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Dear Friends,
Happy Spring!
We're on a post book fair high following the London Book Fair and Bologna Book Fair and are diving into a new season of deals, bestsellers and rave reviews, which we're excited to highlight for you below. We've also been busy visiting LA and meeting with editors in New York and are looking forward to BookExpo America in May that agent Andrea Cascardi will be attending.
As always, you can find our latest catalogues
here and we'll be delighted to discuss any projects you find of interest further with you.
Warmest wishes,
Marilyn Biderman,
Shaun Bradley,
Sandra Bishop,
Andrea Cascardi,
Jesse Finkelstein,
Rob Firing,
Carolyn Forde,
Samantha Haywood,
Fiona Kenshole,
Stephanie Sinclair,
Amy Tompkins,
Tim Travaglini,
Léonicka Valcius and
Trena White
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New Deal Announcements
CANADIAN AND NORTH AMERICAN DEALS
 North American rights to Gary Barwin's NOTHING THE SAME, EVERYTHING HAUNTED, to Anne Collins at Random House Canada for publication in Spring 2021. This extraordinary novel is a cross-pollination between cowboy fiction and Holocaust literature, featuring Motl, a middle-aged Lithuanian Jew, who imagines he's in a Western novel as a way of surviving the displacement and genocide of WWII. Barwin's debut work, Yiddish for Pirates (Random House Canada), was the winner of the 2017 Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour, and a finalist for both the Governor General's Literary Award for Fiction and the Scotiabank Giller Prize. Contact Shaun Bradley, [email protected].
 English-language rights in Canada in a two-book deal at auction to Catherine Hernandez's CROSSHAIRS, for publication in the Fall of 2020. CROSSHAIRS is a novel set in the near future about a country's slide into fascism and a regime that targets racialized, elderly, LGBTQ and disabled folks, and the bond formed among a group of persecuted outsiders, including Kay, a queer Jamaican/Filipino man, as they form an underground resistance, and plan for the revolution. Audio to Audible. Contact Marilyn Biderman, [email protected].
 English Canada rights sold to Algonquin Anishnaabe writer Karen McBride's debut, CROW WINTER, at auction, to Iris Tupholme at HarperCollins Canada. About grief and healing, CROW WINTER follows Hazel, a young woman who decides to move home to her First Nation reserve after losing her father. She discovers the quarry that's been lying unsullied for over a century on her father's property is stirring the old magic that crosses the boundaries between this world and the next. With the help of the trickster Nanabush, Hazel must unravel a web of deceit that, if left untouched, could destroy her family and her home on both sides of the Medicine Wheel. For readers of Thomas King and Eden Robinson, Karen McBride is an important new voice in Indigenous literature. Contact Stephanie Sinclair, [email protected].
 World rights to Leslie Vryenhoek's new novel, ASSUMING DAWN, to Rebecca Rose at Breakwater Books for publication in Fall 2019. Told through alternating perspectives, ASSUMING DAWN explores whether redemption is possible for any of us when technology has made the past so indelible. Contact Shaun Bradley, [email protected].
 World English rights for award-winning author Kathleen Winter's next novel, UNDERSONG, to Publishing Director Lynn Henry at Knopf Canada for publication in Fall 2021. UNDERSONG is inspired by Dorothy Wordsworth's life and work. Over the past year, Winter has been transcribing previously unpublished journals and diaries penned by Dorothy Wordsworth (sister of the English Romantic poet William Wordsworth), which belong to The Wordsworth Trust in the UK. Winter's transcriptions will be returned to the Trust's archives for future public and academic use. Winter is the author of the internationally celebrated novel
Annabel, and more recently,
Lost in September. Contact Shaun Bradley,
[email protected].
Non-Fiction
 Penguin Canada editor David Ross has commissioned
Billy-Ray Belcourt
, the youngest ever winner of the Griffin Poetry Prize, for a book of essays. Drawing on intimate personal experience,
A HISTORY OF MY BRIEF BODY
is a meditation on grief, joy, love, and sex at the intersection of indigeneity and queerness. It will be published under the Hamish Hamilton imprint and is currently scheduled for a May 2020 release. Contact Stephanie Sinclair,
[email protected]
.
 World English Rights to
Chantal Braganza
's
GUARDIAN FLESH
- a collection broaching race, ethnicity and identity in motherhood offering readers a new way to think about how we build our sense of self, our sense of family and our sense of belonging - to Haley Cullingham at Strange Light for Fall 2020. Contact Stephanie Sinclair,
[email protected]
.
 Canadian rights to OPEN HOUSE: A Life in 29 Moves by bestselling memoirist Jane Christmas sold to Patrick Crean at Patrick Crean Editions, HarperCollins Canada for Spring 2020.
