The Year in Books: 2024

As the days grow short, it’s time to settle in for some long reads. And once again this year, Headwaters authors have you covered with a bumper crop of new books, whatever your age or taste. 

For stories inspired by real events, read Boni Thompson’s novel about her fighting Irish grandfather in While Dragging Our Hearts Behind Us, or Ian McLeod’s reimagining of Quebec’s Scottish rebel, Donald Morrison, in The Dispossessed, or Thomas Bolsover’s struggle with good and evil in The Talk. 

And if you plan to greet the New Year brimming with life-affirming resolutions, check out Alex Lam’s Long Life, Janet-Lynn Morrison’s The Million Dollar Soup, or Martina V. Rowley’s Supercharged Productivity to guide you on your way. 

There’s plenty for the kids on your list too, including Glenn Carley’s charming adventure, The One About Stella: A Little Fish, and Lisa Tasca Oatway’s time-traveller series that takes middle-school readers back to historic Canadian events.

All in all, from non-fiction and memoir to fantasy, and from poetry to mythology and mystery, there’s plenty to keep you turning the pages throughout the coming year.

Caledon, Hockley Valley & Mono Cliffs Hikes: A Loops & Lattes Hiking Guide
40 Days & 40 Hikes: Loving the Bruce Trail One Loop at a Time

by Nicola Ross

If Headwaters is ever recognized as a Blue Zone, an area where healthy lifestyles lead to longer lives, it will surely be thanks in part to Nicola Ross. The seventh book in Ross’s popular Loops & Lattes series of hiking guides (more than 52,000 copies sold) includes 38 new hikes to add to your hiking itinerary. Beautifully illustrated, this guide’s strength remains its precise map and information for each hike. Ross provides not only the standard data such as distance, time and difficulty, but also special highlights, fees and GPS co-ordinates. She thoroughly prepares hikers before and, as important, après hiking, with insider info on places to eat and drink. With those lattes, enjoy pizza, cider, even French cuisine close to your loops.

In 40 Days & 40 Hikes, Ross takes a deeper and more personal dive into her love for the Bruce Trail. As a practical guide, the book offers aspiring end-to-enders a way to tackle the trail in discrete one-day loops (thus avoiding shuttling cars). But the book is also a compelling memoir, filled with local colour, historic details and an abiding passion for preserving the landscape of the Niagara Escarpment, recognized as a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve.

Other titles in the Loops & Lattes series explore Hamilton, Halton, Collingwood and Wellington/Waterloo. A longtime contributor to In The Hills, Nicola Ross lives in Alton. (Caledon, Hockley Valley & Mono Cliffs Hikes, Woodrising, $29.95; 40 Days & 40 Hikes, ECW, $26.95)

The Dispossessed

By Ian McLeod

Inspired by real events, The Dispossessed follows Peter Span, an aspiring young Montreal journalist hoping to save his nascent career by interviewing Donald Morrison, a wanted outlaw hiding out in late 19th-century Megantic, Quebec. But is Morrison really an outlaw? Or is he, as those sheltering him in the predominantly Scottish Eastern Townships community believe, the victim of a flagrant injustice that cheated him of his rightful inheritance?

With his career on the line, Span fabricates his first interview with Morrison, then involves himself in his own story by not only aiding the fugitive, but also vying with him to win the heart of a local school teacher. But Morrison’s killing of a bounty hunter in an Old-West-style gunfight tests Span’s loyalties to the outlaw, to his love interest and to his career. Megantic, now known as Lac-Mégantic, is primarily known for the horrific train derailment that occurred there in 2013. This compelling story of clashing cultures and the price of being a living legend may change that.

An award-winning documentary filmmaker and former executive producer of W5, McLeod grew up in the Eastern Townships. He now lives in Mulmur. (Ian McLeod, $26.95)

The Gift of Land

Living with Nature: A Memoir

By Gloria Hildebrandt

In this memoir, Gloria Hildebrandt details not only her complicated life with her often domineering father and sometimes critical mother, but also her symbiotic relationship with the beautiful 14-acre parcel of land where she grew up. Located in Halton Hills near the Niagara Escarpment and Ballinafad, the rocky former farmland was enthusiastically regenerated and nurtured by her father. Hildebrandt and her partner, Mike Davis, have followed in her father’s footsteps, managing, improving and protecting the land and its flora and fauna. In return, the natural beauty of the parcel has provided Hildebrandt with a spiritual grounding that helped focus her journalism and publishing career.

