'Hard Hed' is a contemporary retelling of the Johnny Appleseed story. Hoosier Chapman, local historian and apple orchardist, has just been released from a Northwestern Ohio jail after serving two years for planting wild apple trees in a city park. Dropped at the State Line by a deputy sheriff, Hoosier treks west, overland and barefoot into Indiana …

Tony Burgess has been experimenting with apocalypse fiction in numerous earlier works: the language/speech virus in 'Pontypool', the enigmatic small world in the big world of Caesarea, and other less elaborate speculations. News coverage of the fall of Baghdad and its aftermath were the inspiration for 'Ravenna,' especially the smaller stories of p …

'Vs.' is a collection of poems chronicling the author's foray into the world of amateur boxing. A shy, bookish woman you'd never expect could hit someone in the face, Ryan was soon hooked on the physical and mental challenge of the sport, as well as the camaraderie of the club's members and volunteers. When the club announced an upcoming white coll …

Distinguished in part by its attention to language of place, natural science, local flora and fauna, land and seascapes, and receptivity to aboriginal forebears, much of the literature from British Columbia and the Pacific Northwest region of the US is increasingly informed by cross-border and multicultural perspectives. Within the context of the r …

'The Devil You Know' is the follow-up volume to Farrell's acclaimed debut collection, 'Sugar Bush & Other Stories'. The stories in 'The Devil You Know' deal with the familiar, yet ever-engrossing, territories of sex, love, work, birth, and death. Life's defining moments are explored through the eyes of female characters, from children to teens to a …

Pacific Cinematheque Monograph Series #2 features Nettie Wild, one of the leading documentarians working in Western Canadian cinema today. Her work and her interests span the globe and also encompass issues of regional interest to the broader Western Canadian/British Columbian community. She is best known for her feature length documentary films, ' …

'Kaspoit!' is a novel of our times, told in the language of our times. It's set in the Lower Mainland of Vancouver. The time is now and gangland crime is rampant. Seemingly random murders and takedowns are exploding at a disturbing rate. Criminals are brazen, the cops are jaded, and someone is trying to lay the blame for the disappearance of dozens …

In Greek mythology the muses preside over the arts and inspire writers and artists to produce works of genius. In 'Frenzy', Catherine Owen pays homage to the muses in a six-part compilation of muse-quests, some the author's, some those of others. In "Flood-Ghazals," she takes the leaping form of the Persian ghazal and makes it fluid, out of entirel …

The Pacific Cinematheque Monograph Series was initiated to explore the spectrum of contributions and innovations of Western Canadian filmmakers, videomakers, and fringe media artists. Monograph Number One focuses, fittingly, on David Rimmer, one of Canada's foremost experimental filmmakers.

There is no better way to start off Pacific Cinémathèque' …

'Inventory' is a collection of 58 object poems. Taking as a starting point the reciprocal relation between subjects and objects, the book explores the unique way that objects appear in an individual consciousness. Each object in this inventory exists on its own and also reflects the author's experience, from the mundane stapler and tea bag, to the …

Longlisted for the ReLit Award (2005)

Foozlers is a 24-hour “Odyssey” that runs a juggernaut through the high- and lowlands of Vancouver. Jerry Lowe is the reluctant driver of a getaway car for two sketchy junkies on the make. A pair of cops spend a shift wobbling on the cusp of total breakdown. The groom-to-be in an Indian arranged marriage see …

'Suicide Psalms' is both hymn and visceral scream-of loss, despair, hope and ultimately redemption. These poems are drawn out with quick precision, as if they were indeed written in haste, or delirium, before tightening the noose or firing the pistol or jumping off of the ledge. Even though the media has recognized suicide as an epidemic, it is sti …

'DAMP: Contemporary Vancouver Media Arts', is a singular effort, a visually exuberant work that is also on the vanguard of theoretical engagement, a symbiosis of form and content, in full-colour throughout, inclusive of extensive imagery, graphic intrigues and typographical accent-a rare and desirable art-infused statement of the city's media art s …

Pamela Stewart is a self-described “literary proctologist,” and her writing often looks into places that people generally don—t want to look. The stories in Elysium are about the difficulties of life we all encounter as human beings, the fragility of life—the physical, mental, and spiritual challenges we must try to overcome. They are about …

Finalist, ReLit Awards (shortlist)

Black Rabbit & Other Stories is a debut collection of great intensity and versatility. The stories range from the fantastic to the gritty, from urban dystopias to worlds of dreamlike possibility. Even in their frequent explorations of brutality, the author remains honest and true to the motivations of his character …

