Praise for NO GOOD ASKING by Fran Kimmel (World Rights Available Ex: World, ECW Press 2018). Contact: Stephanie Sinclair, [email protected]:
"The humanity in Kimmel's
No Good Asking is as big as the hearts of her arresting characters. In genuine, unaffected prose, this story builds from the first page to its satiating finale. The beauty of Fran Kimmel's second novel lies deep within the beating hearts of her imperfect characters in an achingly good story. This book has nowhere to go but up."
-Lee Kvern, author of 7 Ways to Sunday
"Flawed, human and fully-realized, the cast of characters Fran Kimmel brings to life in
No Good Asking will peak your interest, charm and frustrate you before capturing your heart. This is book that demonstrates, at a time when we all need it, that sometimes the whole is far greater than the sum of its parts."
-Joan Crate, author of Black Apple
"An inspiring tale of dramatic shifts in human dynamics, compressed into one week. Fran Kimmel compassionately challenges conventional takes on dysfunction, loss, ways to mend, and the definition of family."
-Rona Altrows, author of At This Juncture
"
No Good Asking is a complex, emotional exploration of the deeply personal aspects of existing within a family. With care and sensitivity, Kimmel excavates the hopes, dreams, secret desires and profound wounds of a winning cast of characters. This is a novel filled with poignant insights into the truth of human hearts. As I read it I kept it close - like a friend I wanted to get to know better. When it was over, I felt bereft for days. I look forward to what Kimmel writes next."
-Marissa Stapley, bestselling author of Mating for Life and Things to Do When It's Raining
"Intimate and arresting, honest and profound. From one of Canada's finest voices in fiction,
No Good Asking is a soaring read that explores the messy bonds of family life with humanity and heart."
-Ali Bryan, award-winning author of Roost and The Figgs
"Quiet and honest,
No Good Asking is deeply rooted in western community, and in the small virtues that have large significance for people's daily lives. With grace and clarity, Fran Kimmel shows how the ordinary milk of human kindness, given the minor catalyst of a child's despair, can generate new life."
-Marina Endicott
Praise for Harold Johnson's CLIFFORD (World Rights Available Ex: World, House of Anansi, Fall 2018). Contact [email protected]
:
On the CBC Books list of "10 Canadian books coming out in August we can't wait to read"
"Memoir, fantasy, fiction? Genre bends in
Clifford. Clifford, refuses to distinguish fact from fantasy or fiction from biography...the story's meditations on loss, family, and fateful actions prove absorbing from the opening page."
"
Clifford
is a luminous, genre-bending memoir. Heartache and hardship are no match for the disarming whimsy, the layered storytelling shot through with love. The power of land, the pull of family, the turbulence of poverty are threads woven together with explorations of reality, tackling truth with a trickster slant."
-Eden Robinson, author of Son of a Trickster
"Harold R. Johnson is a wonderful writer, and
Clifford is his best
work yet. For fans of Jack Finney and Richard Matheson, this terrific book is a wonderfully human tale of memory both bitter and sweet, as well as a poignant exploration of time's hold over all of us."
-Robert J. Sawyer, Hugo Award-winning author of Quantum Night
"
Clifford is a story only Harold Johnson could tell. By turns soft and harsh, intellectual and emotional, Johnson weaves truth, fiction, science, and science fiction into a tapestry that is rich with meaning and maybes. A natural storyteller, Johnson seeks imagined pasts and futurity with equal parts longing and care. This work allows readers and writers the possibility of new and ancient modes of storytelling."
-Tracey Lindberg, author of Birdie
"
Clifford is unlike anything I've read-it is at once a story of science and magic, love and loss, and a case for the infi nite potential of humanity. It is a book of profound wisdom-an unpacking of the deepest truths of science in an effort to transform the pain of grief and regret into healing and forgiveness."
-Patti Laboucane-Benson, author of The Outside Circle
Praise for Kate Inglis's NOTES FOR THE EVERLOST: A FIELD GUIDE TO GRIEF (World Rights Available Ex: World, Shambhala, Fall 2018). Contact [email protected]:
"Highly recommended for anyone in the throes of grief, recent or past."
