Hope by Terry Fox, by Barbara Adhiya
About the book: In 1976, when Terry Fox was just eighteen years old, he was diagnosed with osteosarcoma and his right leg was amputated just above the knee. It quickly became his mission to help cure cancer so others would not have to endure what he had gone through. He dreamed up a Marathon of Hope—a fundraising run across Canada, from St. John’s, Newfoundland, to Victoria, British Columbia. 5,300 miles.
When he set off on April 12, 1980, Canadians were dubious. But as he continued across the country, enthusiasm grew to a frenzy. Sadly, Terry’s cancer returned, and after 143 days and 3,339 miles, he was forced to stop his Marathon of Hope. He passed away in 1981, but the nation picked up his mission where he left off, and the annual Terry Fox Run has even spread to cities around the world, raising more than $850 million to date—well over Terry’s goal of one dollar for every Canadian.
After conducting over fifty interviews with people throughout Terry’s life — ranging from his siblings, nurses, and coaches to volunteers during the Marathon of Hope—editor Barbara Adhiya discovers how Terry was able to run a marathon a day. Through their stories, passages from Terry’s marathon journal, and over 200 photos and documents, Hope by Terry Fox shows that with enough resilience, determination, humility, and support, ordinary people can do impossible things.
Blog feature: "Rick Hansen on Terry Fox's Legacy and Paying It Forward"
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The Good Walk: Creating New Paths on Traditional Prairie Trails, by Matthew R. Anderson
About the book: A motley group’s long trek across the prairies, witnessing the land, reflecting on the past, and creating new paths for the future
Equal parts memoir, travelogue, and manifesto, The Good Walk recounts the adventures of settler and Indigenous ramblers who together retrace the earliest historical trails and pathways of the prairies. Readers will share the experience of trekking thousands of kilometres on swollen feet along the Traders' Road, the Battleford Trail, and the Frenchman Trail - prairie paths that haven't been trod for over a century.
The story is steeped in Treaty 4 and Treaty 6 history and is edged with Canadian, nêhiyaw, and Métis stories, politics, and poetry. It braids Indigenous and settler perspectives together along routes increasingly emptied of the family farms and small towns that once defined a province and doesn't shy away from the 1870s and 1880s clearing of the plains nor the 2016 killing of Colton Boushie.
Travel with the group of dreamers who instigated these annual prairie pilgrimages through prairie storms, small-town welcomes, and humorous chance encounters, all while bearing witness to the evolving politics of land ownership and the racialization of access.
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Signs of Life: Field Notes from the Frontlines of Extinction, by Sarah Cox
About the book: What’s to be done when only three spotted owls are left in Canada’s wild? When wolves eat endangered caribou, cormorants kill rare trees, and housing developments threaten a tiny frog?
Environmental journalist Sarah Cox has witnessed what happens when we drive species to the brink of extinction. In Signs of Life, she tags along with the Canadian military, Indigenous guardians, biologists, conservationists, and ordinary people who are racing to save hundreds of species before it’s too late.
Travelling across the country, Cox visits the Toronto Zoo, home of Canada’s only wildlife biobank, where scientists conserve living cells from endangered species in the event of future loss; tours Canada’s military bases, home to some of Canada’s last preserved ecosystems; and travels to Indigenous communities where land stewards are striving to restore the delicate ecological balance that has sustained people for millennia.
Through the eyes and work of individuals who are bringing species back from the precipice, Cox delivers both an urgent message and a fresh perspective on how we can protect biodiversity and begin to turn things around.
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Climate Hope: Stories of Action in an Age of Global Crisis, by David Geselbracht
About the book: Through extensive research and reporting, this boundary-crossing and highly readable survey of efforts to tackle climate change aims to replace our paralyzing fears with a restored sense of hope and determination.
Climate change is a problem so enormous and complex—with threats so frightening in their implications—that many of us fend off confusion and hopelessness by simply turning away. There are jobs to do, children to raise, bills to pay. Meanwhile, with delayed action, missed targets and increasingly dire reports at the international level, a notion that the crisis is intractable continues to spread.
And the proposed solutions can be just as daunting. They often involve jargon about gigatons of carbon and kilowatt-hours of electricity. In a deeply polarized political environment, any sense of the common purpose required to make these work seems to dissolve into denial or paralysis. With all this fear and conflict, the question must be asked: How do we find the tools and—equally important—the hope we need to tackle such a wickedly difficult issue?
In Climate Hope, journalist David Geselbracht blends in-depth research, expert interviews and on-the-ground reporting across Canada and in multiple countries, revealing remarkable efforts to identify the causes and impacts of climate change—and devise crucial ways to address them.
Geselbracht brings the reader to the chaotic 2021 UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, as well as to giant heating ducts below the city of Copenhagen and to wildfire-scorched landscapes in Western Canada, to name just a few sites. The scale of the challenge is clear in the range of fields he covers, from glaciology and climate science to law and diplomacy. But in drawing these approaches together, he shares stories of hope, awe and wonder that encourage us to confront this long-term, world-warping phenomenon with a renewed sense of purpose and possibility.
