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Tragically Hip bio and Candy Palmater memoir are in the works

Candy Palmater

Candy Palmater

Two new non-fiction books focusing on Canadian pop-culture stars were announced this week.

Toronto’s ECW Press has acquired The Never-Ending Present: The Story of Gord Downie and the Tragically Hip, a biography of the band and frontman Gord Downie, whose terminal cancer diagnosis was made public in May 2016. The book will be written by music journalist Michael Barclay, and will include interviews with a number of the band’s peers and friends, covering topics like the Hip’s effect on Canadian culture and Downie’s work with Indigenous reconciliation. In a press release, ECW acquiring editor Michael Holmes calls Barclay “the right person to tackle the complex and fascinating story of the Tragically Hip.” The Never-Ending Present will publish in April 2018.

HarperCollins announced it will be publishing the debut book by Candy Palmater, the columnist and media personality behind APTN’s The Candy Show and CBC Radio One’s The Candy Palmater Show. The unnamed memoir, appearing in spring 2019, will follow the comedian’s journey from being one of seven children born to a Mi’kmaq father and white mother in secluded New Brunswick, to her work in labour and Aboriginal law, to finally finding her passion in media. Palmater says in a press release that she’s excited to share her story with Canadians “who are currently so hungry for alternative perspectives.”