BC Books Online was created for anyone interested in BC-published books, and with librarians especially in mind. We'd like to make it easy for library staff to learn about books from BC publishers - both new releases and backlist titles - so you can inform your patrons and keep your collections up to date.
Our site features print books and ebooks - both new releases and backlist titles - all of which are available to order through regular trade channels. Browse our subject categories to find books of interest or create and export lists by category to cross-reference with your library's current collection.
A quick tip: When reviewing the "Browse by Category" listings, please note that these are based on standardized BISAC Subject Codes supplied by the books' publishers. You will find additional selections, grouped by theme or region, in our "BC Reading Lists."
From the author of 'Dead Man In the Orchestra Pit' and 'Foozlers', comes another tale of madcap human folly. Louella Debra Poule is doing an eighteen-month stint on a weapons charge at a minimum security institution up BC's Fraser Valley. Her drug dealing, sort-of-boyfriend Jimmy Flood, and his sidekick, Blacky Harbottle, should have taken the rap, but with their list of "priors" and pending drug charges, a weapons offense would have put them in the slammer for quite a little stay. Louella did the "right thing"; she did what was expected of her by those on the street. Six months into Louella's sentence, her mother dies. Upon Louella's early release (recommended on good behaviour and for pursuing sincere in-roads to rehabilitation) she discovers that she has inherited a good deal of money and a nice condo in a treed and quiet suburb of Vancouver. It is here that Louella Poule sits in relative anonymity and safety, here that she decides to take some time away from the influence of her former "associates," tend her mother's garden, maintain her new-found sobriety, and reassess her life. But, as so often happens, her past comes a callin'. A story of addiction, rehabilitation, and finding meaning in life.
" 'Budge' is one of the more quirky, unconventional, picaresque novels to come along in a while. It can be pleasurable, if the reader is willing to roll with Osborne's approach to prose, which is original, if not necessarily expedient. Osborne tends to dance all around a point before he makes it, and his paragraphs can go on for quite a bit, without necessarily being cumbersome. In comparison to similar authors, he's like Faulkner without the density, Stein without the obtuseness, or Thomas Wolfe without the extravagance; of those, he's closest to Wolfe. There's a rhythm to Budge's text that Osborne might not have achieved with a more minimalist approach. There's a sense he's luxuriating in the weaving of his narrative, repeating certain key phrases, winkingat the reader and leading him through a meandering, though focused plot. To fully appreciate 'Budge', we must relinquish our trust to Osborne, a somewhat loopy shaman. ...Tom Osborne warrants a great deal of praise for freshness of content, viewpoint, and plot. He knows how to use language with skill and verve. ..." -Foreword Reviews
John Thomas Osborne, aka Tom Osborne, was born on Baffin Island in June of 1949. He has illustrated various books, including Mary Beth Knechtel's under-acknowledged 'The Goldfish That Exploded' and 'Social Credit for Beginners: An Armchair Guide' (Pulp Press, 1986). Tom Osborne is also author of several books of poetry, including 'Under the Shadow of Thy Wings' (1986), '9 Love Poems', and 'Please Wait for Attendant to Open Gate'. His first novel 'Foozlers' was published by Anvil Press in 2004 and was followed in 2006 by 'Dead Man In the Orchestra Pit' (Anvil). Osborne grew up in Kamloops, B.C. and Vancouver, co-founded Pulp Press in the early 1970s, and currently resides in Maple Ridge, B.C.