-Library Journal, starred review
"An emotional and thought-provoking mix of poetic prose, memories, and beliefs on death, loss, and grief."
-Kirkus Reviews
"
Notes for the Everlost is the most beautifully written book I have read in ages, and a great deal more besides: comforting, and sad; full of riddles and wisdom; an unsparing map of grief, with its stubborn terrain and dark jokes and switchback heartbroken roads. This book is great company for terrible times."
-Elizabeth McCracken, author of Thunderstruck & Other Stories
"Kate Inglis is a wise, flexible, and ultimately hopeful guide through the inhospitable country of mourning. She is also fierce-fiercely angry, fiercely funny and, most of all, fiercely loving."
-Katherine Ashenburg, author of The Mourner's Dance
Praise for Iain Reid's FOE (World Rights Ex: U.S., Scout Press; Canada, S&S; U.K., Scribner S&S; Germany, Droemer; Brazil, Rocco; Turkey, Hep Kitap; Czech, Leda; Italy, Rizzoli; and Film, Anonymous Content). Contact [email protected]:
"Reid is remarkable for delivering hypnotic, twisty plots and taunt prose in a short novel.
Foe is a clever tale which examines domestic relationships and one's self as it begs the bigger question, 'What constitutes normalcy?'"
-The New York Journal of Books
"Reid is at it again, exploiting readers with plot twists, narrative unease, and explosive conclusions in his second novel... [he] has the rare ability to make readers both uncomfortable and engaged, and this drama will surely send them back to the beginning pages to track the clues he left to the surprise ending."
-Booklist, starred review
"Reid proves once again that he is a master of atmosphere and suspense. Readers won't be able to put this one down."
-Publisher's Weekly
"Such an ambitious work risks being muddied. Reid, however, brilliantly executes his vision... With
Foe, Reid has written a page-turning novel that will entertain you and have you questioning the very foundation of your existence at the exact same time."
-BookPage
"movie producers are simply confirming what the literary community already knows: Iain Reid just might be the most exciting and excitingly unclassifiable author working in Canadian fiction today."
-The Globe and Mail
"Reid writes it all with controlled understatement, stark beauty in each word, doled out with the care of a parent spoon-feeding a baby."
-Literary Review of Canada
"
Foe
reads like a house on fire, and is almost impossible not to finish in one sitting...an otherworldly hothouse of introversion and fantasy."
-Toronto Star
"Reid builds to a deeply unsettling climax. As much a surgical dissection of what makes a marriage as an expertly paced, sparsely detailed psychological thriller, this is one to read with the lights on."
-Kirkus Reviews
Praise for Shaughnessy Bishop-Stall's HUNGOVER (World Rights Ex: Canada, HarperCollins, December 2018; U.S., Penguin Books; German, Dumont Verlag, August 2018; U.K., Blink Publishing; Korean, Cassiopeia Publisher; Polish, Bukowy Las). Contact [email protected]:
"It takes a writer as skilled as Shaughnessy Bishop-Stall to write a rip-roaring adventure story about the morning after. Thoroughly researched, rich in history and humour, against all odds, Hungover makes you wish you were there."
-
Tabatha Southey, author of
Collected Tarts and Other Indelicacies
"Who knew subject matter so (literally) uncomfortable could be so much damn fun? Shaughnessy Bishop-Stall is the perfect endearingly flawed and funny narrator to take us on this wild, world-wide adventure into the history of our painful morning afters. Whether he's piloting a fighter plate in Vegas, chatting with a blacksmith in Devon, cheating death in the desert and the alps, or attempting 12 pints in 12 pubs, his daring, wit and insight never disappoints--all with, it would seem, a blazing hangover. Part science, part folklore, part string of the author's very bad ideas with good intentions,
Hungover is a highly knowledgeable and ridiculously enjoyable ride."