For fans of Tara Westover, Janette Walls, Plum Johnson, and Nora Ephron, Jane Christmas takes on the pursuit of the perfect home. Having parents who moved and renovated constantly, the house bug bit Jane at an early age. Now, as she confronts her next move in an overheated housing market in England, she and her husband are forced to settle on an overpriced Victorian home that neither likes and that will require more money than they have to renovate it. But this is no how-I-renovated-my-house tell-all; OPEN HOUSE excavates a deeper story. As work proceeds on their home, Jane turns inward, and soon her memories blow the seal off a strict and peripatetic childhood and its ancillary damage-lost friends, divorces, suicide attempts, and threatens to shake the foundations of her marriage. Bravely told with characteristic humour, OPEN HOUSE will strike a chord with anyone who loves peeking inside the homes of other people. Film/TV available. Contact: Samantha Haywood,
[email protected]
.
 World rights to Chief Investigative Reporter at the
Toronto Star
and multiple award-winning journalist and bestselling author,
Kevin Donovan
's true-crime narrative,
THE BILLIONAIRE MURDERS: The Mysterious Deaths of Barry and Honey Sherman
, investigating the violent deaths of the founder of one of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies and his wife -their net worth has been estimated at $4.7 billion - which rocked the intersecting worlds of business, politics, and philanthropy, sold to Diane Turbide at Penguin Canada for October 2019. Contact Samantha Haywood,
[email protected]
and Jesse Finkelstein,
[email protected]
. Film/TV available, contact Samantha Haywood,
[email protected]
.
 North American English rights to
I OVERCAME MY AUTISM AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS LOUSY ANXIETY DISORDER by
Sarah Kurchak - an examination of all of the steps the author took to become an autistic "success story," how it almost ruined her life, and how she is now trying to recover; tackling everything from autism parenting culture, to love, sex, alcohol, obsessions, and professional pillow fighting, Kurchak challenges current perceptions about autism and asks what can really make the lives of autistic people healthier, happier, and more fulfilling - to Douglas & McIntyre for Spring 2020. Contact Stephanie Sinclair,
[email protected].
 World rights to
Amanda Leduc
's
DISFIGURED: On Fairy Tales, Disability, and Making Space for Oneself in the World
, which looks at several prominent, recognizable fairy table traditions and archetypes and examines how these ideas have played out in history and recent popular culture, and draws on Amanda's own experience as a physically disabled woman with cerebral palsy, to compare and contrast the treatment of disability in these stories, sold to Alana Wilcox at Coach House Books for publication in Feb 2020. Contact: Samantha Haywood,
[email protected]
.
 English Canada rights to
Harriet Alida Lye's
NATURAL KILLER - an intimate and gripping memoir examining the interconnectedness of life and death, what it means for your body to turn against itself, self-destructing from within; and how to reconcile that with the magical banality of creating a life; with the searing honesty of A Life's Work by Rachel Cusk and lyricism of On Immunity by Eula Biss, weaving in source material from the year the author lived in the hospital, this memoir is told in narrative, snapshots, and raw observations turned inward and out - to Jared Bland at McClelland & Stewart for Spring 2020. Contact Stephanie Sinclair,
[email protected].
 World rights to
New York Times
bestselling author
Rachel Macy Stafford
's
LIVE LOVE NOW
, her fourth title, again to Carolyn McCready at Zondervan Publishing. Filled with new strategies for relieving the pressures threatening the well-being of the young people in their lives, this book offers compassion oriented inspiration and practical action steps for adults who may need to update their game plan for guiding kids through one of the most stressful times in life in an era when the stakes are higher than ever. Stafford is a beloved blogger who inspires millions in her weekly blog posts at
handsfreemama.com
and through her Facebook community, The Hands Free Revolution. Contact Sandra Bishop,
[email protected]
.
 World rights to
FAST EASY CHEAP VEGAN
and an untitled vegan cookbook by
Sam Turnbull
, that are filled with delicious, easy-to-make vegan dishes that can help vegans (both new and experienced) satisfy their craving for comfort food, sold in a two-book deal to Bhavna Chauhan and Robert McCullough at Appetite Random House. Contact: Samantha Haywood,
[email protected]
.
 World English rights to
Emily Urquhart
's
ORDINARY WONDER TALES: Essays on Belief
, a collection that contains 13 essays that weave personal narratives into larger explorations of belief, ranging from religious convictions to fairy and ghost encounters to the perceptions we hold of women's creative ambition, sold to Dan Wells at Biblioasis for publication in 2021/2022. Contact: Samantha Haywood,
[email protected]
.
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Foreign Rights
 Korean rights to
EQ APPLIED
by
Justin Bariso
to Green Light by Book Cosmos Agency; Italian rights to Unicomunicazione by the Berla Agency; Portuguese rights to Porto by The Foreign Office in association with Stephanie Sinclair Agency on behalf of Page Two Strategies.
 Japanese rights to
HUNGOVER
by
Shaughnessy Bishop Stall
to KOKUSHOKANKOKAI INC. by the Japan Uni Agency in association with Stephanie Sinclair on behalf of Samantha Haywood.
Russian rights to Shaughnessy Bishop-Stall's HUNGOVER: The Morning After and One Man's Quest for the Cure - a journalist's journey to discover the ultimate hangover cure, drinking and writing his way through the world's favorite beverages and their vengeful aftermath - to Bookmate Limited. Previous rights sold: HarperCollins; Penguin Books US; Dumont Verlag, Germany; Blink Publishing, UK; Cassiopeia Publisher, Korea; Bukowy Las, Poland. All deals by Stephanie Sinclair on behalf of Samantha Haywood.
