Book picks similar to
The Badger Riot by J.A. Ricketts


newfoundland
canadian-literature
nl-books
non-fiction

The Best Birth: Your Guide to the Safest, Healthiest, Most Satisfying Labor and Delivery


Sarah McMoyler - 2008
    Move over Lamaze and Bradley! Already taking the west coast by storm, the McMoyler Method offers a modern, medically savvy approach to labor and delivery that addresses the hopes and fears of todays about helping moms cope, involving partners every step of the way, and working with doctors and nurses for the best birth-no matter how it happens.

Coke Machine Glow


Gordon Downie - 2001
    Simultaneously, Vintage Canada is delighted to publish Downie's first book of poetry, under the same title. It will also contain the lyrics to the sixteen songs on the record.Coke Machine Glow is a rich, haunting collection that reveals both the public and private selves of one of Canada's most enigmatic musicians. In poetry that is urban, gritty and political, as well as romantic, nostalgic and whimsical, Downie allows us a glimpse inside his world. With his acute and observing eye, he gives us snapshots of his life, both on the road and at home; he writes of loneliness and isolation; of longing and desire; of the present and the past; of dreams and nightmares; love lost and love of family. Ultimately, this book is about the distances that bridge and separate us.Layered and deceptively simple, imbued with Downie's wit, insight, anger, compassion and rock 'n'roll edge, Coke Machine Glow is a remarkable debut. With its publication, Gordon Downie becomes a part of the wonderful literary tradition of Canadian songwriters like Leonard Cohen and Joni Mitchell who are also poets.

Harlem Duet


Djanet Sears - 1997
    Winner of the Chalmers Play Award. A rhapsodic blues tragedy. Harlem Duet could be the prelude to Shakepeare's Othello, and recounts the tale of Othello and his first wife Billie (yes, before Desdemona). Set in contemporary Harlem at the corner of Martin Luther King and Malcolm X boulevards, the play explores the space where race and sex intersect. Harlem Duet is Billie's story.

The Wife, the Maid, and the Mistress


Ariel Lawhon - 2014
    Behind this great man are three women, each with her own tale to tell: Stella, his fashionable wife, the picture of propriety; Maria, their steadfast maid, indebted to the judge; and Ritzi, his showgirl mistress, willing to seize any chance to break out of the chorus line.As the twisted truth emerges, Ariel Lawhon’s wickedly entertaining debut mystery transports us into the smoky jazz clubs, the seedy backstage dressing rooms, and the shadowy streets beneath the Art Deco skyline.

Marriage: Vintage Minis


Jane Austen - 2018
    Here are stolen glances and nervous advances, meddling parents and self-important cousins, society whisperings and the fluttering hearts of young lovers. All of them have their own views and expectations of marriage, and Austen’s are the wisest of all.Selected from the novels Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion by Jane Austen.VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS.A series of short books by the world’s greatest writers on the experiences that make us human

Sweetland


Michael Crummey - 2014
    By turns darkly comic and heartbreakingly sad, Sweetland is a deeply suspenseful story about one man's struggles against the forces of nature and the ruins of memory. For twelve generations, when the fish were plentiful and when they all-but disappeared, the inhabitants of this remote island in Newfoundland have lived and died together. Now, in the second decade of the 21st century, they are facing resettlement, and each has been offered a generous compensation package to leave. But the money is offered with a proviso: everyone has to go; the government won't be responsible for one crazy coot who chooses to stay alone on an island.  That coot is Moses Sweetland. Motivated in part by a sense of history and belonging, haunted by memories of the short and lonely time he spent away from his home as a younger man, and concerned that his somewhat eccentric great-nephew will wilt on the mainland, Moses refuses to leave. But in the face of determined, sometimes violent, opposition from his family and his friends, Sweetland is eventually swayed to sign on to the government's plan. Then a tragic accident prompts him to fake his own death and stay on the deserted island. As he manages a desperately diminishing food supply, and battles against the ravages of weather, Sweetland finds himself in the company of the vibrant ghosts of the former islanders, whose porch lights still seem to turn on at night.

