National Network for Equitable Library Service

Four years after Therese Greenwood and her husband moved to Fort McMurray, Alberta, their new community was devastated by one of the worst wildfires in Canadian history. As the flames approached, they had only minutes to pack, narrowly escaping a fire that would rage for weeks, burn more than 85,000 hectares and force 80,000 people to flee. This skilfully told first-person account is more than a disaster narrative: Greenwood's experience and skill as a journalist and a mystery writer engages and maintains suspense.

Malcolm Forsyth (1936-2011) was a musical legend: a much-loved composer, performer, teacher, and mentor. Reflections on Malcolm Forsyth presents a captivating and approachable portrait of one of Canada's finest modern composers. Readers will discover both public and private sides to the man and gain fresh insights from critical assessments of a broad range of Forsyth's compositions, his continuing popular appreciation, and his lasting influence on the next generation of musicians and music scholars.

Labrador Innu cultural and environmental activist Tshaukuesh Elizabeth Penashue is well-known both within and far beyond the Innu Nation. The recipient of a National Aboriginal Achievement Award and an honorary doctorate from Memorial University, she has been a subject of documentary films, books, and numerous articles.

The story of Al Howie is a remarkable and at times unbelievable adventure into the heart of the longest races in the world with one of modern history's most eccentric ultra-marathon runners. If you ran 7295 kilometres across Canada in 72 days, wearing three-ounce racing flats, then two weeks later took on the longest certified race on Earth and broke the world record (which happened to be your own), what would you be? Likely an alien.

Put Your Hand in My Hand is the lyrical story of the relationship between one of Canada's most beloved singer-songwriters and his daughter, a talented musical artist. Gene MacLellan's contribution to the Canadian songbook is legendary. He penned top-forty hits, including "Snowbird," "Bidin' My Time," and "Put Your Hand in the Hand," and his compositions vaulted the careers of international stars such as Anne Murray.

A Generous Spirit: Selected Work by Beth Brant collects the writing of Beth Brant, Mohawk lesbian poet, essayist, and activist. During her life, Brant's work gave voice to an often unacknowledged Two-Spirit identity, and today, her words represent continued strength, growth, and connection in the face of deep suffering. A Generous Spirit is Brant's portrait of survival and empathy at the intersection of Native American and lesbian experience.

More than fifty years after most Canadian women received the right to vote, very few women were elected as members of Parliament and none came from Quebec. Canada's 1972 federal election marked a refreshing transition. Twice as many female candidates ran for office than in the previous election, and, of the five women elected to the House of Commons that year, three Liberal Party candidates - Monique Bégin, Albanie Morin, and Jeanne Sauvé - shared the honour of being the first Quebec women MPs.

The name Sri Lanka conjures two images. One is of an island of incredible beauty, a tropical paradise of golden beaches, mist-shrouded mountains carpeted with tea fields, and 2000-year-old cities and archaeological monuments, a land of apparent peace and tranquility. The other is of a brutal thirty-year civil war, an island riven with death, destruction, and racial divides. Here is a story that belongs to neither of those images, a story of a boy growing up in Sri Lanka in the midst of all that beauty and in the run-up to those bitter times.

Captains of whaling vessels were experienced navigators of northern waters, and William Penny was in the vanguard of the whaling fraternity. Leading the first maritime expedition in search of Sir John Franklin, he stood out not just for his skill as a sailor but for his curiosity about northern geography and his willingness to seek out Inuit testimony to map uncharted territory. Hunters on the Track describes and analyzes the efforts made by the Scottish whaling master to locate Franklin's missing expedition.

Caught Between Two Devils is based on the real-life experiences of Antanas Paskevicius, his wife Jadwyga, and his sister Maria. In April of 1944, their lives were forever altered when they were sent to a work camp in northeast Germany where they struggled for ten months. Despite the risk of betrayal, torture, and death, they stole a Wehrmacht truck in February 1945 and, along with other prisoners, fled and headed for Bavaria. The struggles of Antanas, Jadwyga and Maria are not unique; there were six million foreign prisoners compelled to work for the Third Reich.