Off the Page

The anthology Dropped Threads: What We Aren't Told by Carol Shields and Marjorie Anderson was one of Canada's great publishing success stories, inspiring two sequels and underlining the power inherent in collective voices. Anthologies make excellent books—and they make great gifts too! We've asked Jessica Hiemstra and Lisa Martin-DeMoor, editors of the new anthology How to Expect What You're Not Expecting, to share with us some of their favourite non-fiction anthologies, at least one of which is sure to appeal to someone on your list this holiday.

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Great Expectations: Twenty-Four True Stories About Childbirth, Eds. Dede Crane and Lisa Moore: This excellent anthology of birth narratives edited by Dede Crane and Lisa Moore is a collection of literary essays of the best kind. Intelligent, engaging, well-crafted pieces by accomplished writers, the essays in this anthology collectively re-imagine—and complicate—birth and its attendant possibilities.

Double Lives: Writing and Motherhood, Eds. Shannon Cowan, Fiona Tinwei Lam, and Cathy Stonehouse: I …

Theresa Kishkan weaves a gorgeous narrative out of light and time in her beautiful essay, "Love Story," which opens the newly-released non-fiction collection The Summer Book, edited by Mona Fertig. Reviewer Howard Stewart calls the The Summer Book "a masterpiece collection of finely crafted and evocative reminders of why summer is such a special season"; read this essay for a taste of just how right he is. 

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On an early summer morning, I wake to the sound of Swainson’s thrushes. Beyond my bedroom window, beyond the house, they sing where the woods begin. And there are robins, vireos, the long whistle of a varied thrush. My curtains are rough white linen, and they filter light, the light at dawn, coming from the east, pink and golden as the sun finds its way over Mount Hallowell. My husband sleeps closest to the window, and he pulls the curtains aside to let in more song. There is honeysuckle blooming, and dog roses, trumpet vines. Hummingbirds bury themselves in the flowers. The pink throats of the tree frogs inflate, a loud vibrato close enough to touch. A face peers in the window through the lattice of vines, and it’s a weasel, as surprised to see me in a bed with pillows and a log-cabin quilt as I am to see a weasel among the dog roses. That’s what I� …

This spring we've made it our mission (even more than usual) to celebrate new releases in the wake of cancelled launch parties, book festivals, and reading series. With 49th Shelf Launchpad, we're holding virtual launch parties here on our platform complete with witty banter and great insight to give you a taste of the books on offer. You can request these books from your local library, get them as e-books or audio books, order them from your local indie bookseller if they're delivering, buy them direct from the publisher or from online retailers.

Today we're launching Sweet Water: Poems for the Watersheds, an anthology edited by Yvonne Blomer, a book on which Maude Barlow advises, "Stop. Slow down. Suspend time. Let your soul come to rest in this haunting book as you take a quiet journey to a watershed that someone cherishes."

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The Elevator Pitch. Tell us about your book in a sentence.

Sweet Water: Poems for the Watersheds is the second of a trilogy of water-based poetry anthologies, a gathering of voices emerging and established in a beautiful a …

Best Canadian Poetry 2020 is out now, featuring work by poets including Amber Dawn, Billy-Ray Belcourt, Tim Bowling, Ivan Coyote, Louise Bernice Halfe–Sky Dancer, Tanis MacDonald, Nyla Matuk, Jason Purcell, Armand Garnet Ruffo, Robyn Sarah, Kevin Spenst, John Elizabeth Stintzi, and more.

Guest Editor Marilyn Dumont writes about her vision for the anthology in her introduction to the book, which we're pleased to excerpt here today. 

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Before taking on the task of guest-editing Best Canadian Poetry 2020, I had no idea how poems were identified for such an anthology, despite habitually acquiring collections on an annual basis myself. I avidly purchased anthologies throughout the years, and whether I agreed with the anthol­ogist on their yearly selection of poems or not, I always found anthologies instructive because of their capacity to curate a collection of poems that have spoken to a particular poet’s aes­thetic at a specific time in the literary history of a country. If I consider the number of volumes in my bookshelf with the word “best” in the title, there seems to be no end of the desire to isolate what warrants merit among the genres.

Anthologists are not search engines generating a reposi­tory of merit in collections, but instead are human bein …