness. When Caroll Simpson fell in love with a cabin located on pristine Babine Lake in BC, many miles away from her home in Washington State, she knew her life was about to change. After convincing her husband to abandon their dream of living aboard a sailboat, they began the complicated process of buying the lodge and moving north. For two years, their adventure was a blissful dream. Then, tragedy struck.

Twenty-five years after her mother's brutal death made the headlines, Phyllis Dyson felt compelled to unearth the truth about her mother's illness. By chronicling the events of her childhood, uncovering family secrets and betrayals and gaining access to government documents, Dyson has captured the heart of her family's tragedy in a debut memoir.

In 1964, social worker Bridget Moran attracted widespread attention and the wrath of the BC government with her open letter to Premier W.A.C. Bennett, charging the welfare department with gross neglect in addressing the problems of the province's needy. This very public dispute formed a small part of Bridget Moran's "little rebellion" against a system she felt did not, and does not, respond to the needs of those it was designed to help.

The uplifting true story of Elizabeth Quocksister, a strong Indigenous woman and community leader, who dedicated her life to protecting her language and cultural traditions. Elizabeth Quocksister (1925–81) had many roles in her life. She was a cultural teacher, a community leader, a dancer, a nurse, a photographer, a residential school survivor, and a mother of ten.

LD is the colourful biography of Louis Taylor, the longest-serving mayor in Vancouver's history; he was first elected mayor in 1910, and served off and on until 1934, for a total of eleven years. Taylor's story is also the story of Vancouver in the early decades of the 20th century, a young city experiencing a turbulent adolescence. Louis Taylor, or LD as he was known, arrived in Vancouver from Chicago in 1896 at the age of 39.

The Farrell name is respected all along the British Columbia coast. Barrie's father, Allen Farrell, was a much loved eccentric who created offshore sailing vessels from beachcombed lumber using only basic hand tools. Barrie built his first boat in his early teens using only a dull handsaw, a rusty block plane and an old hammer with one claw. Despite his Grade Six education, Barrie became one of the leading innovators when fibreglass first became available. His designs incorporated flowing curves and shaped details that were not possible with wood.

From Captain George Vancouver to Muriel “Curve of Time” Blanchet to Jim “Spilsbury's Coast” Spilsbury, visitors to Desolation Sound have left behind a trail of books endowing the area with a romantic aura that helps to make it British Columbia's most popular marine park. In this hilarious and captivating book, CBC personality Grant Lawrence adds a whole new chapter to the saga of this storied piece of BC coastline.

Hailed as a contemporary classic of oral literature. The Days of Augusta is Shuswap elder Augusta Evans' memories of a lifetime that spanned from 1888 to 1978. Accompanied by Robert Keziere's intimate photographs, Augusta's rhythmic prose reads like poetry. She depicts with strength and eloquence her own story—the days at the Mission School, making good baskets and catching salmon, the pain of giving birth and the death of a son—as well as the legends and stories of events told to her—a stagecoach robbery, a woman who was the prisoner of a bear.

Celebrated historian Barry Gough brings a defining era of Pacific Northwest history into focus in this biography of Richard Blanshard, the first governor of Vancouver Island—illuminating with intriguing detail the genesis and early days of Canada's westernmost province. Early one wintry day in March 1850, after seven weary weeks out of sight of land, a well-dressed Londoner, a bachelor aged thirty-two, stood at the ship's rail taking in the immensity of the unfolding scene.