-Stacey May Fowles, author of Baseball Life Advice
"Shaughnessy Bishop-Stall has risked life and liver to write this book, a perilous trip into many mornings after-historical, cinematic, literary, and of course his own. That's the entertaining part. As to whether Bishop-Stall has, in fact, invented a hangover remedy that actually works? I live in hope."
-Adam Rogers, author of Proof: The Science of Booze
Praise for Joanne Proulx's WE ALL LOVE THE BEAUTIFUL GIRLS (World Rights Ex: Canada English, Viking, August 2017; U.S., Grand Central Publishing, 2018; Canadian Audio rights, Audible, 2018). Contact [email protected]:
"Gorgeously written, Proulx's narrative offers a fascinating plot and both a searing exploration of the butterfly effect of trauma and the uncanny persistence of love in improbable circumstances."
-Publisher's Weekly
"Believe the hype about this family novel that's as complex as it is creative."
-Hello Giggles
"Proulx's novel covers a lot of territory, with several twists and turns... The story excels in its depiction of women."
-amNY
Praise for Naben Ruthnum's FIND YOU IN THE DARK (World Rights Available Ex: U.S., Atria; Canada, Simon & Schuster Canada; U.K./A.N.Z., Text Publishing; Germany, Lubbe; and Spain, Ediciones Siruela). Contact [email protected] and [email protected]:
"Ripley's debut offers a twist on the typical serial-killer story...a unique spin with just enough creepy details to keep suspense readers interested."
-Booklist
"Engrossing...his debut thriller by the pseudonymous Ripley (Journey Prize winner Naben Ruthnum) is highly recommended for fans of Lee Child and C.J. Box."
-Library Journal
"There is something unsettling about this story and readers will feel that tension grow as they consume
Find You in The Dark. Contrasting and conflicting emotions will dominate, making it impossible to stop until the chase is complete."
-The BOLO Books review
Praise for Jan Redford's END OF THE ROPE (World Rights Available Ex: U.S., Catapult/Counterpoint; English Canada, Knopf Canada; U.S. Audio, Audible, Spring 2018). Contact [email protected]:
"The book is a welcome addition to mountain literature, where women's voices (and stories like lactating all over yourself in the woods while on the job) are still noticeably rare."
-Outside Online
"The book...makes a powerful case for motherhood in the outdoors and feeds into a growing concern about the ways we have cut women off from nature."
-Romper
"
End of the Rope is a must-read for any young woman challenged with forging her way in a space that is still largely dominated by men. It's a tome to both harnessing and pushing against fear, and the power of arriving on the other side."
-Bustle
"
End of the Rope is the work of a different kind of a courage-a more vulnerable and hard-earned courage, one more open to trial and error on a climb as well as on the ground."
-Katherine Indermaur
Praise for Claire Holden Rothman's LEAR'S SHADOW (World Rights Available Ex: Canada, Penguin). Contact [email protected]:
"
Lear's Shadow is her best yet, a deft balancing of timeless, classically weighted themes with contemporary relevance and page-turning instincts."
-Montreal Gazette
"Rothman makes great use of the ubiquitous Montreal summer storms to riff off the action of the play and to engage in an examination of identity."
-Quill & Quire
"A deft balancing of timeless, classically weighted themes with contemporary relevance and page-turning instincts."
-Calgary Herald
"Rothman's an accomplished writer, and Lear's Shadow reflects that...
Lear's Shadow is a novel with a play-like feel to it that manages to toy with wisdom and folly, love and loss. It is an ambitious work which hits its mark."
-Winnipeg Free Press
Praise for Sarah Selecky's RADIANT SHIMMERING LIGHT (World Rights Available Ex: Canada, HarperCollins; U.S., Bloomsbury; Australia, Text; English Canada and U.S. Audio, Blackstone Publishing; Muse Entertainment, Film). Contact [email protected]:
"In
Radiant Shimmering Light
, @SarahSeleckyWS nails the Perfect-Yourself 35-43 gen in all of its hopeful internet-brand-conscious pyramid-scheming empowering goddessiness. Social satire+cultural insight whipped into a yummy froth! You'll laugh+shed a tiny precious tear, my petals!"
