Turnstone Press

Miss O: My Life in Dance is the candid autobiography of Betty Oliphant, founder of Canada’s renowned National Ballet School with an introduction from Mikhail Baryshnikov.

An encounter with medical bureaucracy helps paint the portrait of a family growing together while they learn to let go.

When most parents consider sending their child to summer camp, they imagine a sunny lake a few hours out of the city. In 1977, the parents of 11-year-old Kirsten Koza sent their pigtailed, sass-talking offspring on a summer trip to the Soviet Union—with only fifty dollars in her pocket. Lost in Moscow tells the story of Kirsten’s summer camp hijinks: evading the Soviet Red Army in a foot race through and around Red Square, receiving extended radiation treatments for a minor case of tonsillitis, and making a gut-churning, unauthorized parachute jump—without being totally certain whether her parachute would open or even stay on.

Working for the United Nations is often dangerous, and sometimes, an ­utterly futile endeavour. Human rights lawyer Ronald Poulton has experienced these realities first hand. Pale Blue Hope is his account of working for the UN in Cambodia and Tajikistan.

The genesis of Stand the Sacred Tree was in Weier’s previous memoir Marshwalker (page 32)—it grew out of the questions he explored and the opportunities that were represented. Weier traveled widely—Syria, Iceland, Holland, Denmark, and Canada—and wondered at what—if anything—connects these places and their diverse landscapes and cultures. Icelandic horses to Syrian cab drivers. And of course birds, he never stops thinking of birds. What he discovers is people obsessed with place, with travel; each destination, each trip without exception leading to another. Each new landscape brings new exotic birds and flowers, new friends. Yet everywhere there is always something haunting and familiar.

In 1994, Wayne Tefs was diagnosed with carcinoid syndrome. Rollercoaster is an account of his journey from the onset of the disease, to eventually learning to live with it. Both practical and spiritual, the book is a must-read not only for those suffering from cancer, but for their loved ones, caregivers and even for those few whose lives have gone untouched by cancer.

WINNER: Governor General’s Award for Non-Fiction “Painfully bored” with school, 17-year-old Karen Connelly set off for Thailand to spend one year as an exchange student. This is her account of living in a beautiful but sometimes bewildering culture.