Scarborough by Catherine Hernandez
Selected by Jen Turner, Champion for the Bradford West Gwillimbury Public Library
Scarborough is a low-income, culturally diverse neighbourhood east of Toronto, the fourth largest city in North America; like many inner-city communities, it suffers under the weight of poverty, drugs, crime, and urban blight.
Scarborough the novel employs a multitude of voices to tell the story of a tight-knit neighbourhood under fire, offering a raw yet empathetic glimpse into a troubled community that locates its dignity in unexpected places: a neighbourhood that refuses to be undone.
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How to Calm Your Mind by Chris Bailey
Selected by Shakir Barmare, Champion for the Barrie Public Library
How to Calm Your Mind is a crucial guide to achieving calm, navigating anxiety, and staving off burnout. It explains how our digital world drains us, and what we can do to abate the hidden sources of stress that burden our days. By embracing the analog world and “stimulation fasts,” using the science of “savoring” to become more focused and present and relaxing without guilt, investing in calm might be the best productivity strategy around.
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The Maid by Nita Prose
Selected by Amy Kiezebrink, Champion for the Essa Public Library
Molly Gray is not like everyone else. She struggles with social skills and misreads the intentions of others. Her gran used to interpret the world for her, codifying it into simple rules that Molly could live by.
Molly’s orderly life is upended the day she enters the suite of the wealthy Charles Black, only to find it in a state of disarray and Mr. Black himself dead in his bed. Before she knows what’s happening, Molly’s unusual demeanor has the police targeting her as their lead suspect. She quickly finds herself caught in a web of deception, one she has no idea how to untangle. Fortunately for Molly, friends she never knew she had unite with her in a search for clues to what really happened to Mr. Black—but will they be able to find the real killer before it’s too late?
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On the Ravine by Vincent Lam
Selected by Raj Grover, Champion for the Innisfil ideaLAB & Library
In his downtown Toronto condo, Dr. Chen awakens to the sound of streetcars below, but it is not the early morning traffic that keeps him from sleep. News banners run across his phone: Fentanyl Crisis; Toxic Drug Supply; Record Number of Deaths. Claire is a violinist; she feels at one with her music, taking flight in its melody, free in its movement. But now she rises and falls with the opioids in her system, becoming increasingly reckless.
When Claire’s life intersects with Chen’s, the doctor is drawn ever more deeply into the complexities of the doctor-patient relationship, and must confront just how far he would go to save a life.
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Breast Cancer After the Diagnosis by Jayne Pritchard
Selected by Roberta Douglas, Champion for the Midland Public Library
Jayne’s book, ‘Breast Cancer After The Diagnosis’, shares what she went through over a three-year period of emotional ups and downs, including several setbacks. It includes the alternative therapies that Jayne sought out, important supplements that boost the immune system, her Top 10 Health and Wellness Tips, as well as amazing stories that will expand people’s minds and give comfort to those who have lost a loved one.
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Women Talking by Miriam Toews
Selected by Melissa Medaglia, Champion for the New Tecumseth Public Library
One evening, eight Mennonite women climb into a hayloft to conduct a secret meeting. For the past two years, each of these women, and more than a hundred other girls in their colony, has been repeatedly violated in the night by demons coming to punish them for their sins. Now that the women have learned they were in fact drugged and attacked by a group of men from their own community, they are determined to protect themselves and their daughters from future harm.
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A World of Curiosities by Louise Penny
Selected by Jane Ste. Marie, Champion for the Ramara Public Library
Chief Inspector Armand Gamache returns in the eighteenth book in #1 New York Times bestseller Louise Penny’s beloved series.
As the villagers prepare for a special celebration, Armand Gamache and Jean-Guy Beauvoir find themselves increasingly worried. A young man and woman have reappeared in the Sûreté du Québec investigators’ lives after many years. The two were young children when their troubled mother was murdered, leaving them damaged, shattered. Gamache and Beauvoir’s memories of that tragic case, the one that first brought them together, come rushing back. Did their mother’s murder hurt them beyond repair? Have those terrible wounds, buried for decades, festered and are now about to erupt?
Check out this book at your local library: Innisfil ideaLAB & Library ● Barrie Public Library ● Bradford West Gwillimbury ● Essa Public Library ● Midland Public Library ● New Tecumseth Public Library ● Ramara Public Library