Non-Fiction

Fully illustrated with gorgeous color photographs of the forest and its inhabitants, Among Trees is a lush guided journal that helps you record and reflect on your therapeutic trips into the woods. Use the blank pages to capture the date, season, weather, and location of specific outings. Creative prompts throughout will help you deepen your experience. Inspirational quotes and sidebars on the benefits of forest bathing pepper the pages for added motivation and depth.

Reviews
"[This journal] can help you add this delightful practice to your life and help you experience greater health on all levels.” —New Spirit Journal​

Additional Information
224 Pages | 6" x 8.25"

Animal Tracks provides a simplified field reference to familiar tracks and signs of over 65 North American mammals and birds. Laminated for durability. Features a ruler for measuring animal tracks. It is a great source of portable information and ideal for field use by novices and experts alike.

Additional Information
12 pages | 3.75" x 8.25" | Full Colour

Grow more food, with less work, in any yard – now completely revised and expanded!

Are you itching to start your own garden or grow more in the one you have, but feel that gardening is too challenging or time-consuming for your busy schedule?

Now completely updated and expanded, Backyard Bounty will demystify gardening, bringing it back to the down-to-earth, environmentally practical activity that anyone can enjoy.

Author and master gardener Linda Gilkeson covers everything you'll need to grow a successful garden, including:

• Planning your garden and preparing the soil
• Organic fertilizers and simplified composting
• Planting for winter harvests and intensive planting schedules
• Comprehensive information on pests, diseases, and working with an unstable climate
• Greenhouses, tunnels and containers
• Organic pest management.

Packed with a wealth of information specific to the Pacific Northwest, this complete guide emphasizes low-maintenance methods, covers problems related to common pests and climate concerns, includes a monthly garden schedule for year-round planting and harvesting, and features plant profiles for everything from apples to zucchini.

Perfect for novice and experienced gardeners alike, Backyard Bounty shows how even the smallest garden can produce a surprising amount of food twelve months of the year.

Reviews
"Backyard Bounty is very likely the best book ever written on growing food in the Pacific Northwest, and it sets a whole new standard for garden writing. By acknowledging the impacts of climate change on our gardens, Gilkeson further elevates the literature. This is the first “real time” gardening book. It is fresh and timely, and every page courses with practical advice and revelations. All growers should own this amazing and insightful book, and we should refer back to it often." —Mark Macdonald, West Coast Seeds

"Ideal for both new and seasoned gardeners, this new edition adds more listings to the detailed fruit and vegetable profiles, updates variety choices, and supplies practical information on dealing with common pests and diseases, including new ones to our region. Tips on adapting gardening practices to changing weather patterns are eminently helpful, as is a focus on the soil as a life force that fosters health in plants." —Helen Chesnut, Garden columnist, Times Colonist

"Whether you have a small or large lot, little or plenty of time, this book shows you how to grow your own toxic-free fruit and vegetables the whole year-round. From preparing the ground to harvesting and storing the ripened produce, all is clearly explained. An invaluable book for novices and experienced gardeners". —Barry Roberts, Past-President, Master Gardeners Association of BC

Additional Information
384 pages | 7.50" x 9.00" | 120 b&w illustrations and photographs 

“Our stories identify for us the land which surrounds us and tie us to our ancestors. We find ourselves inextricably linked to the past, to the land, to the river, to each other, to the future.” —Shirley Hardman, contributor

This impressive volume tells of the First Peoples of the area through vivid narratives from the past and present.

The traditional territory of the Ts’elxwéyeqw First Peoples covers over 95,000 hectares of land in Southwestern BC. It extends throughout the central Fraser Valley, encompassing the entire Chilliwack River Valley (including Chilliwack Lake, Chilliwack River, Cultus Lake and areas, and parts of the Chilliwack municipal areas). In addition to being an area of natural beauty and abundant resources, it also has a rich cultural history. The Chilliwack region gets its name from the Ts’elxwéyeqw tribe, and this volume delves into what this name means—and also what it means to be Ts’elxwéyeqw. Being Ts’elxwéyeqw portrays the people, artifacts and landscapes that are central to the Ts’elxwéyeqw people, and represents a rich oral record of an aboriginal heritage that has been kept alive—even through adversity—for thousands of years.

Lavishly illustrated with over seven hundred historic and current photos and maps, this book amalgamates a variety of voices and personal histories from elders, while providing background into eighty-five place names within the region. The book’s unique composition—with an emphasis on visual storytelling—showcases a culture with a deep connection to the surrounding land and the watershed.

Educator Information
Recommended for Grades 5-12 for the following subject areas: Geography, Social Studies, Science.  Also a useful Teacher Resource.

