Nine More Literary Finds to Give This Holiday Season

Do you love buying gifts for people, or do you agonize over finding the right thing?

Wherever you find yourself on the gift-giving spectrum, all would agree that books make for fantastic presents. They’re thoughtful, and show that you really know the person you’re buying for. They’re portable, and easy to tote to and from a holiday gathering. And, if you happen to shop from the list below, they’re from independent Canadian literary publishers, meaning they support local businesses.

The following nine books range from children’s books to poetry to local-to-B.C. history and memoir; guaranteeing there’s something for everyone you’re shopping for.

(And, in case you missed it, we shared nine additional reads yesterday that are also worth a look.)

Without further ado, the recommendations!

For the little one in your life who loves a good story and a dear stuffy

My Bunny Lies Over the Ocean
By Bill Richardson, illustrated by Bill Pechet
(Running the Goat, Books & Broadsides)

How many little ones have known the icy realization that a favourite stuffed toy has been lost?

Award-winning team Bill Richardson and Bill Pechet steer one special stuffy home in My Bunny Lies Over the Ocean, a hilarious read-aloud, sing-along story that follows a multi-species, round-the-world mission to get Bunny home safely after she’s accidentally been left behind at the beach.

With a chorus of love-sick seagulls, a super starfish rescue operation, an accommodating whale and a helpful kangaroo, My Bunny is full of laughs and adventures. Bill Pechet’s zany and exuberant artwork adds a whole other level of fun to this very tall tale. The book includes a link to a recording of the Barbershop Bunnies singing the book. It’s a delightful treat for young and old alike.

For anyone seeking an honest and deeply human story of love, longing and the courage to rebuild from the darkest moments

Sunrise over Half-Built Houses: Love, Longing and Addiction in Suburbia
By Erin Steele
(Caitlin Press / Dagger Editions)

Enter into the life and mind of a shy teenager coming of age in the early 2000s in a pretty, West Coast suburban neighbourhood where nothing is quite as it seems — including her. At a glance, she’s a student with a boyfriend and a job at the coffee shop. Yet she’s skipping class, grappling with intense feelings for girls, and growing dangerously dependent on illicit pills with cute names.

Erin Steele's spiral into addiction and parallel quest for meaning takes readers into big houses with spare room for secrets; past quiet cul-de-sacs where kids party in wooded outskirts zoned for development. Written with searing honesty that stares at you until you turn away, then stares at you some more, Sunrise over Half-Built Houses digs down past pleasantries and manicured lawns to reveal a place where we can all see ourselves and each other more clearly.

For the food lover who deserves a Nancy Meyers kitchen

Hearty: On Cooking, Eating and Growing Food for Pleasure and Subsistence
By andrea bennett
(ECW Press)

There are many reasons to be anxious in the modern world, but for andrea bennett, food is a source of comfort: a way for them to reconnect with the fundamentals of life and with other people. Even so, bennett realizes food is also not uncomplicated, bound up as it is in class, colonialism, gender, diet culture and extractive agriculture.

In Hearty’s wide-ranging essays, bennett moves seamlessly from examining global food production or appetite in food media to sharing their own stories of growing and cooking food. These essays are guided by passion, curiosity, connection and inclusivity, and they’ll make anyone interested in food and garden writing want to close the book and dig in.

For the reader who loves immersive worlds and is craving a new series

The Mona Lisa Sacrifice
By Peter Darbyshire
(Wolsak & Wynn)

The first book in Peter Darbyshire’s brilliant Cross series, The Mona Lisa Sacrifice introduces us to Cross, a man who cannot die and who has lived for centuries. But Cross is a reluctant hero at best. When an angel promises to deliver Judas, a forgotten god of a forgotten people, to Cross for revenge if he can find the real Mona Lisa, a cascading set of mysteries involving a sisterhood of gorgons, Alice from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Morgana le Fay and renegade angels is set in motion.

The Mona Lisa Sacrifice is “a deliriously unhinged roller coaster of a novel,” writes Robert J. Wiersema in the National Post, and a “fast-moving romp through history and myth, conspiracy and confusion,” says Tom Sandborn in the Vancouver Sun. This novel is sure to surprise and delight the most discerning reader of speculative fiction.