Learning First, Technology Second: The Educator’s Guide to Designing Authentic Lessons


Liz Kolb - 2017
    It happens when proven teaching strategies intersect with technology tools, and yet it’s not uncommon for teachers to use a tool because it’s “fun” or because the developer promises it will help students learn.  Learning First, Technology Second offers teachers the professional learning they need to move from arbitrary uses of technology in their classrooms to thoughtful ways of adding value to student learning.   This book includes:  An introduction to the Triple E Framework that helps teachers engage students in time-on-task learning, enhance learning experiences beyond traditional means and extend learning opportunities to bridge classroom learning with students’ everyday lives.Effective strategies for using technology to create authentic learning experiences for their students.Case studies to guide appropriate tech integration.A lesson planning template to show teachers how to effectively frame technology choices and apply them in instruction.

Dead Weight


Batt Humphreys - 2009
    There is a trial in the town, a triangle of animosities. A Jewish merchant murdered, a black man accused and a white populace primed for a hanging. A reporter from New York assigned to cover a story which would seem to be a fait accompli. The outsider's view of Charleston just after the turn of the century, still clinging to a cultural past and caught in the racial realities of the time, brings a Menckenesque perspective to a plot that is anything but a simple tale of racial wrongdoing."--Publisher marketing.

The Singer's Gun


Emily St. John Mandel - 2009
    His parents deal in stolen goods and his first career is a partnership venture with his cousin Aria selling forged passports and social security cards to illegal aliens. Anton longs for a less questionable way of living in the world and by his late twenties has reinvented himself as a successful middle manager. Then a routine security check suggests that things are not quite what they appear. And Aria begins blackmailing him to do one last job for her. But the seemingly simple job proves to have profound and unexpected repercussions.

Vampire Killer: A Terrifying True Story of Psychosis, Mutilation and Murder (Ryan Green's True Crime)


Ryan Green - 2020
    His pregnant wife, Teresa (22), was nowhere to be seen. The radio was still playing and there were some peculiar stains on the carpet. Wallin nervously followed the stains to his bedroom and encountered a scene so chilling that it would haunt him for the rest of his life. Teresa had been sexually assaulted and mutilated. She was also missing body parts and large volumes of blood. Four days later, the Sacramento Police Department were called to a home approximately a mile away from the Wallin residence. They were not prepared for the horror that awaited them. Daniel Meredith (56) and Jason Miroth (6) were shot multiple times. Evelyn Miroth (38) was disfigured, disembowelled and abused like Teresa. She was also missing body parts and large quantities of blood. David Ferreira (2), who Evelyn was babysitting, was nowhere to be seen and likely in the hands of the deranged mass murderer. It was official, Sacramento had a blood-thirsty serial killer in their midst. The FBI and local police were under no doubt that he would kill again and that his crimes would continue to escalate if not apprehended immediately. Vampire Killer is a gripping account of Richard Chase, and one of the most gruesome true crime stories in California’s history. Ryan Green’s riveting narrative draws the reader into the real-live horror experienced by the victims and has all the elements of a classic thriller. CAUTION: This book contains descriptive accounts of abuse and violence. If you are especially sensitive to this material, it might be advisable not to read any further.

I'll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman's Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer


Michelle McNamara - 2018
    Then he disappeared, eluding capture by multiple police forces and some of the best detectives in the area.Three decades later, Michelle McNamara, a true crime journalist who created the popular website TrueCrimeDiary.com, was determined to find the violent psychopath she called "the Golden State Killer." Michelle pored over police reports, interviewed victims, and embedded herself in the online communities that were as obsessed with the case as she was.At the time of the crimes, the Golden State Killer was between the ages of eighteen and thirty, Caucasian, and athletic—capable of vaulting tall fences. He always wore a mask. After choosing a victim—he favored suburban couples—he often entered their home when no one was there, studying family pictures, mastering the layout. He attacked while they slept, using a flashlight to awaken and blind them. Though they could not recognize him, his victims recalled his voice: a guttural whisper through clenched teeth, abrupt and threatening.I’ll Be Gone in the Dark—the masterpiece McNamara was writing at the time of her sudden death—offers an atmospheric snapshot of a moment in American history and a chilling account of a criminal mastermind and the wreckage he left behind. It is also a portrait of a woman’s obsession and her unflagging pursuit of the truth. Framed by an introduction by Gillian Flynn and an afterword by her husband, Patton Oswalt, the book was completed by Michelle’s lead researcher and a close colleague. Utterly original and compelling, it is destined to become a true crime classic—and may at last unmask the Golden State Killer.