Her story is truly about becoming one with nature. She worked with the Escarpment Biosphere Conservancy, and in 2022 the parcel became a registered private nature reserve named the Hildebrandt + Davis Nature Park, ensuring its protection in perpetuity. 

Hildebrandt and Davis also authored Views & Vistas: Favourite Photographs from the Whole Niagara Escarpment in Canada. The cofounders and publishers of Niagara Escarpment Views magazine, they continue to live on the property. (Niagara Escarpment Views, $24.99)

My Father’s Letters

Romance Amidst War

By Garth M. Stiebel

In 2010, while sorting through his parents’ belongings after their deaths four weeks apart, Garth M. Stiebel stumbled upon the letters his father, Max, wrote to his mother, Rosaleen, in the 1940s. Chronicling their love story against the chaotic backdrop of World War II, the letters follow the two from their initial meeting in 1941 at a dance in Rosaleen’s hometown near London, England, to their arrival in Halifax as a married couple in 1946. Replete with passion and yearning, Max’s articulate, poetic prose guides readers on a trip to the frontlines of love and life during wartime.

Throughout, Stiebel provides the historical context in which Max penned the letters and enhances the couple’s story with vintage photos. Unfortunately missing are Rosaleen’s responses, but a couple of poems she wrote much later suggest her letters may well have matched the intensity and eloquence of Max’s. Even without her responses, this book is a moving tribute to lovers in a dangerous time.

Now retired from a long career in procurement, Stiebel lives in Mono. (FriesenPress, $21.99)

Long Life

Mapping Your Well-Being with Purpose and Meaning

By Alex Lam

In Long Life, Alex Lam provides a one-stop shop for all things related to living long and living well. Packed with strikingly designed maps, infographics and charts, his beautifully produced book draws on ancient wisdom, pop culture and contemporary research to cover everything from how telomeres (protective caps at the ends of chromosomes) affect aging to how the gut, our “second brain,” influences both our physical and emotional well-being and how connecting with nature relieves stress and nurtures the soul. Now that the first children with the potential to reach the age of 135 have been born, Lam has collected and connected the physical and spiritual keys to living a long, enjoyable and healthy life.

Educated in architecture and theological studies, Lam has been honoured by, among others, the International Facility Management Association and the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada. He lives in Caledon. (The Inukshuk Letters, $29.95) 

Sophia B. Jones

The First Canadian Black Woman to Become a Doctor

By John Steckley

In 2020, while preparing a new edition of his textbook Elements of Sociology, retired Humber College teacher John Steckley hoped to include the name of the first Black Canadian woman doctor. A simple task, he thought. Not so. That’s because her name, Sophia Bethena Jones, is nearly unknown in this country.

This oversight inspired Steckley to write Sophia B. Jones, the story of this trailblazing Black woman who was born in Chatham in 1857 but barred from studying medicine in Canada because she was, he writes, “doubly damned by being both a woman and Black.” Forced to study medicine in the United States, Sophia went on to have a distinguished medical career south of the border, a reason her achievements are not widely known here.

Steckley, who lives in Bolton, is the author of many books focusing on anthropology, sociology and the language and history of Indigenous peoples. (Rock’s Mills Press, $32.48)

The Million Dollar Soup

The Recipe for a Meaningful Life

By Janet-Lynn Morrison

Think of Janet-Lynn Morrison’s timely self-help book as a more practical version of the popular Chicken Soup for the Soul books. In The Million Dollar Soup, Morrison draws mostly on her own life to provide advice on meeting life’s challenges and clearly explains how the recipe for making soup is metaphorically the same as forging a meaningful life. You are the soup. Measuring, mixing and cooking up life’s ingredients (adventure, fitness, friendship, grief, love, to name a few) creates your special dish.

Morrison herself has survived a dysfunctional family and personal injury to excel as a fitness guru, musician, triathlete, motivational speaker and, of course, writer. Also the author of Surviving Seventeen and Forever Is Today, Morrison lives in Orangeville. (Hasmark Publishing, $22)

J.E.H. MacDonald, Up Close

The Artist’s Materials and Techniques

By Alison Douglas and Kate Helwig

Orangeville resident Alison Douglas, longtime art conservator at the McMichael Canadian Art Collection, teamed up with Ottawa-based conservation scientist Kate Helwig to co-author this exhaustive and fascinating study of the life and work of J.E.H. MacDonald, a founder of the Group of Seven. 