Note: Educators should pre-read sections of this book that they are considering using from this reference book, as reading levels vary greatly.

Additional Information
304 pages | 11.00" x 14.00"

Twenty years ago, Carey Price was flying 319 kilometres across British Columbia in his father's plane so he could play on the nearest organized hockey team. Today, he is the highest-paid goalie in the NHL. But he's never forgotten where he started.

The son of an NHL draftee and the chief of the Ulkatcho First Nation, Carey got his start on skates as a toddler, first on a frozen creek and then on his father's homemade rink. The natural athlete went on to become the top amateur player in Canada in 2002, getting drafted fifth overall by the Montreal Canadiens three years later. Now one of the most recognizable figures in hockey, Carey credits his success to his community of Anahim Lake, where hard work and commitment often face off against remoteness and cost. Throughout his incredible career, he's taken every opportunity possible to encourage all young people, especially those who share his Indigenous background, to follow their dreams.

Reviews
"The book is aimed at middle-grade readers, ages 12+, and has a decidedly different approach to telling his remarkable story. For one, author Catherine Rondina chose to really spotlight Price's Indigenous background ... The pocketbook from Lorimer's RecordBooks series crams a lot into its 150 pages, from Price's early days in the remote Anahim Lake, B.C., to leading Canada to a gold medal at the 2014 Olympic Games in Sochi."— Greg Oliver, Society for International Hockey Research, June 2018

"This slim, pocket-size biography manages to convey an awful lot of information through engaging, brief chapters and breezy vocabulary. Readers will come away with an overview of acclaimed goalie Carey Price's hockey career to date."— Kathleen McBroom, Booklist, August 2018

"An inspiring story, especially for hockey fans and not just for reluctant teen readers."— Kirkus Reviews, May 2018

"A short and captivating peek into a remarkable athlete's life for middle schoolers."— School Library Journal, October 2018

Educator & Series Information
Hi-Lo Book.
Interest age: From 12 To 18
Fry Reading Level [grade]: 3.5
Lexile Reading Level: 890L

This book is part of the Recordbooks Series. Recordbooks help reluctant readers understand social issues through the lens of a true story of a sports hero.

Series features:

• Ideal for reluctant readers
• Hi-lo
• Short chapters, easy-to-read format
• Great for ESL and adult students
• Writing with a flair for making history feel like novels
• Accompanied by historical photos and sports trivia
• Ideal for ages 12+

Additional Information
152 pages | 4.25" x 7.00"

I open my eyes in the darkness, laying on my side, half my vision is of the earth and shadows; the other is of the sky, treetops, and stars. I should write Clifford’s story. The thought emerges fully formed . . . The thought dissipates. I close my eyes and the earth and the sky disappear. The warmth of my sleeping bag wraps around me and sleep pulls me under into that half-world where reality and fantasy mingle in a place where coherent thoughts disintegrate.

When Harold Johnson returns to his childhood home in a northern Saskatchewan Indigenous community for his brother Clifford’s funeral, the first thing his eyes fall on is a chair. It stands on three legs, the fourth broken off and missing. So begins a journey through the past, a retrieval of recollections that have too long sat dormant. Moving from the old family home to the log cabin, the garden, and finally settling deep in the forest surrounding the property, his mind circles back, shifting in time and space, weaving in and out of memories of his silent, powerful Swedish father; his formidable Cree mother, an expert trapper and a source of great strength; and his brother Clifford, a precocious young boy who is drawn to the mysterious workings of the universe.

As the night unfolds, memories of Clifford surface in Harold’s mind’s eye: teaching his younger brother how to tie his shoelaces; jousting on a bicycle without rubber wheels; building a motorcycle. Memory, fiction, and fantasy collide, and Clifford comes to life as the scientist he was meant to be, culminating in his discovery of the Grand Unified Theory.

Exquisitely crafted, funny, visionary, and wholly moving, Clifford is an extraordinary work for the way it defies strict category and embraces myriad forms of storytelling. To read it is to be immersed in a home, a family, a community, the wider world, the entire cosmos.

