National Network for Equitable Library Service

Skin introduces us to a group of Canadian teenagers who are coming of age in the late 1980s. Faced with racial discrimination, Phiroza, Jennifer, and Tuan must navigate the choppy waters of high school, each confronting his or her own set of challenges. Ranging from academic difficulties, to budding relationships, to the trials of adapting to a foreign language and culture, the three share their stories of struggle, survival, and defiance of negative expectations and racist attitudes. Lenny is at the top of her class. Jace seemingly couldn't care less.

In a Catholic high school in Scarborough, Ontario, amidst low-income housing, difficult race relations, and poverty, a young woman struggles to find her sexual identity. In this sincere portrayal of high-school kids pitting the voice of God and thousands of years of scripture against the voice of their own bodies, Kilt Pins cheekily asks "Is your kilt pin up or down?"

Based on a true story, Get Yourself Home Skyler James follows the harrowing journey of a young lesbian who defects from the army when she is outed by fellow soldiers. Peter Fechter: 52 Minutes chronicles the last hour of Peter Fechter's life, a teenager in East Berlin shot while attempting to cross the Berlin Wall in 1962 with his companion. Finally, rihannaboi95 centres around a Toronto teen whose world comes crashing in when YouTube videos of him dancing to songs by his favourite pop heroine go viral.

Sixteen-year-old Dane and his mom have relocated to Nova Scotia hoping to flee an abusive relationship with Dane’s father. In the midst of this, Dane has been getting into trouble with the law. He’s been caught breaking into and vandalizing an elderly woman’s home and is about to be charged with a host of serious offences unless he participates in a court-ordered restorative-justice program. With dreams of joining the military, Dane decides to co-operate so a criminal record won’t follow him.

Two is fraught. While dealing with the impossible expectations of her parents, she is trying to understand why her brother, a bright and talented teenager, has taken his own life. It’s not until a fateful school detention that she meets three other students who all seem as lost as she is. There’s Three, a quiet, misunderstood guy who doesn’t quite know how to care for himself; Four, the fashionable, popular kid and class clown; and Five, a rebel ready to fight against everyone and everything.

Amidst pushy parents, eccentric teachers, hours of repetitive practice, stage fright, the agony of competitions and exams, and the dream of greatness, Ted and Richard grow up as "piano nerds." As they mature, they become more aware of the gap between the merely very good and the great, and come to the humbling realization that concert stardom may be out of reach, but they just might be two of the best piano players in the neighbourhood, and that in itself is worth celebrating.

Growing up, Nancy believed in magic despite a hand-me-down life in a small town. So it’s no wonder the buzzing excitement of Toronto and its allure of freedom was a likely choice for her new home, the place she finds herself years later selling her body for drugs. Nancy is further from freedom than ever under the wings of Sikes, a drug dealer and pimp. When she meets Oliver, a seventeen-year-old who lands at Sikes’s feet after a life of foster care and shelters, the two find unlikely solace in each other.

Dixon Carter wants to share his life manifesto. Don't worry — there won't be any violence. Dixon doesn't believe in violence. But Dixon is seeing things differently. He has gone off his meds — the drugs deaden him to the world. He is writing a daily journal from the point he stopped the meds.

There are times he is angry with the world and everyone in it. But then there are the times where he can see all the beauty, just like the Romantic poets. His girlfriend Sylvia and best friend Zeke are trying to help him on his journey.

Depuis le départ de son père, Mathilde a quitté le cégep afin de subvenir à ses besoins et à ceux de sa mère devenue alcoolique. La jeune fille est caissière dans une épicerie, où elle subit l’humeur exécrable d’un supérieur qui la harcèle sans répit. Incapable d’en sup­porter davantage, Mathilde décide d’en finir avec cette vie infernale. Mais un jeune garçon l’en empêche au dernier moment. Tout de blanc vêtu, il dit s’appeler Mot et, de toute évidence, il aime la confrontation.

In the town of Leamington, Ontario, a seventeen-year-old boy is suddenly stricken by a schizophrenic episode and wakes up in hospital. The boy’s name is Calvin, and he is plagued by hallucinations. As the hallucinations persist, Calvin comes to believe that the answer lies in performing one grand and incredible gesture. And so he decides to walk across Lake Erie. In January. The temperatures have been below freezing for weeks. The ice should hold...