Burnham's poetry works at the edges of meaning, propriety, and the commodification of language. Combining elements of found text-the overheard, the over-read-he recasts his findings in various combinations that are unique to their presentation on the page. The essentials of language, how people use it-and how it uses them-is Burnham's main concern. …

'I Cut My Finger' is Stuart Ross's first full-length poetry collection since his acclaimed 'Hey, Crumbling Balcony! Poems New & Selected' (2003). The poems here show Ross's ever-expanding breadth, from his trademark humour and surrealism, to pointedly experimental works and poems of human anguish. Here, a poet includes a letter threatening suicide …

Following the success of his novel, 'The Dreamlife of Bridges', Robert Strandquist makes a much-awaited return to the short story form. As always, Strandquist's works explores relationships both familial and sexual, and plumbs the unspoken communications where things go haywire. This collection is more eclectic than his first collection, 'The Inani …

“Reading the Riot Act” is a phrase that has entered the popular lexicon, meaning the action taken by authority figures when they perceive that their “charges” are getting out of hand. The act itself is a seldom-used piece of legislation actually designed to prevent a riot from taking place. Supposedly, the mere mention of the Riot Act is en …

Best Books of 2005, Ottawa Xpress

Writer's Trust of Canada's "Warm Weather Reads Recommended by Writers" list (recommended by Robert Hough)

Confessions of a Small Press Racketeer is equal parts literary memoir, advice for the emerging writer, and reckless tirade. Ross has been active in the Canadian literary underground for a quarter of a century: he …

Painted Lives & Shifting Landscapes showcases the artwork of Vancouver painter, printmaker and muralist Richard Tetrault. Tetrault's work explores universal themes of the figure and the urban landscape. From Berlin to Bangkok to Vancouver, his artwork revisits these themes over thirty years. His imagery is at its most direct in street drawings and …

Finalist, ReLit Award

Amazon.ca's 50 Essential Canadian Books selection

First published in 1997 to much critical acclaim, Salvage King, Ya! is a novel firmly rooted in Canada’s favourite national pastime—hockey. Critics have called Salvage King, Ya! “the great Canadian novel,” and a “postmodern Canadian classic.” Drinkwater, Jarman’s n …

When jazz musicians of the “30s and “40s were gettin” down, when things were really cookin” they—d say, Yeah, make it tight like that. It meant things were good, as good as they could get. It's a good thing in fiction, too. The stories in Jim Christy's latest collection span time and space, taking us from the depression-era Deep South to …

With a thousand members throughout the province, the Federation of BC Writers is one of the most active and vigorous writers' organizations in the country. 'The Fed Anthology', edited by Susan Musgrave on the occasion of the group's 25th anniversary, is a colourful bazaar of previously unpublished fiction and poetry by nearly 50 of those members. L …

Winner of the City of Vancouver Book Award

The Heroines Series is an epic photographic documentary of the addicted women of Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. In 1997, fashion and portrait photographer Lincoln Clarkes turned his lens away from the world of glamour and began documenting the dire circumstances being endured by the marginalized women livin …

'Articles of Faith' is a play designed to promote understanding of the controversial subject of the blessing of same-sex unions. The play is based on a series of interviews conducted by the author in a Pacific Northwest community where the issue of formal condoning and blessing of same-sex unions divided and eventually split an Anglican parish.

"Int …

'The Door Is Open' is a compassionate, reflective, and informative memoir about three-and-a-half years spent volunteering at a skid row drop-in centre in Vancouver's downtown eastside. In an area most renowned for its shocking social ills, and the notorious distinction of holding the country's "very poorest forward sortation area of all 7,000 posta …

Finalist, Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize (BC Book Prizes)

Finalist, City of Vancouver Book Prize

Long listed for CBC Canada Reads 2015

The Door Is Open is a compassionate, reflective, and informative memoir about three-and-a-half years spent volunteering at a skid row drop-in centre in Vancouver’s downtown eastside. In an area most renowned for its …

Finalist, City of Vancouver Book Prize

A blackly comic new novel from Vancouver author Grant Buday, based on his eight glorious years working in a mass production bakery. Dickensian in magnitude, White Lung is a sardonic portrait of B.C.’s racial conflicts and chaotic economy.

Praise for White Lung:

"a rollicking black comedy of errors with a host o …

A wonderful hybrid of post-modern genre-bending and conventional narrative-an exploration of a state of mind rather than a description of events. This work deals with subjects as varied as memory; rewriting notions of history; erotic latitude; the blurred border between sleep, dream and reality; isolation; loss; pleasure and change.