-Margaret Atwood
"Selecky's work is smart and subtle."
-Toronto Star
"
Radiant Shimmering Light, Sarah Selecky's gently funny debut novel, satirizes the packaging of feminine leadership... Brimming with insights into female-driven motivational seminars in the age of #MeToo,
Radiant Shimmering Light speaks to our desire for community in a time of intense technological connection and consumerism."
-Hamilton Review of Books
Praise for Judy Rebick's HEROES IN MY HEAD (World Rights Sold: Canada, House of Anansi Press, April 2018). Contact [email protected]:
"Rebick writes with an authoritative voice about an undeniably difficult subject."
-Quill & Quire
Praise for Angie Abdou's HOME ICE: Confessions of a Reluctant Hockey Mom (World Rights Sold: North America, ECW Press, September 2018). Contact [email protected] and [email protected]:
"The author brings a novelist's eye to the story, telling it in first-person present tense; with its sharp characterizations and dialogue in place of autobiographical exposition, the book is a first-rate memoir and a fine example of narrative nonfiction. It's also a must-read for parents with youngsters who play organized sports."
-Booklist, starred review
"A beautifully written and wise look at the troubling culture surrounding amateur sports through the eyes of a conflicted hockey mom.
Home Ice reminds us 'the best lessons we take from hockey have nothing to do with winning."
-Erica Ehm, Creator and Publisher of YummyMummyClub.ca
"Needing more hockey books written by women in our canon, Angie Abdou delivers with writing so clear you can smell the arena ammonia and feel the ice shavings through a novelist's eye and a parent's heart. Abdou has emerged as one of the country's best writers on sport at any level."
-Rheostatics' Dave Bidini, author of Keon and Me and publisher of the West End Phoenix
"Angie Abdou's son loves playing hockey; she loves her son. Ergo, she must strike a deal with the sport - with the expense, risk of concussion, crazy weekend commutes, early mornings, marital strains and occasional heartbreak involved in being a hockey mom. I don't give a hoot about hockey but I couldn't put this memoir down. As a former competitive athlete, Abdou has to rethink her focus on winning at all costs when it comes to her son's happiness on the rink. Home Ice is searingly honest, compassionate and always engaging. Anyone who has experienced the unique anxiety of watching a son or daughter play a team sport will be grateful for this truth-telling book."
-Marni Jackson is the author of the bestselling memoir The Mother Zone, and Don't I Know You?
"Angie Abdou cracks open the world of the hockey mom with her distinctive, wry humour. Not only does she explore the winner-take-all hockey culture, she confronts her own place in it and the price it exacts on her family and her marriage. Brave and refreshingly candid, Angie delves into issues many of us grapple with but don't dare voice."
-Jan Redford, author of End of the Rope: Mountains, Marriage, and Motherhood
"A frank, funny, and highly emotional memoir, I found myself crying and laughing out loud and shaking my fist and nodding vigorously, and that was just in the first 50 pages. This is the book all hockey parents must read."
-Grant Lawrence, CBC broadcaster, goalie, and author of The Lonely End of the Rink
Praise for Ian Weir's THE DEATH AND LIFE OF STROTHER PURCELL (World Rights Sold: Canada, Goose Lane Editions, Fall 2018; French, Lemeac Editeur). Contact [email protected]:
"This is an outstanding novel, alternately tragic and funny, grim and joyous, about spilled blood, shattered lives, and the redemptive power of both the smallest good deed and the grand selfless act."
-Publisher's Weekly, starred review
Praise for Georgia Webber's DUMB (World Rights Sold: World English, Fantagraphics, August 7, 2018). Contact [email protected]:
"Webber's meditative graphic memoir is an ode to doggedness and a testament to resilience through change."
-Publishers Weekly
"Webber's experiences make for fascinating, engrossing, and revelatory reading in her new graphic memoir,
Dumb."
-Four Color Apocalypse
"Webber wields the full power of the comics medium to address the life-changing catastrophe of being forced into silence." -Broken Frontier