Bookmark Halifax’s Mike Hamm Chooses Top 5 from our #GiftAtlantic Collection
In no particular order, here is what I consider 5 of the most impactful titles for our store over the past couple of months, whether because of incredible sales, shopper reaction or our own favouritisms!
Poor Farm
Ronan O’Driscoll
Moose House Publishing
Walking Nova Scotia’s Cole Harbour Heritage Trail with his autistic son, Martin, Ronan O’Driscoll came across 20 unmarked graves from the “Poor House for the Harmlessly Insane,” established in 1887; inspiration for Poor Farm, featuring two children on the autism spectrum in drastically different circumstances. Providing a unique, fictionalized history of autism, this tale explores the attitudes and assumptions that contorted and continue to contort the way we deal with neuro-divergent people, and takes us into the Dickensian grimness of Victorian-era poor houses and official policies for dealing with the poor and the weak.
Tunes and Wooden Spoons
Mary Janet MacDonald
MacIntyre Purcell Publishing
Mary Janet MacDonald launched her Facebook group, Tunes and Wooden Spoons, in the spring of 2020, more for a lark than anything and to have some fun with family and friends. Never did she think in her wildest dreams that her Cape Breton Cinnamon Buns would turn her into a social media sensation. Today, her followers have grown to more than 50,000 and she is must-see viewing for anybody who loves down-home cooking and Cape Breton charm. Tunes and Wooden Spoons, the cookbook, is the one we’ve all been waiting for. Complete with her most popular recipes and mixed with more than a pinch of that famous Cape Breton wit.
Forgotten Nova Scotia
Ted Pritchard & Ingrid Bulmer
MacIntyre Purcell Publishing
The stunning images found in Forgotten Nova Scotia offer a window into our past, showing life as it once was, and stirring in us the emotions of wonder and curiosity about those who have gone before us and the lives they lived. Nova Scotia is in Ingrid Bulmer and Ted Pritchard’s blood, and you might say Forgotten Nova Scotia is their love letter to the province. Where others may see only decay and rot in these long-forgotten locations, Bulmer and Pritchard see exquisite beauty.
Pop-Up Halifax
Brad Hartman
Nimbus Publishing
A pop-up book for adults and kids alike, featuring six iconic scenes of Nova Scotia’s capital city and beyond, brought to vivid new life. Visit Peggy’s Cove village, the Halifax and Dartmouth waterfronts, Fairview Lawn Cemetery–where many Titanic victims are laid to rest–the Halifax Public Gardens, and surfer’s paradise Lawrencetown Beach. This book is a full-colour, interactive way to explore Canada’s Ocean Playground!
The History of Rain
Stephens Gerard Malone
Vagrant Press
Our story begins in 1915. While convalescing in a French army hospital, Rain, a veteran of the Great War now raging across Europe, finds solace in aiding the buildings’ groundskeeper. In the ensuing decadence of the postwar years, Rain finds himself lured into the intricate and lavish world of landscape gardening. He travels the world to create magnificent gardens for celebrities and, eventually for the pictures during Hollywood’s Golden Age. But the nomadic nature of his work is also a way for him to chase his unrequited love, Lily. As author Marjorie Simmins puts it, “All of this [is] wrapped in the most evocative writing, which transported me to another time and place…A dreamy and memorable reading experience!”
A sprawling story written in stunning, spare language, this anticipated new novel from the master wordsmith behind Big Town and I Still Have a Suitcase in Berlin is a lyrical, magical, and starkly realist meditation on the dissonant worlds that emerge from the conflict, and the lengths we’ll go to chase the illusion of love.
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