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Just Say Yes: A Memoir, by Bob McDonald
About the book: Bob McDonald, host of CBC Radio’s Quirks and Quarks, offers a personal and inspiring memoir of life-changing events in his early years through five decades in science journalism.
Revered science reporter and radio host Bob McDonald has devoted his career to turning our attention away from everyday perspectives and outward to the vast, intricate wonders of our planet and universe. Now, in this revealing and captivating memoir, he looks within, offering an intimate view of the path that brought him from a blue-collar background to his long-standing role as Canada’s foremost explainer of all things scientific.
It’s an engrossing and often jubilant story that allows McDonald to share powerful insights on overcoming fear of failure and tackling life-transforming challenges. Early on, he describes a childhood and youth plagued by difficulties in school that eventually convinced him to drop out of university. Yet, despite the academic obstacles, his love of science burned bright. Soon, through an innate stage sense and sheer enthusiasm, he landed a gig doing high-spirited demonstrations for the public at the Ontario Science Centre, which in turn led to self-produced TV spots.
And as each hard-won, never-certain success built on the last, he arrived at the role that would make him a national figure: the witty, engaging, passionately curious host of the perennially popular CBC Radio show Quirks and Quarks, reporting from the frontiers of scientific exploration and rubbing elbows with such luminaries as Chris Hadfield, Buzz Aldrin and Stephen Hawking. Told with all of McDonald’s trademark pace and humour, Just Say Yes is bound to please, surprise and inspire his numerous fans in entirely new ways.
Giveaway: Win a copy of Just Say Yes in our January Giveaways Program
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The Science of Human Possibilities, by V. Kumar Murty
About the book: Delve into the profound realm of human potential with The Science of Human Possibilities, a transformative journey that unveils the inherent talents and divinity within every individual.
Kumar Murty, a distinguished mathematician and scholar deeply rooted in the Indian teachings of Vedanta, brings over four decades of expertise in mathematics as a revered professor at the University of Toronto and Director of the Fields Institute for Research in Mathematical Sciences. Surrounded by brilliant minds in the realms of math and science, Murty has witnessed the untapped talents within each student who crossed his classroom threshold. Embark on a quest to unlock the boundless capabilities of the mind with insights that seamlessly blend scientific rigor with spiritual wisdom. Drawing from his dual expertise in science and philosophy, Murty illuminates the interconnectedness of mental acuity and spiritual enlightenment. The Science of Human Possibilities is a beacon of inspiration tailored for anyone yearning to unearth their latent gifts.
This compelling narrative transcends boundaries, exploring themes such as the art of learning, navigating uncertainty, fostering discipline, shaping identity, honoring tradition, and embracing enlightenment. Through Murty’s reflections as a Mathematics Professor intertwined with profound Vedanta teachings, readers are guided to realize the infinite potential inherent in the human experience, empowering individuals from all walks of life to evolve and flourish.
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At a Loss for Words: Conversation in an Age of Rage, by Carol Off
About the book: As co-host of CBC Radio's As It Happens, Carol Off spent a decade and a half talking to people in the news five nights a week. On top of her stellar writing and reporting career, those 25,000 interviews have given her a unique vantage point on the crucial subject at the heart of her new book—how, in these polarizing years, words that used to define civil society and social justice are being put to work for a completely different political agenda. Or they are being bleached of their meaning as the values they represent are mocked and distorted. As Off writes, “If our language doesn’t have a means to express an idea, then the idea itself is gone—even the range of thought is diminished.” And, as she argues, that’s a dangerous loss.
In six, wide-ranging chapters, Off explores the mutating meanings and the changing political impact of her six chosen words—freedom, democracy, truth, woke, choice and taxes—unpacking the forces, from right and left, that have altered them beyond recognition. She also shows what happens when we lose our shared political vocabulary: we stop being able to hear each other, let alone speak with each other in meaningful ways. This means we stop being able to reckon with the complexity of the crises we face, leaving us prey to conspiracy theories, autocrats and the machinations of greed. At a Loss for Words is both an elegy and a call to arms.
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What She Said: Conversations About Equality, by Elizabeth Renzetti
About the book: A passionate advocate for gender equity, and one of our most respected journalists, explores the most pressing issues facing women in Canada today with humour and heart.
The fight for women’s rights was supposed to have been settled. Or, to put it another way, women were supposed to have settled—for what we were grudgingly given, for the crumbs from the table that we had set. For thirty per cent of the seats in Canada’s Parliament; for five per cent of the CEO’s offices; for a tenth of the salary of male athletes; for the tiny per cent of sexual assault cases that result in convictions; for tenuous control over our health and bodies. "Aren’t we over it yet? No, we’re not," Elizabeth Renzetti writes.