 Spanish rights to EXACTLY WHAT TO SAY by Phil M. Jones to Ediciones Urano by The Foreign Office in association with Stephanie Sinclair on behalf of Page Two Strategies.
 Russian rights to LABYRINTH by Pawel Motyl to Piter by Stephanie Sinclair on behalf of Page Two Strategies.
 Vietnamese rights to THE FOUR NOBLE TRUTHS OF LOVE by Susan Piver to ThaiHa Books by Maxima Creative Agency in association with Stephanie Sinclair on behalf of Page Two Strategies.
 Portuguese rights to FOE by Iain Reid to 20/20 Editora by The Foreign Office in association with Stephanie Sinclair on behalf of Samantha Haywood.
 Japanese rights to I'M THINKING OF ENDING THINGS by Iain Reid to Hayakawa Publishing Inc by The English Agency Ltd in association with Stephanie Sinclair on behalf of Samantha Haywood.
 ANZ rights to Bestselling author Marissa Stapley's new novel THE LAST RESORT to Allen & Unwin. For fans of Big Little Lies - two couples arrive at The Harmony Retreat for couples therapy on the shores of Tulum Mexico where they hope to fix their marriages with the help of celebrity therapists Miles and Grace Markell. But all is not as it seems, and when Miles mysteriously disappears, the complex truth behind the façade of love, marriage and professional success begins to unravel, leaving room for romance to blossom in unexpected ways. Previous rights sold to Simon & Schuster Canada, Graydon House U.S. and Rowholt Germany. Deal arranged by Stephanie Sinclair on behalf of Samantha Haywood.
 Audio rights to THE CONNECTORS ADVANTAGE by Michelle Tillis Lederman to Gildan, Recorded Books by Stephanie Sinclair on behalf of Page Two Strategies.
 Slovak rights to A GOOD WIFE by Samra Zafar to Ikar by the Kristin Olson Literary Agency in association with Samantha Haywood and Stephanie Sinclair.
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Film/TV Deals
 Kris Bertin and
Alexander Forbes'
THE CASE OF THE MISSING MEN, the first graphic novel in the Hobtown Mystery series, a
Stranger Things meets
Twin Peaks mystery thriller set in a strange Nova Scotia town that follows a group of teens who have made it their business to investigate each and every one of their town's bizarre occurrences as "The Teen Detective Club," and have their small world of missing pets and shed-fires turned upside down when real-life kid adventurer Sam Finch comes to town and enlists them in their first real case-the search for his missing father-to Anonymous Content and Likely Story, for Kevin Cotter, Anthony Bregman, Jeff Stern, and Stefanie Azpiazu to produce. Contact: Samantha Haywood,
[email protected] and Stephanie Sinclair,
[email protected].
 Film/TV rights to
Linden MacIntyre
's novel
THE BISHOP'S MAN
have been optioned to Babak Payami at Payam Films Inc. for development. THE BISHOP'S MAN was a #1 national bestseller, won the Scotiabank Giller Prize, the Dartmouth Book Award and the CBA Libris Fiction Book of the Year. It has been published in the U.K. and the U.S. and translated into eight languages. Contact Shaun Bradley,
[email protected]
.
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Drawn and Quarterly Deals
 Macedonia rights to
PAYING FOR IT by
Chester Brown to Templum by Stephanie Sinclair and Samantha Haywood on behalf of Drawn and Quarterly.
 Brazilian rights to
WOMAN WORLD by
Aminder Dhaliwal to Conrad Editora by The Foreign Office in association with Stephanie Sinclair and Samantha Haywood on behalf of Drawn and Quarterly.
 Ukraine rights to
BAKING WITH KAFKA
by
Tom Gauld
to Vydavnytstvo by Stephanie Sinclair and Samantha Haywood on behalf of Drawn and Quarterly.
 German rights to
DEPT OF MIND-BLOWING THEORIES
, the highly new anticipated series by
Tom Gauld
to Edition Moderne; Italian rights to Mondadori; Spanish rights to Salamandra Graphic; Russian rights to Guprus; Canadian French rights to Alto and World French Ex: Canada to Editions 2024; Italian rights to Oscar Ink, Mondadori; all deals by Stephanie Sinclair and Samantha Haywood on behalf of Drawn and Quarterly.
 Ukraine rights to
SABRINA
by
Tom Gauld
to Vydavnytstvo by Stephanie Sinclair and Samantha Haywood on behalf of Drawn and Quarterly.
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 Endless congratulations to Shelley Wood whose debut novel, THE QUINTLAND SISTERS, was an INSTANT bestseller debuting at #1 on The Globe and Mail and Toronto Star Canadian Fiction lists its first week of publication and holding strong at #1 for six weeks straight. The title also debuted at #9 on the Globe and the Star overall fiction lists, reaching #6. THE QUINTLAND SISTERS has appeared on both lists each week since publication on March 5th.
 It's a thrill to see both Becky Blake and Joshua Whitehead selected for this year's RBC Taylor Prize mentorship program, two of the five authors on this year's roster!
