National Network for Equitable Library Service

One has lost a child and paints her house blue, another has found a not-so-handy man she can't get rid of; one perches in a tree and observes the neighbourhood, and yet another goes off into the woods with Jesus. These are some of the "wild pieces" that fill Catherine Hogan Safer's remarkable new book, Wild Pieces - characters as wry and quirky and heart-wrenching as the short stories in which Safer brings them to life. In language, taut and beautifully controlled, perfectly pitched and witty, Safer creates an array of unforgettable people.

Jason Dade, quixotic hero of this 1970s coming-of-age novel, is on a quest. He must decipher cryptic signs on his journey to meet an elusive figure known only as The Man. His father, Saul Dade, broods restlessly at hope, helpless to intervene. Their interwoven narratives include idyllic descriptions of rural childhood, the grim spectre of war, the harsh realities of leaving the nest ... and finding the way back home.

In the early 1900s a young and newly wed Leona Merrigan sets out from the Newfoundland community of Three Brooks to find a better life in Knock Harbour on the island's Cape Shore. After some happy years, tragedy strikes when she unwittingly brings disaster upon her home. Years later, William Cantwell, a politician tormented by regret, finds Leona in Knock Harbour, virtually alone but for her only child, a deaf girl named Dulcie. Both William and Leona come to focus on Dulcie's education as a way to mend their shattered lives.

A Fine Balance is in mid-1970s India. It tells the story of four unlikely people whose lives come together during a time of political turmoil soon after the government declares a "State of Internal Emergency." Through days of bleakness and hope, their circumstances - and their fates - become inextricably linked in ways no one could have foreseen. Mistry's prose is alive with enduring images and a cast of unforgettable characters.

Marie-Pierre vit avec Suzanne, sa mère avocate, depuis que son père les a quittées pour un autre continent. Le métier de Suzanne l’obligeant à faire de longues heures au bureau, Marie-Pierre se retrouve plus souvent qu’autrement seule à la maison. En jeune fille responsable et autonome, Marie-Pierre occupe ses soirées à faire ses devoirs, parfois en compagnie de son amie Loulou avec qui elle partage tout. Depuis quelque temps, elle reçoit des appels anonymes qui l’inquiètent et s’aperçoit d’une étrange activité dans sa chambre. Des objets personnels disparaissent de façon inexpliquée.

Elegantly written and profoundly moving, Frances Itani's debut novel is a tale of virtuosity and power. Set on the eve of the Great War, Deafening spans two continents and the lives of a young deaf woman and her beloved husband. Frances Itani's astonishing depiction of a world where sound exists only in the margins is a singular feat in literary fiction, a place difficult to leave and even harder to forget.

Following the curves of history in the first half of the twentieth century, Fall On Your Knees takes us from haunted Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, through the battle fields of World War One, to the emerging jazz scene of New York city and into the lives of four unforgettable sisters.

Sprawling and intimate, stark and fantastical, Galore is a novel about the power of stories to shape and sustain us. This is Michael Crummey's most ambitious and accomplished work to date. An intricate family saga and love story spanning two centuries, Galore is a portrait of the improbable medieval world that was rural Newfoundland, a place almost too harrowing and extravagant to be real. Remote and isolated, exposed to savage extremes of climate and fate, the people of Paradise Deep persist in a realm where the line between the everyday and the otherworldly is impossible to distinguish.

Un chien de garde un peu trop zélé et un chat de garde qui passe son temps à dormir, voilà la recette idéale pour une mission de surveillance manquée. Vous croyez ? Eh bien, vous pourriez être surpris ! Parce que vous avez affaire là à des sentinelles hors du commun...

Lors d'une rencontre avec un mystérieux personnage, Maurice Richard et quelques-uns de ses coéquipiers et adversaires de l'époque reçoivent une invitation pour assister au match des étoiles à New York; la Ligue nationale de hockey veut rendre hommage aux grands joueurs du passé au cours d'une cérémonie vraiment spéciale! Mais, arrivés à destination, ils se rendent compte qu'ils sont victimes d'une incroyable machination! Ils doivent participer à un match avec les joueurs de hockey d'aujourd'hui, jeunes et en pleine forme!