In this book, Renzetti draws upon her own life story and her years as an award-winning journalist at the Globe and Mail, where her columns followed the trajectory of women's rights. Forcefully argued, accessible, and witty, What She Said explores a range of issues: the increasingly hostile world of threats that deter young women from seeking a role in public life; the use of non-disclosure agreements to silence victims of sexual harassment and assault; the inadequacy of access to health care and reproductive justice, especially as experienced by Indigenous and racialized women; the ways in which future technologies must be made more inclusive; the disparity in pay, wealth, and savings, and how women are not yet socialized to be the best financial managers they can be; the imbalanced burden of care, from emotional labour to child care.
Renzetti explores the nuance of these issues, so often presented as divisive, with humour and sympathy, in order to unite women at a time when women must work together to protect their fundamental right to exist fully and freely in the world. What She Said is a rallying cry for a more just future.
Blog Feature: Elizabeth Renzetti's favourite memoirs by Canadian women
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Health Explored: A Journey in Happiness, Healing and Humanity, by Mike Wahl, Photographs by Braeden King
About the book: Part travel narrative, part examination of global health practices, Health Explored seeks to learn and understanding the diversity of wellness traditions, and how these can be integrated into Western lifestyles to promote health and longevity.
Follow author Dr. Mike Wahl as he mines not only his history of extensive travel and research, but his discovery and trial of health wisdom and insights from around the world. Illustrated with stunning photography by Braeden King, this approach seeks to capture the essence of each culture and landscape visited, along with how to practically integrate these global health practices for enhanced well-being here at home.
Giveaway: Win a copy of Health Explored in our January giveaways program
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Crafting a Better World: Inspiration and DIY Projects for Craftivists, by Diana Weymar
About the book: From the climate crisis, to racism, to gun violence, to attacks on LGBTQ+ rights, the list of issues facing this country goes on and on, and it’s only natural to feel anxious about the state of our union. Even if you vote, march, volunteer, and donate, feelings of hopelessness (and helplessness) still creep in.
Crafting a Better World is a new kind of call to action: a guidebook for combatting fatigue and frustration with the handmade. Whether that’s sewing a welcome blanket for new immigrants, or making a batch of “vulva chocolates” to raise money at a bake sale for abortion access, this book will teach you how to transform your anxiety into action.
Curated by Diana Weymar, the creator of the Tiny Pricks Project, who knows what it means to meld craft and activism. On Jan. 8, 2018, she stitched “I am a very stable genius” (a Donald Trump quote) into a piece of her grandmother’s abandoned needlework from the 1960s and posted it to Instagram. Since then, she’s turned her embroidery practice into a material record of the trials facing this country and become a leading voice in the movement to save our democracy.
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What I Mean to Say: Remaking Conversation in Our Time, by Ian Williams
About the book: Enough small talk. Let’s get right to it: Why can’t we talk to each other anymore? What makes good communication? And how do we restore the lost art of conversation?
In contemporary society, much of our communication exists in a new dimension, the online space, and it’s changing how we regard each other and how we converse. In the digital realm, we can be anonymous, we can make false and hurtful comments yet evade consequences in a hurried scroll of clicks and swipes. But a good conversation takes time and patience, courage, even. We need to realize that one-half of our conversations is, in fact, listening. And aren't the best conversationalists—like the best musicians—good listeners?
With What I Mean to Say, award-winning novelist and poet Ian Williams seeks to ignite a conversation about conversation, to confront the deterioration of civic and civil discourse, and to reconsider the act of conversing as the sincere, open exchange of thoughts and feelings. Alternately serious and playful, Williams nimbly leaps between topics of discussion and, along the way, is discursive, digressive, and endlessly generous—like any great conversationalist.
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True Reconciliation: How to Be a Force for Change, by Jody Wilson-Raybould
About the book: There is one question Canadians have asked Jody Wilson-Raybould more than any other: What can I do to help advance reconciliation? It is clear that people from all over the country want to take concrete and tangible action that will make real change. We just need to know how to get started. This book provides that next step. For Wilson-Raybould, what individuals and organizations need to do to advance true reconciliation is self-evident, accessible, and achievable. True Reconciliation is broken down into three core practices—Learn, Understand, and Act—that can be applied by individuals, communities, organizations, and governments.
The practices are based not only on the historical and contemporary experience of Indigenous peoples in their relentless efforts to effect transformative change and decolonization, but also on the deep understanding and expertise about what has been effective in the past, what we are doing right, and wrong, today, and what our collective future requires. Fundamental to a shared way of thinking is an understanding of the Indigenous experience throughout the story of Canada. In a manner that reflects how work is done in the Big House, True Reconciliation features an “oral” history of these lands, told through Indigenous and non-Indigenous voices from our past and present.
The ultimate and attainable goal of True Reconciliation is to break down the silos we’ve created that prevent meaningful change, to be empowered to increasingly act as “inbetweeners,” and to take full advantage of this moment in our history to positively transform the country into a place we can all be proud of.
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