The book includes highlights of MacDonald’s life, travels and diaries, but the meat of it is the authors’ forensic analysis of his paintings. Using state-of-the-art technology, the pair undertook a microscopic examination of every physical aspect of the artist’s work, from brushstrokes to pigments to the materials he painted on. In a time when multimillion-dollar art frauds seem continually in the headlines, much of this kind of work is directed at confirming authenticity. In fact, as the book recounts, the authors produced some headlines of their own when their research proved incontrovertibly that 10 of MacDonald’s paintings scheduled for a retrospective exhibition at the Vancouver Art Gallery were indeed fakes. (GooseLane, $35)

Vandemere  +  Fire Horse

By Kimberley D. Tait

Vandemere, the first book in Kimberley D. Tait’s two-part Circ de Tarot series, deftly marries the genres of historical fiction and the supernatural. The novel opens in 1939 Oklahoma and introduces 17-year-old Vandemere “Vandy” Petruska, a trick horse rider who works in the circus along with his fortune-telling, psychic mother. Vandy shares his mother’s psychic ability, but struggles to accept this gift and to understand how – or whether – it is connected to the horrifying visions of evil demons that threaten to overpower and destroy him.

As Vandy’s quest for understanding continues in Fire Horse, the second book in the series, his search for answers forces him to confront a man he loathes: his own absent father. Tait notes that both books are intended for young adult readers 16 and older, and warns that the themes may be disturbing.

An Orangeville resident, Tait spent most of her career training dressage horses for the show ring. (Kimberley D. Tait, $25.71)

With Blood Through Fire

By Alyestal Hamilton

In this powerful collection of poems, Alyestal Hamilton explores what she calls “colonialism 101” and its effects on lives lived in the shadow of the -isms, especially racism and sexism. In “The Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations,” for example, she writes, “I remember the day I realized my daily terrain was a landmine. / That I was both Black and woman. / Drafted into an unspoken war.”

Against this backdrop, Hamilton reflects, often painfully, on her forebears – the sacrifices they made and the trauma they suffered – and how their legacy has percolated through her own consciousness and shaped her expectations of herself. “But this woman, the one I am / cannot be stretched or filled to the fullness of their offering,” she writes in “These Women.”

Yet for Hamilton, remembering is essential. In “The Remnant,” she writes that “memory is the only remnant of living the dead have.” And in “Velvet Skies,” she wonders, “Will our descendants be curious as to what became of us or will such knowledge be fed to them from birth, for we have placed our marks so hard here on earth we could never be forgotten?” 

An Orangeville resident, Hamilton is a speaker, writer and spoken-word poet. With Blood Through Fire is her first book. (Genius Mode Publishing, $20)

Murder in the Parole Office

I Need a Hand to Solve This Crime

By Nathaniel Watt

When the director of a downtown Toronto parole office is violently murdered, fingers point at nine sex offenders, all clients of clinical psychologist Henry Little. Armed only with his clinical notes and clues left at the crime scene – cryptic symbols written on a blackboard and toilet paper arranged in the shape of a cross or a sword – Little teams up with his girlfriend, a police detective, to identify the murderer. Little’s sessions with the nine suspects provide often chilling insights into the workings of their minds.

Set in modern times, Watt’s story reads like a 1950s Mickey Spillane mystery, a more tongue-in-cheek Mike Hammer investigator, replete with the ideology and stereotypes of those times. 

Murder in the Parole Office is Watt’s second book featuring Henry Little. Watt lives in Mono. (Nathaniel Watt, $14.95)

The Muskoka Murders

By James Robin Gerus

The Muskoka Murders, James Robin Gerus’s gripping, fast-paced murder mystery, focuses on a cop turned true crime novelist, Mickey Butts, who is enjoying family life in Oakville – until a former police colleague and friend calls to lure him back to work on an unsolved case that has haunted him. A killer dubbed “the Muskoka Murderer” has struck again, five years after his last victim and 25 years after his first. Determined to track down the killer this time, Mickey agrees to return to his hometown of Muskoka City to join the investigative team. His goal? To put paid to the case that has obsessed him for years, causing the nervous breakdown that led to his premature retirement.