Following a hugely successful launch last year, the program returns this year with the continued goal of developing the careers of the  top emerging voices in literary non-fiction.
Becky Blake and Joshua Whitehead have been paired with 2019 RBC Taylor Prize finalists Elizabeth Hay and Ian Hampton, respectively.
Congratulations to you both!
Catherine Hernandez, author of Scarborough, will present her one-woman play, Eating With Lola, at the FOLD Festival on May 4, 2019.
 Congratulations to Trina Moyles, author of Eyes in the Sky (soon to be on submission) for the nomination of "Herd Memory," an essay about growing up in northern Alberta and the decline of woodland caribou herds, for the John Whyte Memorial Essay Award.
 A MIND SPREAD OUT ON THE GROUND by Alicia Elliott hit the Toronto Star Canadian Nonfiction bestsellers list at #9 in its first week! Samra Zafar's memoir A GOOD WIFE (HarperCollins Canada) hit #8 on that list as well, and debuted at #2 on The Globe and Mail's Canadian nonfiction bestseller list and #4 on the overall nonfiction bestseller list in it's first week!! A GOOD WIFE has remained a bestseller each week since publication on March 5th.
A GOOD WIFE by Samra Zafar was highlighted by The Guam Daily, The Gazette, The Borneo Bulletin, The Business Times, and Oregon Live as one of 10 books to watch out for in 2019. A GOOD WIFE was also named as a Best Book of 2019 from Washington Post.
THE LAST RESORT was named by Parade Magazine as one of 12 Big Fictions Reads Every Book Club Will Love in 2019.
 The Toronto Star included the following titles it in its spring preview of 20 Books I Can't Wait to Read in 2019: A GIRL NAMED LOVELY by Catherine Porter, THE LAST RESORT by Marissa Stapley, A MIND SPREAD OUT ON THE GROUND by Alicia Elliott, and FRYING PLANTAIN by Zalika Reid-Benta.
    
The following titles were included on 49th Shelf's Most Anticipated Spring 2019 Fiction Preview: THE LAST RESORT by Marissa Stapley, THE STUDENT by Cary Fagan, USE YOUR IMAGINATION by Kris Bertin, SMALL GAME HUNTING AT THE LOCAL COWARD GUN CLUB by Megan Coles, FRYING PLANTAIN by Zalika Reid-Benta, and THE DEAD CELEBRITIES CLUB by Susan Swan.
Indigo, Chapters and Coles's most-anticipated #CanLit list includes Marissa Stapley's THE LAST RESORT and
Zalika Reid-Benta
's
FRYINGPLANTAIN
.
 MEALS MADE EASY by Sara Lynn Cauchon made Chatelaine's list of '10 Spring Cookbooks We Can't Wait to Cook From'!
Congratulations to Alicia Elliott's A MIND SPREAD OUT ON THE GROUND and Andrew Reeves'  OVERRUN, which are on Loan Stars Top 10 list for March 2019 with Alicia Elliott's debut memoir selected as the Adult Top Pick!
 Congratulations on Rachel Giese's BOYS (HarperCollins Canada) and Abu Bakr al Rabeeah & Winnie Yeung's HOMES (Freehand Books) being  named finalists for this year's Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing!
Iain Reid's FOE and Elisabeth de Mariaffi's HYSTERIA have been  nominated for the 2019 Evergreen Award!
Congratulations to Iain Reid on Indigo naming FOE as a Top 10 thriller.
Big film news - the cast of Charlie Kaufman's Netflix adaptation of Iain Reid's I'M THINKING OF ENDING THINGS is out, and we have stars in our eyes! We can't wait to see Toni Collette, Jessie Buckley, and David Thewlis in this mind-bending story.
 The movie adaptation of ANTHEM OF A RELUCTANT PROPHET had its US debut on January 10th, and author Joanne Proulx was there to cheer it on, calling it "a night to remember." ANTHEM is out now in select theatres, on-demand, and digital!
 FIND YOU IN THE DARK
has appeared on the Canadian Fiction bestsellers list in the
Toronto Star
recently at #8.
 Zoe Whittall has been long listed for the 2018 Cosmonauts Avenue Fiction Prize.
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New Clients
 Allison Ashley
Allison Ashley is a Board Certified Oncology Pharmacist and is drawn to reading and writing funny, quirky love stories. She lives in Oklahoma with her husband and children and is a member of RWA, WFWA, and ACFW.
 Jeff Beer
Jeff Beer is a senior staff editor and writer at Fast Company, covering advertising, marketing and the business of brands. He lives in Toronto.
 Marianne Boucher
Marianne Boucher is an accomplished artist, illustrator and writer based in Toronto. Her debut graphic memoir, Talking To Strangers, is based on her lived experience as a teenager who travelled to California to join the Ice Capades. Instead, she unwittingly joined a religious cult. It will be published by Penguin Random House Canada in 2020. A graduate of OCADU, she started her career as a painter and has worked since 1990 as a court artist/illustrator and ultimately became a reporter for Citynews, specializing in the court beat. She is at work on her second graphic novel.