Reviews
“Clifford is a luminous, genre-bending memoir. Heartache and hardship are no match for the disarming whimsy, the layered storytelling shot through with love. The power of land, the pull of family, the turbulence of poverty are threads woven together with explorations of reality, tackling truth with a trickster slant.” — Eden Robinson, author of Son of a Trickster

“Clifford is a story only Harold Johnson could tell. By turns soft and harsh, intellectual and emotional, Johnson weaves truth, fiction, science, and science fiction into a tapestry that is rich with meaning and maybes. A natural storyteller, Johnson seeks imagined pasts and futurity with equal parts longing and care. This work allows readers and writers the possibility of new and ancient modes of storytelling.” — Tracey Lindberg, author of Birdie

“Harold R. Johnson is a wonderful writer, and Clifford is his best work yet. For fans of Jack Finney and Richard Matheson, this terrific book is a wonderfully human tale of memory both bitter and sweet, as well as a poignant exploration of time’s hold over all of us.” — Robert J. Sawyer, Hugo Award–winning author of Quantum Night

“Clifford is unlike anything I’ve read — it is at once a story of science and magic, love and loss, and a case for the infinite potential of humanity. It is a book of profound wisdom — an unpacking of the deepest truths of science in an effort to transform the pain of grief and regret into healing and forgiveness.” — Patti Laboucane-Benson, author of The Outside Circle

Educator Information
Curriculum Connections: English, Biographies, Family 

Additional Information
264 pages | 5.25" x 8.00"

What can we do, right now, in our own landscapes, to help solve climate change?

Predictions about future effects of climate change range from mild to dire - but we're already seeing warmer winters, hotter summers, and more extreme storms. Proposed solutions often seem expensive and complex, and can leave us as individuals at a loss, wondering what, if anything, can be done.

Sue Reed and Ginny Stibolt offer a rallying cry in response - instead of wringing our hands, let's roll up our sleeves. Based on decades of experience, this book is packed with simple, practical steps anyone can take to beautify any landscape or garden, while helping protect the planet and the species that call it home. Topics include:

• Working actively to shrink our carbon footprint through mindful landscaping and gardening
• Creating cleaner air and water
• Increasing physical comfort during hotter seasons
• Supporting birds, butterflies, pollinators, and other wildlife.

This book is the ideal tool for homeowners, gardeners, and landscape professionals who want to be part of the solution to climate change.

Reviews
"Sue Reed and Ginny Stibolt bring complementary backgrounds to bear on the subject of how we can adapt our landscapes to a changing climate. Starting from the premise that the impacts of climate change will only become more severe in the future, the authors have created a comprehensive book that outlines dozens of actions that people can take to adjust to evolving climate regimes. In the process, they articulate a new gardening aesthetic for people who work with small garden plots, farms and woodlots. The result is a positive and hopeful story of how people can use their imagination and ingenuity to help craft more resilient landscapes." -Dr. Peter Robinson, former CEO, David Suzuki Foundation

"Climate-Wise Landscaping is a comprehensive, yet easy to read, source of information on climate-change adaptation and mitigation actions for the homeowner, gardener, and landscape professional. Beautiful photos and pleasing graphics illustrate key ideas and actions while informative sidebars and inspiring quotes from climate and landscape experts provide clarity of complex systems and motivation to adapt to a changing future. The text provides an engaging blend of broad ideas along with specific actions we can take to adapt to climate-change at the level of our home landscapes, whether a small garden plot within an urban area or twenty acres in the countryside." -Julie Richburg, Ph.D., Ecologist

"Given the lateness of the hour, a book on climate-wise landscaping could not be more timely or more necessary. We are moving into a new and critical era, and this book takes landscape professionals and home gardeners where they need to go. The facts, well-presented and practical, will be an eye-opener for many people, and empower us as horticulturists of all stripes to do what is both helpful and imperative. Landscaping has always been more than just exterior decorating, and now we have one more tool in our kit to make the landscape ecosystem a part of the solution. Thank you, Sue and Ginny, for hitting a home run." -Owen Dell RLA, ASLA, landscape architect, educator, author, Owen Dell & Associates

"Gardening is not always as green and good for the planet as we might think. Sue Reed and Ginny Stibolt open our eyes to surprisingly common, unsustainable landscaping practices and inspire us to rethink how we create and care for land. This fantastic resource is filled with climate-wise solutions for anyone who owns or manages a piece of ground – even if it’s just a few containers on a tiny rooftop garden. You will quickly learn about exiting ways to offset some of the effects we people have on the planet. The book is easy to navigate and it passionately links better gardening practices with better life quality and a brighter future for our planet." -Claudia West ASLA, Principal, PHYTO STUDIO LLC

Additional Information
320 pages | 7.50" x 9.00" | full colour throughout

Native Elements - Colouring Our Drums: Northwest Coast First Nations and Art

We are all born to the beat of a drum, it is within us. Our drum beat is what leads us to find our own path through our journey in life. - Doug Horne, Coast Salish

Features:

Features 32 pages of original drum drawings from Northwest Coast Indigenous artists.  One page at the beginning of the book includes words and insights from the artists about drums.