An actor and screenwriter who, with Liam Gillespie, won the screenwriting award at the inaugural Dufferin Film Festival, Gerus lives in Mono. The Muskoka Murders is his first novel. (FriesenPress, $29.99)

Ghosted

By June Hustler 

In Ghosted, June Hustler draws inspiration from Dufferin County folklore suggesting that, after robbing a Wells Fargo train, notorious American outlaws Jesse and Frank James fled north and hid for a time on a farm in Mulmur. Before returning to the United States, the brothers are said to have buried the loot from the robbery on the farm.

Enter Hustler’s main character, Sass “Silver” Tillsbury, who becomes embroiled with a gang of Dufferin bank robbers who are searching for the rumoured stash. When Sass finds part of the stash, she seizes the opportunity to escape and begin life anew as a schoolteacher in Saskatchewan. But will her past come back to haunt her?

Hustler, who lives in Orangeville, has published eight other books, including Jammed Up. (June Hustler, $19.95)

The Talk

By Thomas Bolsover

Based on a true story, The Talk is narrated by a character named Harlan Peters who grapples with the existential question of why bad things happen to good people. In his search for an answer, Harlan tells the stories of good people, including his own young grandson, who, through no fault of their own, are struggling to cope with the unfair hand that life has dealt them.

But does he find an answer to his question? Is an answer even possible? In the end, perhaps an answer of sorts lies in the message that concludes this emotional story of wisdom born of pain.

Thomas Bolsover is the pseudonym of a Shelburne writer who is also the author of Tall Tales and Short Yarns. (BookBaby, $17.95)

Riddles of the Sphinx 

By Meagan Cleveland

In this work of mythological fiction, Meagan Cleveland draws on the ancient works of Sophocles to reimagine the story of Ismene, youngest daughter of Oedipus. A minor character in Sophocles’ Theban plays, a teenage Ismene takes centre stage in Cleveland’s tale. Chafing at her sheltered life in the palace where she lives, Ismene escapes and discovers a world she didn’t know existed.

Blessed and cursed with the power to see the past, present and future, and aided by her dreaded enemy, the Sphinx, she embarks on an odyssey to thwart the gods and reverse the curse that predicts the destruction of Thebes and her family, including her beloved sister Antigone.

A classical scholar, Meagan Cleveland grew up in Orangeville. (Meagan Cleveland, $19.99)

Supercharged Productivity

by Martina V. Rowley

Feeling overwhelmed by your to-do list at work and at home? Falling hopelessly behind in pursuit of the elusive work/life balance? Author Martina Rowley argues you don’t have to be a superwoman or superman to supercharge your productivity. In fact, quite the opposite.

Inspired by her busy, efficient and list-free mother and drawing on her own experience as a management and administration consultant, Rowley lays out clear, simple and achievable strategies for setting realistic priorities, sharpening your focus, mastering time management and optimizing workflow, so that time is your friend instead of your enemy. A kind of Marie Kondo approach for clutter-busting your brain.

Martina Rowley lives in Orangeville. (Martina Rowley, $17.95)

A Long Walk

By John P. Drudge

In his latest poetry collection, John P. Drudge writes of paradise lost (forgotten births, dreams and times) and paradise found (love, community, hope in tomorrow) with haiku-like rhythm and ironic wit. For Drudge the glass is both half empty and half full. Standout poems include “Trigger Warning,” “After the Fury,” and “Shout Out,” his poetic reflections on today’s cancel culture.

As he notes in “Trigger Warning”:

Life
Is supposed to
Trigger you
That’s how we survive

A social worker, Drudge lives in Caledon. The Long Walk is his fifth poetry collection. (Cajun Mutt Press, $19.95)

While Dragging Our Hearts Behind Us

Cork, 1916–1923

By Boni Thompson

In this work of creative non-fiction, Boni Thompson makes good on a promise to her grandfather, James Fitzgerald, to tell the story of the role he played in the struggle to win Ireland’s independence from the United Kingdom. The story begins in 1911 when a young James encounters an old tinker woman who predicts – correctly – that he will live to the age of 92 and experience joy, but she also warns: “There will be many days you walk the earth dragging your heart behind you.”

From this beginning, Thompson follows James as he experiences the 1916 Easter Rising and joins the Irish Republican Army. Her research reveals that, as a member of an intelligence squad, her grandfather played a much more significant role than suggested by the “few shortened, sanitized anecdotes” he had related to her. Though James’ story is Thompson’s focus, her sprawling, meticulously detailed work also brings to life the pivotal people and events of this turbulent time in Irish history.