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Rave Reviews
 Praise for Katherine Ashenburg's SOFIE & CECILIA (World Rights Available Ex: Canada, Knopf, New Face of Fiction, Spring 2018). Contact Samantha Haywood, [email protected]:
"Sofie and Cecilia is magnificent. The characters are so tenderly and deeply explored, I couldn't put it down . . . A joyful experience . . . One of the best things I've read in years."
-Sarah Polley
"Sharon, I have just finished Sofie & Cecilia and LOVED it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What a marvellous, fascinating, beautifully written book, I could hardly bear to reach the end! Thank you so much for sending it!" -Mary Lawson, author of Crow Lake
 Praise for Martha Baillie's SISTER LANGUAGE (World Rights Available). Contact Samantha Haywood, [email protected]:
"In Sister Language, Christina Baillie writes, LANGUAGE BELIEVES IN THE PATIENT'S REAL EXISTENCE, but this book makes clear that she and her sister Martha believe that language can also be a place of play, hope, exploration, great tenderness and the profound expression of the strangeness, pain and beauty of having a life. This intimate and attentive correspondence between these two sisters who are both writers is an ode to relationship, understanding, communication, love and trust as well as the possibilities and negotiations of disability, sisterhood and a life lived through language. This is a remarkable and moving epistolatory work that thinks deeply about what writing is and what it means to share both writing and one's self." -Gary Barwin
Praise for Sara Lynn Cauchon's THE DOMESTIC GEEK'S MEAL'S MADE EASY (World Rights Available ex: World English, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, April 2019). Contact Samantha Haywood, [email protected]:
"This down-to-earth guide to getting healthy home-cooked meals onto the table quickly will delight time-pressed home cooks."
-Publishers Weekly
Praise for Megan Gail Coles' SMALL GAME HUNTING AT THE LOCAL COWARD GUN CLUB (World Rights sold, House of Anansi Press, Feb 2019). Contact Samantha Haywood, [email protected]:
"Megan Gail Coles's humour, a sharp, wry intelligence that cuts all ways in its commentary...
Small Game Hunting at the Local Coward Gun Club
is a dark, taut, funny novel that feels for its characters' pain while remaining caustic toward the enablers and the kinds of violence that polite society allows."
-The Globe and Mail
"No mistake, Megan Gail Coles is a driven, consequential writer who plays for keeps. Her seemingly off-the-cuff voice is controlled and quite intricate, and commands revisiting. Small Game Hunting at the Local Coward Gun Club is as important a novel as any that's hit Canadian literature in years."
-Joel Thomas Hynes, author of We'll All Be Burnt in Our Beds Some Night
 Praise for HELL AND DAMNATION by Marq de Villiers (World Rights Available Ex: World English, University of Regina Press, March 2019). Contact Shaun Bradley, [email protected]:
"Novelist de Villiers (Water) eloquently discusses a number of questions about hell in this fun book. By illuminating contemporary culture's own unexamined beliefs about what happens after death, de Villiers details the long, strange history of how hell has been imagined in this delightful book." -Publishers Weekly
"The perfect juxtaposition of knowledge and humor ... Written as if hell were a real and true place, it is the best guidebook to a horror that no one hopes ever to experience."
-Foreword Reviews
"De Villiers...is a well-informed and agreeable guide, whose hellish reportage will satisfy even the most curious."
-Booklist
"A deliciously cynical analysis of the afterlife viewed from a variety of perspectives."
-
Michael Coren,
The Walrus
Praise for A MIND SPREAD OUT ON THE GROUND by Alicia Elliott (World Rights Available Ex: Canada, Doubleday). Contact Samantha Haywood, [email protected] and Stephanie Sinclair, [email protected]:
"The gifted Tuscarora writer...powerfully links larger questions of Indigenous life in North America to the unfolding of her own life."
-Maclean's list of "books you need to read in 2019"
"This book is hard, vital medicine. It is a dance of survival and cultural resurgence. Above all, it is breathtakingly contemporary Indigenous philosophy, in which the street is also part of the land, and the very act of thinking is conditioned by struggles for justice and well-being."
-Warren Cariou, author of Lake of the Prairies
"These essays are of fiercest intelligence and courageous revelation. Here, colonialism and poverty are not only social urgencies, but violence felt and fought in the raw of the everyday, in embodied life and intimate relations. This is a stunning, vital triumph of writing."
-David
Chariandy, author of
Brother
"Wildly brave and wholly original, Alicia Elliot is the voice that rouses us from the mundane, speaks political poetry and brings us to the ceremony of every day survival. Her words remind us to carry both our weapons and our medicines, to hold both our strength and our open, weeping hearts. A Mind Spread Out on the Ground is what happens when you come in a good way to offer prayer, and instead, end up telling the entire damn truth of it all."
-Cherie Dimaline, author of The Marrow Thieves
"
A Mind Spread Out on the Ground is a new lens on Indigenous Canadian literature."
-Terese Marie Mailhot, author of Heart Berries
"We need to clone Alicia Elliott because the world needs more of this badass writer. A Mind Spread Out on the Ground showcases her peculiar alchemy, lighting the darkest corners of racism, classism, sexism with her laser-focused intellect and kind-hearted soul-searching. A fresh and revolutionary cultural critic alternately witty, vulnerable and piercing."