Printed in Canada using non-toxic, vegetable based ink, and water based coating.

32 pages; measures 8.5" x 11".

Additional Information
This is a colouring book for adults and young adults; however, intermediate and secondary students would still enjoy colouring in the intricate drum drawings.

Discover the rich and varied world of Nunavut's many fishes in this comprehensive guide.  

Covering a broad range of information about Northern fish species, each section includes identification and appearance, habitat and range, relationship to humans, life cycle and reproduction, feeding habits, and other fascinating facts. This book also includes photorealistic illustrations of each species and traditional knowledge about fish collected through interviews with Inuit elders.  

Common Fishes of Nunavut will introduce readers to the stunning range of fishes that live in Arctic rivers, lakes, and oceans. 

Educator Information
For young adults & adults.

Additional Information
368 pages | 6.50" x 9.00"

Authenticity Note: Because of the contributions from Inuit elders, this book has received the Authentic Indigenous Text label. It is up to readers to determine if this will work as an authentic resource for their purposes.

Since the 1970s, the Site C Dam in northeastern British Columbia's Peace River Valley has been touted by B.C. Hydro and successive governments as necessary to meet the province's increasing energy needs. With its enormous $10 billion price tag, the dam would be the largest public works project in BC history. It would be the third dam on the Peace River, and destroy traditional unceded territory belonging to Treaty 8 First Nations.

Following the last provincial election, the newly appointed NDP government called for a review of the project, but work on the dam continues. This comes after protests by aboriginal groups and landowners, several lawsuits against the government, and federal government intervention to let the dam go ahead. More recently, there has been a call from a United Nations panel to review how the dam will affect Indigenous land.

This book presents the independent voices of citizen experts describing every important impact of the dam, including:

• Sustainable energy expert Guy Dauncey on future energy demand, and whether there is likely to be a need for the dam's electricity
• An interview with aboriginal activist Helen Knott on the dam's assault on traditional lands and culture, in particular Indigenous women
• Agrologist Wendy Holm on the farm land impact — prime horticulture land important to food security and nutrition
• Family physician Warren Bell on the effect that loss of traditional way of life and connection to the land has had on the health of aboriginal people
• Wildlife biologist Brian Churchill with forty years' experience of studying its land and wildlife
• Former environmental minister Joan Sawicki on government cover-ups and smoking guns
• Energy industry watchdog Andrew Nikiforuk on the links between dams, fracking and earthquakes
• Award-winning broadcaster Rafe Mair on how party politics corrupts political leadership, and the role of activism and civil disobedience in shaping government decision-making
• David Schindler, one of the world's foremost water ecologists, explains the role dams like Site C will play in Canada's climate change strategy
• Joyce Nelson connects the dots between the Site C dam and continental water sharing plans

Reviews
"Wendy Holm brings another perspective to the case against Site C, that of the production of crops." — Nelson Star, January 2018

"A massive, $10 billion hydroelectric dam project on British Columbia’s Peace River could threaten the First Nations peoples who live nearby. This volume dives deep into the potential impacts and decades of governmental cover-ups related to this long-planned project."— John R. Platt, The Revelator, April 2018

"This book provides an organized and rigorous “how to” guide on the intellectual and fact-based opposition to Site C, and in doing this becomes a great model for a book on any long-term protest. Its ambition is to inform on the subject from every possible angle, keeping the Peace River, the region and its people in mind, rather than the expediency of the business and government angle, which is usually given at least equal weight by the mainstream media." — Cathryn Atkinson, Rabble, June 2018

"There is an "elephant in the room" — not the huge white elephant that you see at No-Site C rallies. This elephant is dark and invisible. The government does not talk about it ... No. This elephant is rather more sinister. Wendy Holm confronts it and exposes it. It's about exporting water."— John Gellard, The Ormsby Review, August 2018

"Damming the Peace is an accessible, thoughtful and informative collection of essays that reveal the grave environmental, human and economic costs if the Site C dam is built."— Tim Pelzer, People's Voice, October 2018

Educator Information
Includes Indigenous content/perspectives and an Interview with Indigenous activist Helen Knott.

