The Theory of Hummingbirds

By Michelle Kadarusman

The Grade 6 experience is vast in the sense that kids can be anywhere on the innocence spectrum. Some are still playing with toys and seeing the world through rose-coloured glasses while others are coming ... Read More »

July 13, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

Holly Farb and the Princess of the Galaxy

By Gareth Wronski

There are worse sources for an author to borrow from than the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series by the late Douglas Adams. Though Adams was ostensibly writing for adults, his irreverent approach to the ... Read More »

July 12, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

Clutch

By Heather Camlot

Not yet 13, Joey Grosser feels he must become the man of the house when his father dies. This means working at the family grocery store, helping his sick mother, and tending his younger brother, ... Read More »

July 4, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

Hit the Ground Running

By Alison Hughes

In Hit the Ground Running, the latest YA novel from Alberta author Alison Hughes, protagonist Dee is told by her aunt that “every family needs an anchor.” At 16, Dee doesn’t expect to be that ... Read More »

July 4, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

Biometrics: Your Body and the Science of Security

By Ian Turner (ill.); Maria Birmingham

Biometrics: Your Body and the Science of Security offers a fun, futuristic look into the fascinating world of recognition technology. Maria Birmingham, author of A Beginner’s Guide to Immortality: From Alchemy to Avatars and longstanding ... Read More »

June 22, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Non-fiction

Saints and Misfits

By S.K. Ali

In Saints and Misfits, the first YA novel from Simon & Schuster’s new Muslim-focused Salaam Reads imprint, Toronto author S.K. Ali delivers a contemporary coming-of-age story about a 15-year-old Arab-Indian-American girl named Janna Yusuf. Janna ... Read More »

June 22, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

★ My Wounded Island

By Jacques Pasquet; Marion Arbona (ill.); Sophie B. Watson (trans.)

Imarvaluk lives on Sarichef, a tiny island off the west coast of Alaska. She fears for her home, as a terrible sea creature is slowly eating away at the island. She has nightmares in which ... Read More »

June 22, 2017 | Filed under: Picture Books

Heartwood Hotel: The Greatest Gift

By Kallie George; Stephanie Graegin (ill.)

If there’s one thing Vancouver author Kallie George knows, it’s how to craft a tale full of whimsy. Her Magical Animal Adoption Agency series for beginning readers is full of the kind of subtle quirkiness ... Read More »

June 21, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

Heartwood Hotel: A True Home

By Kallie George; Stephanie Graegin (ill.)

If there’s one thing Vancouver author Kallie George knows, it’s how to craft a tale full of whimsy. Her Magical Animal Adoption Agency series for beginning readers is full of the kind of subtle quirkiness ... Read More »

June 21, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

Love Is Love

By Mette Bach

Navigating adolescence, testing your boundaries, and figuring out who you are is hard. For LGBTQ+ teens, it’s even more difficult, and potentially much more dangerous. Love Is Love and Rough Patch are two books that ... Read More »

June 19, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

Rough Patch

By Nicole Markotic

Navigating adolescence, testing your boundaries, and figuring out who you are is hard. For LGBTQ+ teens, it’s even more difficult, and potentially much more dangerous. Love Is Love and Rough Patch are two books that ... Read More »

June 19, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction, Kids’ Books

The Gold Leaf

By Kirsten Hall; Matthew Forsythe (ill.)

For centuries, authors of fables have invited animals into the human realm to point out the errors of our ways. In these days so fraught with human foolishness, it makes sense that writers and artists ... Read More »

June 19, 2017 | Filed under: Picture Books

The Fog

By Kenard Pak (ill.); Kyo Maclear

For centuries, authors of fables have invited animals into the human realm to point out the errors of our ways. In these days so fraught with human foolishness, it makes sense that writers and artists ... Read More »

June 19, 2017 | Filed under: Picture Books

Carson Crosses Canada

By Kass Reich (ill.); Linda Bailey

Among new books celebrating Canada’s sesquicentennial are two children’s titles with a focus on geography. Both give readers a sense of the different landforms and attractions that characterize our vast country. My Canada: An Illustrated ... Read More »

June 12, 2017 | Filed under: Picture Books

My Canada: An Illustrated Atlas

By Katherine Dearlove; Lori Joy Smith (ill.)

Among new books celebrating Canada’s sesquicentennial are two children’s titles with a focus on geography. Both give readers a sense of the different landforms and attractions that characterize our vast country. My Canada: An Illustrated ... Read More »

June 12, 2017 | Filed under: Picture Books

Short for Chameleon

By Vicki Grant

Cam Redden is something of a chameleon. It’s his job as a part-time employee of the Almost Family Surrogate Agency to blend into other people’s lives, whether he’s hired to play a bereaved-but-stoic grandson or ... Read More »

June 12, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

The Land Beyond the Wall: An Immigration Story

By Veronika Martenova Charles

Given the abundance of stories about refugees and immigration released over the last couple of years, it might seem that Toronto author-illustrator Veronika Martenova Charles’s latest picture book is simply another among the throng. But ... Read More »

June 12, 2017 | Filed under: Picture Books

Polly MacCauley’s Finest, Divinest, Woolliest Gift of All

By Darka Erdelji (ill.); Sheree Fitch

In this poetry-infused folktale set in the village of River John, Polly MacCauley needs a rare breed of sheep to finish a lifelong knitting project, and Star, an orphaned lamb, is the divine animal that ... Read More »

June 8, 2017 | Filed under: Picture Books

★ Stay

By Katherine Lawrence

At first glance, Stay appears to be modest in length, form, and story. But within the spare pages of this middle-grade novel in verse is a powerful narrative about a family in transition, and the ... Read More »

June 7, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

Road Signs That Say West

By Sylvia Gunnery

Sisters Hanna, Megan, and Claire have just waved off their parents at the airport in Halifax when Hanna announces her plan: while Mum and Dad are in Europe, the three of them are going on ... Read More »

June 5, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

By The Time You Read This

By Jennifer Lanthier; Patricia Storms (ill.)

Author Jennifer Lanthier uses a fun format and some great vocabulary to shepherd young readers through her engaging picture book, which begins on a mysterious note: in the wake of some dramatic – and initially ... Read More »

May 29, 2017 | Filed under: Picture Books

The Way Back Home

By Allan Stratton

Zoe Bird’s world is cracking apart. The teenaged narrator of Allan Stratton’s latest YA novel lives in a small Ontario town where she struggles against the oppressive influence of her narrow-minded parents at home and ... Read More »

May 29, 2017 | Filed under: Children and YA Fiction

Greetings, Leroy

By Alix Delinois (ill.); Itah Sadu

The latest picture book from author, storyteller, and bookstore owner Itah Sadu is both a perfect gift for children making Canada their new home and a love letter to Bob Marley. Written as an email ... Read More »

May 24, 2017 | Filed under: Picture Books

Stop Feedin’ da Boids!

By James Sage; Pierre Pratt (ill.)

The opening spread of American author James Sage’s Stop Feedin’ da Boids! paints a lazy pastoral landscape, idyllic green and dotted with free-roaming animals. Bunnies frolic, a lone horse drinks, a clump of cows graze… ... Read More »

May 18, 2017 | Filed under: Kids’ Books, Picture Books

★ Colette’s Lost Pet (Mile End Stories, Book 1)

By Isabelle Arsenault

The opening spread of American author James Sage’s Stop Feedin’ da Boids! paints a lazy pastoral landscape, idyllic green and dotted with free-roaming animals. Bunnies frolic, a lone horse drinks, a clump of cows graze… ... Read More »

May 18, 2017 | Filed under: Kids’ Books, Picture Books