-Eden Robinson, author of Son of a Trickster and Trickster Drift
"The future of CanLit is female, is Indigenous-is Alicia Elliott. I anticipate this book to be featured on every 'best of' and award list in 2019, and revered for years to come."
-Vivek Shraya, author of I'm Afraid of Men and even this page is white
"In A Mind Spread Out on the Ground, Elliott invites readers into her unceded mind and heart, taking us on a beautiful, incisive and punk rock tour of Tuscarora brilliance. Elliott's voice is fire with warmth, light, rage and endless transformation."
-Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, author of This Accident of Being Lost
"Alicia Elliott has gifted us with an Indigenous woman's coming of age story, told through engagingly thoughtful, painfully poignant and enraging essays on race, love and belonging. With poetic prose and searing honesty, she lays bare what it is like to grow up Indigenous and exist in a country proud of its tolerance, but one that has proven to be anything but. She opens eyes and captures hearts, leading you by the hand to see our fractured world through her eyes. Alicia is exactly the voice we need to hear now."
-Tanya Talaga, author of Seven Fallen Feathers
"Incisive. That's the word I keep coming back to.
A Mind Spread out on the Ground is incredibly incisive. Alicia Elliot slices through the sometimes complicated, often avoided issues affecting so many of us in this place now called Canada. She is at once political, personal, smart, funny, global and, best of all, divinely human. Necessary. That's the other word I keep thinking about. In every chapter, she manages to find the perfect word and the precise argument needed-I found myself saying 'yes, yes, that is exactly it' more than once. I am so grateful for her work."
-Katherena Vermette, author of The Break
"
A Mind Spread Out on the Ground is an astonishing book of insightful and affecting essays that will stay with you long after the final page."
-Zoe Whittall, author of The Best Kind of People
 Praise for WE HAVE ALWAYS BEEN HERE by Samra Habib (World Rights Sold: Penguin Canada). Contact Samantha Haywood, [email protected] and Stephanie Sinclair, [email protected]:
"I fell in love with this book.
We Have Always Been Here is more than one person's memoir; it's a record of who and what we are as a people living in a time of great migrations, of cultures bumping into cultures, of politics of exclusions. In prose as economical, crisp, clear, and truthful as poetry, Samra Habib offers a map of how we might-each and every one of us-learn to see and treasure one another and ourselves. In this way it calls to mind the works of James Baldwin, Langston Hughes, and Jane Rule. I predict that this book will never go out of print-it will become required and desired reading for people of all ages, persuasions, and backgrounds. How I wish I had had it to keep close to my heart when I was younger."
-Shani Mootoo, author of Cereus Blooms at Night
"Gutting and redemptive,
We Have Always Been Here is the story of one woman's path to self-determination against every odd. Habib's voice is sensual and mesmerizing, her talent fierce and necessary. A transformative reading experience . . . Habib's every word lifts off the page, vital and bright as a match being struck."
-Claudia Dey, author of Heartbreaker
"A memoir of coming of age and coming out told in rich detail. Samra Habib's account of growing up queer and Muslim in Pakistan and Canada is at once searching and tender. Weaving together the threads of her family history with her sexuality, faith, and culture, Habib speaks for a community that has often been muted, but writes with a voice and style that is all her own."
-Rachel Giese, author of Boys: What It Means to Become a Man
"Samra Habib's memoir unfolds like a pre-digital photograph developing before our eyes. The identities she carries lovingly and with pride insist we revere a complication for so long denied. In the way that her photography and interview project, 'Just Me and Allah,' turned a tender gaze at queer Muslims each insisting 'I am here,' Habib's memoir demands 'See my selves.' To say I count, I exist, is revolutionary when you are denied complication. Habib has written the book she wished she had when she was young. It is a book we should all have had long ago."
-Mona Eltahawy, author of Headscarves and Hymens: Why the Middle East Needs a Sexual Revolution
"Habib's graceful prose shines alongside the weight of her story and the fierceness of her message. A beautiful telling of a life, of love, of the reclamation of power, of feeling truly seen, and of finding your way home. An exquisite, powerful, and urgent book."
-Stacey May Fowles, author of Infidelity and editor of Whatever Gets You Through: Twelve Survivors on Life After Sexual Assault
 Praise for DIRTY WORK: My gruelling, glorious, life-changing summer in the wilderness by Anna Maxymiw (World Rights Available Ex: English Canada and Audio, Penguin Random House Canada, May 2019). Contact Stephanie Sinclair, [email protected]:
"Crows, shit, water wolves, and pheromones whirl in Maxymiw's bush camp tense with rigid gender roles, its wildness framed by surprising portraits of the two cities she left behind."
-Kathleen Winter, author of Lost In September
 Praise for LEGACY by Suzanne Methot (World Rights Available Ex: North American, ECW PRESS, March 2019). Contact Stephanie Sinclair, [email protected]:
CBC's 10 must-read Canadian books this March
"Legacy is a book that is sure to be found on classroom syllabuses in years to come. It offers Indigenous readers testimony and some tools, and provides non-Indigenous readers depth of scope for understanding the relationships that exist between Indigenous peoples, their nations, and Canada." -Quill and Quire
"A deeply empathetic and inspiring work with insights of value to anyone struggling to overcome personal or communal trauma."