Boni Thompson lives in Mono. While Dragging Our Hearts Behind Us is her first book. (Blackwater Press, $28.99)

Shadow Man

A Cole Buckman Novel

By Marina L. Reed with Don Hawkins

The disappearance of Jim Morrison’s daughter is first assumed to be a teen prank. But as days go by, Cole Buckman, a Canadian agent for MI6, gets called in. What follows is a fast-paced tale of intrigue and corruption, complete with high-speed car chases, secret rooms and undercover operations that lead to the discovery of a human trafficking ring. With action that takes them from barroom brawls to the corridors of political power, Cole and his team seek to expose the identity of the Shadow Man in an urgent bid to rescue the abducted girls. 

This is the second Cole Buckman mystery resulting from the collaboration between Orangeville author Marina Reed and retired police officer and security expert Don Hawkins of Mono. The first book in the planned series was On the Edge. (Chicken House Press, $16.99)

Daughter of the Valkyrie

Reaper’s Call

By Kevin Saul

Steeped in Norse mythology, Daughter of the Valkyrie: Reaper’s Call is a historical fantasy that will appeal to fans of the Vikings TV series. The saga begins as Gudrun waits anxiously in the harbour town of Vestrijóborg for her father, Thorkil, and brother, Sigurd, to return from a long voyage. But when the town is attacked by a ship carrying raiders who launch a murderous rampage, Gudrun and her sister, Siv, manage to flee to a nearby island where they discover the wreck of the ship that Thorkil and Sigurd had sailed on. Both are dead, a dying survivor tells the sisters.

The survivor also reveals that Magnor, leader of the raiders, is after an ancient treasure that legend says is hidden in Lutvin, the village that is Gudrun’s home. To warn the village of the danger posed by Magnor’s lust for power and his desire to find the hidden gold, the sisters must find their way home.

A lifelong storyteller, Saul lives in Orangeville. Daughter of the Valkyrie: Reaper’s Call is his first novel and the first book in a projected four-part series. (Tritale Books, $17.99) 

Play

By Jess Taylor

Jess Taylor’s work of psychological fiction tells the compelling story of Paul (Paulina) Hayes, an arts teacher who, at 32, begins therapy to deal with PTSD caused by the childhood trauma that led to the death of her cousin and best friend, Adrian. The details of Paul’s life unfold not chronologically but in the order of the memories she records for her therapist. “To me, life was a magnificent, terrifying beast that everyone else got to admire from afar, while I was stuck inside its jaws where it was rancid and impossible to move,” Paul writes.

Though the book is a timely look at mental health issues, as well as the power of the arts and the imagination to teach, shelter and heal – and destroy – Taylor warns that the topics of childhood trauma, suicide and abuse may trigger emotional responses in sensitive readers.

Now living in Toronto, Taylor is an award-winning writer and poet who spent her youth in Caledon. Play is her debut novel. (Book*hug Press, $23)

The Shepherd of Princes

By Mike Bonikowsky

Set largely in Dufferin County and the surrounding area, Mike Bonikowsky’s post-apocalyptic novel explores how the caregivers and residents of a centre for people with developmental disabilities survive by fending for themselves after a cataclysmic event devastates civilization as they have known it. Taking refuge on a farm, they build a community called the Fold and, for years, live a pre-industrial existence – until one day the sky is once again lit by lights from Toronto. In hope of harnessing this power, the community sends Micah as their emissary to the city.

Bonikowsky’s novel will appeal to those who enjoyed the themes – faith, love, hope and the human will to survive – probed by Emily St. John Mandel in Station Eleven and Cormac McCarthy in The Road. 

A Melancthon resident, Bonikowsky is a caregiver for people with developmental disabilities. He is also the author of Red Stuff: A Collection of Poetry. (Solum Literary Press, $31.75)

Elephant On My Chest

By Sabrina Moussa 

In this young adult romance, Sabrina Moussa tells the story of Elena Hererra, a high schooler who begins suffering severe anxiety attacks – she describes them as an elephant on her chest – after her grandparents die and her parents become distant as they struggle with mental health issues of their own. But to help soothe Elena’s pain, not one but two tall, handsome jocks, Kane and Liam, vie for her friendship and love.

The novel neatly balances the tale of young love with more serious topics, such as sexual assault and physical abuse. And to provide a soundtrack for readers, many chapters suggest a song that reinforces the themes.

