Off the Page

Foodies, take note!

Every year, the Taste Canada Awards are a literary and culinary highlight, celebrating the best in Canadian food writing. We also love them as a good excuse to share some of our favourite posts when books we've celebrated already end up on the shortlists!

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Seafood and Chorizo Paella, from Gather: A Dirty Apron Cookbook, by David Robertson, nominated for Culinary Narratives

Go to the recipe

About the book: Bestselling chef David Robertson, of The Dirty Apron Cooking School, is back with a stunningly designed book of new recipes for the home cook and the whole family.

The Dirty Apron Cooking School has taught thousands of Canadians to cook. In this anticipated follow-up to his bestselling Dirty Apron Cookbook, David Robertson's latest book celebrates the simple pleasures of cooking food for friends and family.

Gather features an enticing collection of 80 delicious recipes designed to be shared, whether on platters or heaped high in big bowls, and served with care, generosity and a lot of love. From crème brûlée French toast, to a s …

Today we're launching David Berry's book On Nostalgia, a history of nostalgia—which is no small thing! Tobias Carroll writes at Literary Hub, "[Berry] pulls off the impressive feat of covering plenty of ground in a concise and compelling manner."

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

It’s a cultural history of nostalgia, an examination of why and how we’re so ceaselessly drawn back.

Describe your ideal reader.

Someone who has never met a Wikipedia hole they couldn’t fall in.

What authors/books is your work in conversation with?

Among others, I’d hope it’s in conversation with writers like FT Marinetti, Jaron Lanier, Eric Hobsbawm, Barbara Tuchman, Steven Pinker, Bill Bryson and every tech CEO who has written a thinkpiece or memoir, although I would certainly not claim that all those conversations are polite or respectful.

What is something interesting you learned about your book/ yourself/ your subject during the process of creating and publishing your book?

I learned that when left to my own devices, my nostalgic thoughts tend to turn towards chocolate chip cookies. Also, I went from someone who was pretty deeply suspicious of nostalgia in general to someone who is deeply suspicious of the ways it’s used against us and profoundly …

Today we're launching Literatures, Communities, and Learning: Conversations with Indigenous Writers, by Aubrey Jean Hanson, which gathers nine conversations with Indigenous writers about the relationship between Indigenous literatures and learning, and how their writing relates to communities. 

The book's official launch is tonight (Thursday June 25) online!

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

It’s a book of conversations with nine Indigenous writers talking about their work, about why literatures are important for Indigenous communities, and about how writing can have an impact on people’s understandings and interrelationships.

Describe your ideal reader.

Loves to read, is thoughtful about complex politics and histories, gets really into the Canada Reads contest or anything Shelagh Rogers does on CBC radio, is a good listener, always shares what they know with others, and is stepping into more and more community engagement since the TRC’s Calls to Action came out in 2015.

What authors/books is your work in conversation with?

The book itself carries conversations with Tenille Campbell, Warren Cariou, Marilyn Dumont, Daniel Justice, Lee Maracle, Sharron Proulx-Turner, David Robertson, Richard Van Camp, and Katherena Vermette. Beyond the …

Swimmers in Winter (Invisible Publishing) is Faye Guenther’s debut collection of short fiction. These six stories explore the lives of queer women across through time. Among other issues, the works consider conflicts between queer people and the police; the impact of homophobia, bullying, and PTSD; the dynamics of women’s friendships; and life for queer women in Toronto during WWII.

Thea Lim, author of An Ocean of Minutes, says “Faye Guenther lovingly tells the stories of ordinary women, whose lives have yet been mostly ignored by literature. Each character in this collection is a planet unto herself: the stories part the mists and show the miles to the surface. Dizzying, precise, and beautiful.”

Faye Guenther lives in Toronto. Her writing has appeared in literary magazines including Joyland and she has published a chapbook, Flood Lands, with Junction Books. Swimmers in Winter is her first collection of short fiction.

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Trevor Corkum: The title story “Swimmers in Winter” takes place partly in the back room of a lesbian bar in 1950s Toronto. It’s a powerful exploration of time and place. What did you learn about this period in Toronto’s queer history during your research?

Summer is not cancelled, and summer reading isn't either. We've got thrillers, epics, drama, historical fiction, and so much more. There is something for every kind of fiction reader on our 2020 Summer List.

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Ridgerunner, by Gil Adamson

About the book: November 1917. William Moreland is in mid-flight. After nearly twenty years, the notorious thief, known as the Ridgerunner, has returned. Moving through the Rocky Mountains and across the border to Montana, the solitary drifter, impoverished in means and aged beyond his years, is also a widower and a father. And he is determined to steal enough money to secure his son’s future.

Twelve-year-old Jack Boulton has been left in the care of Sister Beatrice, a formidable nun who keeps him in cloistered seclusion in her grand old house. Though he knows his father is coming for him, the boy longs to return to his family’s cabin, deep in the woods. When Jack finally breaks free, he takes with him something the nun is determined to get back—at any cost.

Set against the backdrop of a distant war raging in Europe and a rapidly changing landscape in the West, Gil Adamson’s follow-up to her award-winning debut, The Outlander, is a vivid historical novel that draws from the epic tradition and a literary Western brimming wi …