-School Library Journal
"This book is accessible, relatable, and full of storytelling about real people. It deeply resonates with me as a traditional counsellor, educator, and Indigenous person. Suzanne Methot, a brave Nehiyaw writer and community helper, takes up the challenges of logically explaining a child's traumatized brain and body and how these impacts continue into adulthood. Methot also explores Indigenous health-care models, proving that Indigenous values provide solutions. This book uncovers the critical need for legislation that moves from creating 'a renewed relationship' with Indigenous peoples to creating real structural change."
-Dr. Cyndy Baskin, Mi'kmaq Nation, Associate Professor, School of Social Work, Ryerson University
Praise for CROW WINTER by Karen McBride (World Rights Available Ex: English Canada, HarperCollins Canada). Contact Stephanie Sinclair, [email protected]:
"Full of spirit, love, mystery and good medicine, Crow Winter tells the story of Hazel and one very tricky little crow. Karen McBride's debut novel ambitiously and successfully balances all these things creating a world and story that will stay will you after you have turned that last page." -Katherena Vermette, award-winning author of The Break
"An honest and poignant portrayal of kinship, land, family, settler colonialism, and loss steeped in rich Anishinaabeg oratories that offer us skillsets into how to mend our mourning. . . . McBride enters the scene in the wake of Eden Robinson's Trickster trilogy and Tracey Lindberg's Birdie so gracefully it's as if she has been here all along."
-Joshua Whitehead, Governor General and Giller Prize nominated author of
Jonny Appleseed
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; Portuguese, 20/20 Editora; French, Presses de la Cites; Czech Audio, OneHotBook; and Film, Anonymous Content). Contact Samantha Haywood, [email protected]:
"The narrative is so eerie and disturbing...fuelling the reader's unease; and Reid pulls off a wonderful twist in the tail."
-The Guardian
"Reid is a master storyteller with a knack for absorbing prose. Most of the action takes place in the microcosm of the couple's house, but Reid writes about the relationship so well that it becomes a universe full of questions and possibilities."
-LA Review of Books
"Reid, who has already sold the film rights to this, delicately places scents to tease and torment, using a less-is-more policy for maximum torture. Not a step is misplaced over the course of a three-act structure that sustains this shrill note of unease all the way through to its jarring reveal."
-The Irish Independent
Praise for OVERRUN by Andrew Reeves (World Rights Available Ex: World English, ECW Press, March 2019). Contact Shaun Bradley, [email protected]:
"A thorough look at an important - and multifaceted - topic."
-Publishers Weekly
"The definitive narrative of carp in America. Reeves chronicles the complex web of good intentions, imperfect science, and different agencies and entities working at cross purposes that led to the carpification of U.S. waterways. His tour through the quest to regain control is compelling and comprehensive. In the end, Reeves takes a broad and holistic view of the issue, pointing out that fighting a few enemy fish species in the absence of meaningfully addressing the pollution, land management, water management, and climate change that create the conditions for carp to thrive is like dueling with our own shadow. The carp is the symptom, not the disease. A must-read for those who love the Mississippi River watershed and the Great Lakes, for those interested in "invasive" species, for sport fishers and environmental historians."
-Emma Marris, author of Rambunctious Garden
"With a journalist's critical eye and storytelling ability . . .
Overrun is more than an engaging story about nuisance fish. This eye-opening book demonstrates the interrelationship of species, the climate, and the environment."
-Foreword Reviews
"In shining a light on the many facets of one of the most wicked problems besetting the planet - the spread of invasive species - Andrew Reeves shows us how to see with compassion and intelligence, and how to voice a range of perspectives while holding in tension the need to embrace complexity and the urgency of choosing worthy solutions. This book is important not merely for its topic but for its nuanced and thoughtful approach."
-Trevor Herriot, naturalist and author of Islands of Grass, and River in a Dry Land
"Overrun is a whip-smart romp through the dystopian history of Asian carp, that wrecking ball of aquatic ecosystems in North America. But in telling it, Reeves charts a sustainable future for the waterways that connect all of us on the continent. An environmental writer as good as Reeves gives me hope." -Harry Thurston, winner of the Lane Anderson Award for Excellence in Canadian Science Writing and the Sigurd F. Olson Nature Writing Award
"A riveting 'can't put it down' book about fish? You bet! Andrew Reeves takes us on a dizzying journey along the waterways of North America with a rich cast of fish farmers, environmentalists, hustlers, scientists and befuddled politicians as we follow the murderous and seemingly unstoppable advance of Asian Carp that now threaten the Great Lakes themselves. This is a very important book to heed if we want to save this watershed."
-Maude Barlow, author of Boiling Point
"This detailed account of the invasion of Asian carp into North American waterways reads like a Kurt Vonnegut novel or science fiction. Yet the carp's unbelievable progress splashes another clear warning about how so-called solutions have become the chief cause of our problems."
