In 1930s Hamilton, the boathouse community of Cootes Paradise is under siege: the squatters' shacks that line the shores of Dundas Marsh stand in the way of ambitious plans to make the city beautiful. Egypt Fisher and her mother are struggling to keep their lives together in the absence of her father, a con man neither of them has seen for six years. Into this mix walks a handsome drifter and the family falls under his spell, until Egypt’s father unexpectedly returns. Unhinged by jealousy and a harrowing brush with the local mafia, he reveals a family secret that sets Egypt's world off-kilter and poisons her relationship with her mother. When Egypt tries to turn the situation to her own advantage, her lies set in motion a series of events with devastating consequences.

The Fishers of Paradise

Literature & Fiction

Preston, Rachael

Genre Fiction

James Street North Books

Ross Belot's latest collection is a dark ode to the end of oil. From industrial accidents to frozen highways Belot charts the ends of a life that face a working man in stripped-down lyric poetry. These are poems that have seen it all and acknowledge the darkness that's coming while still finding beauty in the arched neck of a tundra swan. Belot has a filmmaker's sense of atmosphere and an environmentalist's urgency and his stark lines take the reader deep into the heart of industrial man.

Moving to Climate Change Hours

Belot, Ross

Poetry

Margaret Jacobson was a sweet-natured young girl who played the accordion and had dreams of becoming a teacher until she had a psychotic break in her teens, which sent her down a much darker path. Her Name Was Margaret traces Margaret's life from her childhood to her death as a homeless woman on the streets of Hamilton, Ontario. With meticulous research and deep compassion author Denise Davy analyzed over eight hundred pages of medical records and conducted interviews with Margaret's friends and family, as well as those who worked in psychiatric care, to create this compelling portrait of a woman abandoned by society. Through the revolving door of psychiatric admissions to discharges to rundown boarding homes, Davy shows us the grim impact of deinstutionalization: patients spiralled inexorably toward homelessness and death as psychiatric beds were closed and patients were left to fend for themselves on the streets of cities across North America. Today there are more 235,000 people in Canada who are counted among the homeless annually and 35,000 who are homeless on any given night. Most of them are struggling with mental health issues. Margaret's story is a heartbreaking illustration of what happens in our society to our most vulnerable and should serve as a wake-up call to politicians and leaders in cities across Canada.

Her Name Was Margaret: Life and Death on the Streets

Biographies & Memoirs

Davy, Denise

Community & Culture

When Ralph Benmergui discovered he was literally hours away from a deadly heart attack he realized his life had changed. He was entering the autumn of his life, as he saw it, and he was being dragged into it by his heels. What follows this awakening is a funny, profound, and generous look at where he came from--from his childhood as the youngest son of Moroccan immigrants, to his experiences during the early years of Yuk Yuk's, to his long and storied career at CBC, and much more--to where he is now, with stents in his arteries, having survived two bouts of cancer, hosting a much-loved podcast, and with a practice in Hashpa'ah: Jewish Spiritual Direction. Along the way Benmergui looks critically at what it means to grow old in our society and challenges the reader to push against the stereotypes, to find a new purpose, and to claim the title and role of elder in a society that demands we strive to stay "forever young."

I Thought He Was Dead: A Spiritual Memoir

Benmergui, Ralph

Humor & Entertainment

When Margaret Nowaczyk immigrated to Canada with her family from Poland she was determined to be Canadian, whatever that meant, and she was equally determined to be a doctor. Arriving as a teen with an English vocabulary deeply influenced by the few English books she had, including Somerset Maugham's The Painted Veil, Margaret made her way through medical school at the University of Toronto, followed by residencies at Toronto's SickKids until she settled in at McMaster University Hospital as a clinical geneticist. From leaving Communist Poland to enduring the demands of medical school, through living with a long undiagnosed mental illness to discovering the fascinating field of genetics, plunging into the pressures of prenatal diagnosis and finally finding the tools of writing and of narrative medicine, Margaret shares a journey that is both inspiring and harrowing. This is a story of constant effort, of growth, of tragedy and of triumph, and most of all, of the importance of openness. In the end, Dr. Nowaczyk invites us all to see that "life is precious and fragile and wondrous and full of mistakes." And to keep trying.

Chasing Zebras: A Memoir of Genetics, Mental Health and Writing

Nowaczyk, Margaret

Parenting & Relationships

Adventurize Your Summer!

Pannell, Chris

Grandfather of the Treaties: Finding Our Future Through the Wampum Covenant

History

Coleman, Daniel

Americas

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the James Street North Books publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by James Street North Books