Having recently earned a degree in psychology, Moussa lives in Orangeville. Elephant On My Chest is her first published novel. (Archway Publishing, $24.95)

The Chronicles of Paisley • Corners

By Cheryl van Daalen-Smith

When Kick Cavendish lands a coveted job as the public health nurse for Paisley • Corners (dot intended), she doesn’t know her life is about to become entwined with the town’s often quirky and colourful cast of characters. Kick is drawn to help people such as Kelsey, a bulimic high school student; Jo, a veteran nurse who needs a hip replacement; and Old Joe, the town’s unhoused wanderer. And when the powers that be threaten to dismantle the encampments that are the last refuge of those “living rough,” she leads the charge to change the town’s mindset from victim-blaming to community engagement.

For a time early on, Caledon East was known as Paisley, and sharp-eyed readers will enjoy picking up on van Daalen-Smith’s other nods to the history and landmarks of the town whose setting inspired her heartwarming story.

A nursing professor who worked as a public health nurse, van Daalen-Smith lives in Caledon East. (FriesenPress, $21)

Books for Children

Auston the Sidecar Dog in Outer Space

By Wayne Sumbler
Illustrated by M.K. Komins

After saving a whale and Christmas in two previous books, Auston the Sidecar Dog continues his adventures by travelling to outer space, where he visits the International Space Station, the moon and Mars. For many residents of Orangeville and beyond, the real Auston, wearing helmet and goggles, will be a familiar sight as he rides in the sidecar of Sumbler’s red Vespa scooter. With brightly coloured illustrations by M.K. Komins, this rhyming dog tale will appeal to preschoolers and beginning readers.

Sumbler, who lives in Orangeville, is also the author of the cookbook, Sex, Drugs and Pots & Pans. He and Auston have raised more than $2,000 for the Orangeville SPCA. (Austin Macauley, $16.95)

What’s Normal?

By Joanne Good
Illustrated by Ana Sánchez

Anyone who has felt ugly or shunned will instantly identify with this children’s story about a boy named Bill, born with webbed feet. Bullied at school because of this unique physical trait, Bill finally finds social acceptance and success with the aid of a swimming coach.

What’s Normal? is a clever modern retelling of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Ugly Duckling, though more specifically, the Ugly Duckling’s feet. 

Joanne Good lives in Orangeville. (Joanne Good, $10)

The Railway Flower +
The Dinosaur Encounter, The Harbour Explosion, The Underground Railroad Twins

By Lisa Tasca Oatway

The Railway Flower continues Lisa Tasca Oatway’s Blue Crescent Moon series of historical fantasy adventures featuring the Stonehart family’s four time-travelling children. In this latest story, set in British Columbia, a lunch basket used by 19th-century Chinese railway workers and displayed at the Revelstoke Railway Museum, transports the youngest child, Tori, back to 1883. There she helps nine-year-old Lian Hua, who has been injured in a dynamite blast used in the construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway.

Other books in Oatway’s series, which combines history with a generous dose of Canadiana, have taken readers to Alberta (The Dinosaur Encounter, winner of the Canadian Book Club Award for early readers), Nova Scotia (The Harbour Explosion) and Ontario (The Underground Railroad Twins). Oatway plans to have the complete series represent every province and territory in Canada. 

A Caledon resident, Oatway is now retired from a career in the finance and software industries. (Tellwell, $17.99)

The One About Stella

A Little Fish 

By Glenn Carley and Adriana Carley
Cover Illustration by Shelagh Armstrong

This engaging tale recounts the story of Stella, a young female rainbow trout who is swept downstream from her home. Too weak to swim back upstream on her own, Stella is helped by Slingo the salamander and other underwater friends to find an alternative way back and avoid being eaten by human and other natural predators. Stella was originally the main character in the bedtime stories the author told his young daughter, Adriana. As an adult, Adriana, in turn, helped reimagine those long-ago tales into this first of a planned four-book series about Stella and her adventures. Children are invited to join in illustrating the novel by drawing their impressions of the story on the blank page at the end of each chapter.

Carley resides in Bolton. His previous children’s books are The Long Story of Mount Pester and The Long Story of Mount Poozah. Shelagh Armstrong grew up in Alton and is a longtime contributor to this magazine. (Rock’s Mills Press, hardcover, $44.95) 

With files from Dyanne Rivers and Signe Ball, and thanks to the staff at BookLore for their invaluable assistance in compiling this year’s book list.