Additional Information
272 pages | 6.00" x 9.00"

Known for her expansive multidisciplinary approach to art making Vancouver-based Dana Claxton, who is Hunkpapa Lakota (Sioux), has investigated notions of Indigenous identity, beauty, gender and the body, as well as broader social and political issues through a practice which encompasses photography, film, video and performance. Rooted in contemporary art strategies, her practice critiques the representations of Indigenous people that circulate in art, literature and popular culture in general. In doing so, Claxton regularly combines Lakota traditions with "Western" influences, using a powerful and emotive "mix, meld and mash" approach to address the oppressive legacies of colonialism and to articulate Indigenous world views, histories and spirituality. This timely catalogue is the first monograph to examine the full breadth and scope of Claxton's practice. It's extensively illustrated and includes essays by Claxton's colleague Jaleh Mansoor, Associate Professor in the Department of Art History, Visual Art & Theory at the University of British Columbia; Monika Kin Gagnon, Professor in the Communications Department at Concordia University, who has followed Claxton's work for 25 years; Olivia Michiko Gagnon, a New York-based scholar and doctoral student in Performance Studies; and Grant Arnold, Audain Curator of British Columbia Art at the Vancouver Art Gallery.

Additional Information
160 pages | 9.08" x 10.60"

Freeman Douglas Knockwood is a highly respected Elder in Mi’kmaw Territory and one of Canada’s premier addictions recovery counsellors. The story of his life is one of unimaginable colonial trauma, recovery and hope.

At age 6, Knockwood was placed in the Shubenacadie Residential School, where he remained for a year and a half. Like hundreds of other Mi’kmaw and Maliseet children, he suffered horrible abuse. By the time he reached his twenties, he was an alcoholic. He contracted tuberculosis in the 1940s, had one lung and several ribs removed.

Having hit rock bottom, Knockwood, gained sobriety in his thirties through Alcoholics Anonymous. He went on to become a much sought after drug and alcohol rehabilitation counsellor in Canada. Many of Doug’s initiatives have been implemented across Canada and used by thousands of people, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous. Looking back now, says Doug, “I realize I wasn’t only helping them. They were helping me to gather strength in my presentations, in feeding them the knowledge I received, the same as it was fed to me. That helped me to gain confidence in myself; doing all these things that I didn’t know I could yet do”.

This book is an in-depth look at Doug Knockwood’s life that also casts a wide and critical glance at the forces that worked to undermine his existence and the indomitable spirit of a man who recovered from, yet still struggles to overcome, those forces.

Educator Information
The 2018-2019 Canadian Indigenous Books for Schools list recommends this resource for Grades 10-12 for these subjects: English Language Arts, Social Justice, Social Studies.

Additional Information
128 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | Written by Doug Knockwood and Friends

From fiddleheads to spruce tips, wild food can be adventurous and fun--with the right guide. In Eating Wild in Eastern Canada, award-winning author and conservationist Jamie Simpson shows readers what to look for in the wilds and how and when to collect it.

Grouping foods by their most likely foraging locations—forests, fields, and shorelines—and with 50 full-colour photographs, identification is made accessible for the amateur hiker, wilderness enthusiast, and foodie alike. Includes historical notes and recipes, cautionary notes on foraged foods' potential dangers, and interviews with wild-edible gatherers and chefs. While gathering wild edibles may be instinctive to some, there is an art to digging for soft-shelled clams and picking highbush cranberries, and Simpson joyfully explores it in this one-of-a-kind narrative guidebook.

Additional Information
152 pages | 6.50" x 9.00" | Paperback

From sunfish to catfish, there are almost 800 species of freshwater fish in North America. Freshwater Fishes is the ideal pocket-sized, folding guide for the avid angler. This beautifully illustrated guide highlights over 120 familiar species. Laminated and durability, this handy guide will fit into your pocket as you cast your fishing rod into the pristine water.

Additional Information
12 pages | 3.75" x 8.25" | Foldable guide 

There is an old saying that it takes a village to raise a child, but Jessie Jollymore has experienced through the youth of Hope Blooms, an inner-city initiative she founded that engages at-risk youth, that sometimes it takes the children to raise the village. A dietitian who worked in inner city health for 15 years, Jollymore witnessed the challenges people face every day with food security, isolation, discrimination, and poverty. An idea bloomed of creating sustainable, youth-driven micro-economies: growing local food systems, growing social enterprises, and mentoring youth to become leaders of change. This led to over 50 youth ages 6 to 18 leading the way in growing over 3,000 pounds of organic produce yearly for their community, building innovative outdoor classrooms, and building a successful Fresh Herb Dressing social enterprise, with 100% of proceeds going toward growing food, and scholarships for youth.

In this inspiring, vibrant book, the youth behind Hope Blooms tell the story of the social enterprise they built from the soil up, the struggles of "creating something from nothing," successfully navigating the world of business, and ultimately building resilience and leaving behind a legacy. Includes youth's words of wisdom, stories, and poetry, and over 75 colour photos.

Additional Information
180 pages | 7.50" x 9.25"