Materials from the Americas
It is David’s first day at his brand-new school. He doesn’t know anyone. At recess, he stands alone and watches the other children enjoying their activities on the playground, from practicing soccer moves and climbing monkey bars to playing hopscotch and daydreaming in the grass. Bundled deep inside David’s pocket is a string of rubber bands, knotted and ready for a game of elastic skip.
Canadian women have long been trailblazers, creating art, making discoveries and setting records – and often battling incredible odds and discrimination in the process. Here, award-winning children’s writer Elizabeth MacLeod presents biographies of more than one hundred of these remarkable women, from the famous, such as Margaret Atwood, to the lesser known, such as multi-award-winning mathematician Karen Yeats. There are stories of activists and architects, engineers and explorers, poets and politicians and so many more. Each category pairs a historical groundbreaker with a present-day woman making her mark in that same field. Included are stories of Indigenous women, immigrants, women with disabilities and women from the LGBTQ+ community. Together, they tell the story of Canada. And together they offer a vision of what’s possible, to inspire all children to blaze trails of their own.
The vast boreal forest spans a dozen countries in the northern regions like “a scarf around the neck of the world,” making it the planet’s largest land biome. Besides providing homes for a diversity of species, this spectacular forest is also vitally important to the planet: its trees clean our air, its wetlands clean our water and its existence plays an important role in slowing global climate change. In this beautifully written book, award-winning author L. E. Carmichael explores this special wilderness on a tour of the forest throughout the four seasons, from one country to another. Evocative watercolor and collage artwork by award-winning illustrator Josée Bisaillon provides a rare glimpse of one of the world’s most magnificent places.
The boy in this story never wants to go to his friends’ birthday parties, because Happy the Clown is always there. And Happy is … his dad.
The Honey Jar retells the ancient stories Rigoberta Menchú’s grandparents told her when she was a little girl, and we can imagine her listening to them by the fire at night. These Mayan tales include natural phenomena narratives and animal stories. The underworld, the sky, the sun and moon, plants, people, animals, gods, and demigods are all players in these vibrant stories. Enchanting images by Domi draw on the Mayan landscape and the rich visual vocabulary that can be found in the weavings and crafts for which the Maya are renowned.
When two rabbit sisters ignore their parents’ warnings and decide to play outside on the open tundra, a hungry owl soon spots them and decides they will make a delicious meal. As a chase ensues, the sisters must act quickly, using the owl’s own greed against him in order to get away. A traditional Inuit story and cautionary tale, this book presents a centuries-old narrative for a new generation of readers.
A mysterious shadow walks the corridors. It goes from room to room, and sometimes leaves with someone in its arms, taking them to the land of dreams. Until one day a patient at the hospital―a young child―speaks to the shadow, offering it a drink of water. The child is fearful at first, but as he gets to know the shadow through their conversations, he realizes that she has feelings of her own. So begins a great friendship between an unlikely pair: a young child, and Death.
Tired of reading negative and disparaging remarks directed at the Indigenous people of Winnipeg in the press and social media, artist KC Adams created a photo series that presented another perspective. Called “Perception Photo Series,” it confronted common stereotypes of First Nation, Inuit and Métis people to illustrate a more contemporary, truthful story. First appearing on billboards, on storefronts, in bus shelters and on Winnipeg’s downtown buildings as projections, Adams’s stunning photographs now appear in her new book, Perception: A Photo Series. Meant to challenge the culture of apathy and willful ignorance about Indigenous issues, Adams hopes to unite readers in the fight against prejudice of all kinds.
Featured in WOW Review Volume XII, Issue 4
From the New York Times bestselling author of When Dimple Met Rishi comes the first novel in a brand-new series set at an elite boarding school, that’s a contemporary spin on Beauty and the Beast.Will the princess save the beast? For Princess Jaya Rao, nothing is more important than family. When the loathsome Emerson clan steps up their centuries-old feud to target Jaya’s little sister, nothing will keep Jaya from exacting her revenge. Then Jaya finds out she’ll be attending the same elite boarding school as Grey Emerson, and it feels like the opportunity of a lifetime. She knows what she must do: Make Grey fall in love with her and break his heart. But much to Jaya’s annoyance, Grey’s brooding demeanor and lupine blue eyes have drawn her in. There’s simply no way she and her sworn enemy could find their fairy-tale ending…right? His Lordship Grey Emerson is a misanthrope. Thanks to an ancient curse by a Rao matriarch, Grey knows he’s doomed once he turns eighteen. Sequestered away in the mountains at St. Rosetta’s International Academy, he’s lived an isolated existence—until Jaya Rao bursts into his life, but he can’t shake the feeling that she’s hiding something. Something that might just have to do with the rose-shaped ruby pendant around her neck… As the stars conspire to keep them apart, Jaya and Grey grapple with questions of love, loyalty, and whether it’s possible to write your own happy ending.
After the flood, Raven falls from the sky far out the sea. How will he get back to the mainland? with the help of a friendly sea otter, Raven comes up with a plan.