The Works of Emily Dickinson


Emily Dickinson - 1994
    An undiscovered genius during her lifetime, only seven out of her total of 1,775 poems were published prior to her death. She had an immense breadth of vision and a passionate intensity and awe for life, love, nature, time and eternity. Originally branded an eccentric, Emily Dickinson is now recognised as a major poet of great depth.

Lives of Mothers & Daughters: Growing Up With Alice Munro


Sheila Munro - 2001
    Such is the power of her fiction that sometimes it even feels as though I’m living inside an Alice Munro story.”The millions of people around the world who read Alice Munro’s work are enthralled by her insight into the human heart. Consider, then, what it would be like to have a mother who was so all-knowing. Worse, if that mother were world-famous as you were growing up and trying to make your own way as a writer, while you yourself followed in her footsteps, raising a family and trying to write on the side.That is Sheila Munro’s dilemma, and it gives this book special fascination for anyone interested in their own relationship with their own mother, or their own daughter.This book is, in effect, an intimate, affectionate biography of Alice Munro. It describes in a way that only a close relative could, the details of the family background. We follow the family history from the Laidlaws who left Scotland in the early 19th century, to Alice Munro’s birth in 1931, her early years and marriage all the way to the current family, including Alice Munro’s grandchildren. One of the many fascinations of the book is that faithful readers of Alice’s work – and are there any other kind? – will find constant echoes of settings, situations, and characters that occur in her fiction. So this book is not only a fascinating biography of Alice Munro, it also provides an informative commentary to the stories we all know.But Sheila Munro goes further. As a writer growing up in the shadow of a writing mother, she’s able to write frankly and personally about being a daughter and about being a writer. With the publication of this book – richly embellished with scores of family photographs – Sheila Munro has established herself as a skilled and successful author in her own right.• Includes dozens of fascinating Munro family snapshots scattered throughout the text• Full of real-life details that will fascinate any Alice Munro fan

Some Things I Did for Money


Stephanie Georgopulos - 2015
    Equal parts comical and cringe-inducing, Some Things I Did for Money is an honest reflection on the way we define work and what it means to be rich.Most of Stephanie Georgopulos's odd jobs now fall under the umbrella of writing and editing. Her work has been featured in The Guardian, Glamour, McSweeney's Internet Tendency, and more. She edits the Human Parts collection on Medium.com and delivers weekly vignettes about growing up on the internet to people's inboxes, like magic! Find her on Twitter at @omgstephlol.Cover design by Hannah Perrine Mode.Spot illustrations by Alex Cannon.

Things as They Are? Short Stories


Guy Vanderhaeghe - 1992
    Following the death of his domineering father, a middle-aged man tries to uncover a truth about their sometimes difficult relationship. When a grade-six teacher tyrannizes a student without apparent reason, the boy learns an unexpected lesson and his young life is changed irrevocably. An elderly widow falls prey to a con artist, revealing what we are capable of sacrificing to appease what we dread the most. A twelve-year-old boy is shunted off to his grandmother's farm and becomes part of an adult world he scarcely understands. A group of high-school students play on a classmate's self-delusions and set up what promises to be the most loaded boxing match ever staged. Whether writing from the point of view of a child, an adolescent, or a man in his seventies, Guy Vanderhaeghe takes us into the lives of his characters with razor-sharp insights laced with gentle humour.