For history buffs looking to journey through the fascinating and astonishing tales of BC’s history

Untold Tales of Old British Columbia
By Daniel Marshall
(Ronsdale Press)

Daniel Marshall’s insatiable curiosity about the rich history of British Columbia has driven his explorations — the need to see what is around the next corner. He compares his book to a cabinet of curiosities whose objects, like these tales, invite you to gaze through a historical looking glass.

A national bestseller, Untold Tales of Old British Columbia is a gold mine for B.C. history enthusiasts as well as those unfamiliar with the remarkable stories of this province. The British Columbia that emerges in these pages is revealed in vivid accounts of the most dramatic times in B.C.’s history as well as forgotten moments that made all the difference. Bob Kronbauer, founder of Vancouver Is Awesome, says Daniel “possesses some sort of literary magic that he uses to bring us back to the early days of our province.”

For anyone interested in nature, endangered species and what we can do as a society to turn things around

Signs of Life: Field Notes from the Frontlines of Extinction
By Sarah Cox
(Goose Lane Editions)

Signs of Life is the first book to address the question of species extinction in Canada, examine how weak species protection laws impact recovery efforts in Canada, and how we can enact meaningful change.

Award-winning journalist Sarah Cox’s research has enabled her to witness firsthand — in all parts of Canada, and in the U.S. — what happens when we drive species to the brink of extinction.

Full of in-depth interviews and on-the ground reporting from across the country, Cox looks at the competing attempts to save endangered species across Canada — from the spotted owl in B.C. to endangered lichen in Nova Scotia — while our country’s laws largely fail to help struggling species. Rather than succumbing to the doom and gloom of popular discussions around extinction, Signs of Life focuses on solutions, from new strategies to save wildlife on a New Brunswick river to Indigenous-led conservation efforts in Alberta.

For the specific reader looking for hope in the darkest of times

White World
By Saad T. Farooqi
(Cormorant Books)

For Avaan, an apostate pariah living under martial law and religious bigotry in Pakistan in 2083, violence has become a way of life. What respite he had from this terrifying world — his brother, his family and Doua, the love of his life — was snatched away in military raids.

But there is a ray of hope: Avaan discovers that Doua is alive. Obsessed with finding her, he takes a stand against the army, the mob and Pakistan itself with the only thing he has ever been able to count on: the gun in his hand.

Saad T. Farooqi reaches beyond the established narratives of Pakistan — family sagas, magical realism and immigrant stories — to create a post-apocalyptic world that reflects the rampant corruption, martial law, religious bigotry and violent crimes familiar to any Pakistani.

Little fiction has been written from the perspective of apostates — until now. In a starred review in the Quill & Quire, Manahil Bandukwala writes: “White World is a gritty read that shocks, frightens and challenges.”

For the reader contemplating the complex issues around immigration

Permission to Settle
By Holly Flauto
(Anvil Press)

Permission to Settle fills in the blanks of the application for permanent residency with a series of memoir-based poems, capturing common aspects of immigration while exploring the sense of privilege that comes from the geographically and culturally close immigration journey from the U.S. to Canada. These poems investigate the implicit biases in the forms and the gaps between the messy reality of life lived and the structured and colonial system of boxes and check marks that still seek to categorize “the other."

"Flauto skillfully navigates the complexities of privilege, foreignness and identity, revealing the stark contrasts between lived reality and bureaucratic structures,” says writer Chelene Knight. “Flauto invites us to reclaim the possibility of collectively re-dreaming the boundaries of our contemporary world,” says author Johanna Skibsrud.

For the lovers, fighters, skateboarders and anyone trying to find their way in this crazy world

Late September
By Amy Mattes
(Nightwood Editions)

In the summer of 2000, Ines, a grief-stricken skateboarder beginning to explore her sexuality, leaves behind her sheltered hometown on a Greyhound bus bound for Montreal. In awe of the city’s vibrancy, and armed with a journal and a Discman, Ines sets out to find a new way of living.

As summer fades to fall, Ines tries to uphold the bliss of new friendship and love but realizes that while she has escaped the confines of her small town, she cannot escape her past. The city changes and the romance darkens as Ines learns loving herself first requires trial and error — and that love is not always an innocent word.

Late September is a love letter to the optimistic malcontents and in the words of novelist Stephane Larue “… an authentic coming of age tale, powerful and beautifully crafted.”

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We hope you’ve found the perfect gift in these book recommendations from Canadian independent literary publishers. You can purchase them online via the linked titles, or pick them up at your favourite local independent bookstore.

Happy holidays from your friends at the Literary Press Group!