-Andrew Nikiforuk, author of Empire of the Beetle
Praise for Marissa Stapley's THE LAST RESORT (World Rights Available Ex. US, Graydon House, June 18, 2019; Canada, S&S, June 4, 2019; Germany, Rowohlt, 2019; ANZ, Allen & Unwin; English Canada Audio, Audible). Contact Samantha Haywood, [email protected]:
"Featuring vivid, heart-pounding storytelling and a compelling depiction of the heartbreaking ways that long-term abuse can destroy your will, Stapley's latest (after Things to Do When It's Raining, 2018) is an excellent beach read for anyone who loves romantic suspense." -Booklist
"Stapley shows a real knack for suspense."
-Publishers Weekly
Praise for THE QUINTLAND SISTERS by Shelley Wood (World Rights Available Ex: World English, HarperCollins Canada and William Morrow US, March 2019). Contract Stephanie Sinclair, [email protected]:
INSTANT #1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER
"Yvonne, Annette, Ceěcile, Marie, and Eěmilie Dionne delighted the world in 1934. The curious public couldn't get enough of the tiny quintuplets born in Ontario at the height of the Great Depression, but Emma Trimpany had been there all along. Unsure of her future at 17, Emma fell into midwifery and was forever changed by the miracle of the quintuplets' birth. Even as custody issues, gawking tourists, and hardscrabble times swirl around her, Emma's sole focus remains on the babies. Her own future may never be set in stone, but as long as she's able to help take care of the most famous children in Canada, she knows her sacrifices will have been worthwhile. Blending historical fact with a fictional coming-of-age story, Wood has crafted an ambitious, meticulously researched, and imaginative debut novel that is engrossing and compelling. Exploring the shared sisterhood of the quintuplets' caretakers and the trouble with unwanted celebrity, this heartwarming novel will win over loyal readers of Patricia Harman, Jodi Picoult, and Carol Cassella."
-Stephanie Turza
"This recounting of a blight on our history is as fascinating as it is informative"
-Sara Cation, Canadian Living
Praise for Samra Zafar's A GOOD WIFE: Escaping the Life I Never Chose (World Rights Available Ex: HarperCollins Canada, March 5, 2019; Slovak, Ikar; Czech, Euromedia). Contact Samantha Haywood, [email protected] and Stephanie Sinclair, [email protected]:
"Zafar's courage lies not only in walking away from her abuser but in the astounding vulnerability with which she chooses to tell her story. She commits to the raw, infuriating, exasperating, triumphant truth of her experience and also recognizes the isolation that plagues abuse victims, most particularly newcomers to a country."
-Quill & Quire
"If you think you already know about domestic violence or arranged child marriages, never mind. Zafar will take you deeper, inside her own mind conflicted, teetering, calculating, reprogramming, and finally, fiercely triumphant. Her story will resonate with abuse survivors from many religious and cultural backgrounds, but particularly gives a peek inside a conservative Pakistani Muslim community settled in the West, seemingly normal from the outside."
-Religion Unplugged
"A must read, especially in a time when women are breaking through the barriers of inequality."
-Divine
"A very readable memoir ... Many readers, female and male, will recognize their own situations or those of acquaintances."
-Winnipeg Free Press
"A teenage girl is pressured to marry a much older man and move to a foreign land. If you think you know this story, that it is a stereotype, you are wrong. A Good Wife is not the story of an abused woman. This is a memoir of ambition, how the very thing that lured Samra Zafar into an abusive marriage ultimately galvanized her escape and success. With unflinching candour, Zafar dissects the forces constricting her: culture, religion, her parents' difficult marriage, their uneasy complicity in hers, the intergenerational expectations that shackled her in-laws, even her own naïveté. Thorny and surprising, her story is all the more heartbreaking for its complexities. Zafar has penned a rare memoir, a life story worth reading and an emotional roller coaster that will leave you feeling empowered at the end. This is a modern-day fairy tale where the heroine saves her own life."
-Sharon Bala , bestselling author of The Boat People
"A thoroughly engaging story of strength, feminism and refusal to conform to societal and familial expectations. I found it difficult to put this book down."
-Cea Sunrise Person, bestselling author of North of Normal
"Samra Zafar's harrowing story of escaping her abusive marriage in Canada-arranged when she was just a teenager in Pakistan-might read like a taut domestic thriller, but A Good Wife is all too painfully real. I cried while reading this book, but I was also left in awe of Zafar's epic grit and bravery. Her story will stay with you long after the last hope-filled page is turned."
-Lisa Gabriele, author of the bestselling novel The Winters
"The shining result of a partnership between a sensitive writer and an indomitable survivor of domestic abuse, this memoir chronicles the ebbs and flows of Samra Zafar's courage as her home life began to control her every moment and shatter her spirit. To follow her descent into self-doubt and despair is to delve deeply into financial limitations, the requirements of assimilation into Canada and the constraints she faced as a parent. Whether you are trying to escape a life you never chose or the one you did, Samra's resolve and ingenuity will inspire you to honour every flicker of longing for freedom."
-Shauna Singh Baldwin, author of The Tiger Claw and The Selector of Souls
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