Mewsings, Musings author Barbara Florio Graham signing Sat. Nov. 27 from 1-3pm

mewsingsmusings.jpg If you are a cat lover, a fan of poetry or someone who just enjoys a good chuckle, then Books on Beechwood is the place to be on Saturday, November 27 from 1-3pm. Barbara Florio Graham will be here signing her book “Mewsings, Musings,” a book she wrote with some help from her beautiful cat, Simon Teakettle.

From author’s website:
“The subtle wit and gentle satire of award-winning writer, Barbara Florio Graham, is back to back with her celebrity cat, Simon Teakettle, in a clever flip book designed to ‘a-muse’ readers of all ages.
Barbara’s satiric pieces on writing and teaching are coupled with several of her award-winning humorous poems as well as witty comments on living with the ‘classy cat in the black fur tuxedo.'”
(…)
“Barbara Florio Graham is a writer, teacher and communications consultant. She has contributed to more than 30 magazines and newspapers around the world, websites in 44 countries in 11 time zones, and 35 print anthologies in five countries.
Mewsings, Musings won an Award of Excellence in the Cat Writers’ Association’s international contest in 2001.”

Come on down to Books on Beechwood on November 27 to meet Barbara in person, have a chat, buy a book, and get it signed! We look forward to seeing you all here!

For more information on Barbara, Simon Teakettle, or any of their work, please visit their website at www.simonteakettle.com.

“Missing Women, Missing News:Covering Crisis in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside” – Author David Hugill signing November 25, 5pm-7pm

David Hugill Meet author David Hugill on Thursday, November 25th from 5pm to 7pm at Books On Beechwood and pick up a signed copy of his book, Missing Women Missing News: Covering Crisis in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside.

From the publisher:

In a country with comparatively little violent crime, murders usually generate a flurry of media attention and police action, but this was not the case for the sixty women who were murdered or went missing from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside between 1978 and 2002. When police charged Robert Pickton in 2002, the media suggested that these long years of inaction and silence were the result of individual incompetence and bureaucratic failure.

Through a critical analysis of the print coverage of the Pickton trial, Hugill demonstrates how news narratives reproduce a dominant “commonsense” framework that rationalizes the victimization of people on the margins. He argues that while journalists exposed the failure and incompetence of a few individuals within the police force and the state, they did little to reveal the disturbing socio-political context that made it possible for these murders to continue unabated for so many years. In this insightful critique Hugill shows how the mainstream press squandered the opportunity to examine the continued workings of colonialism, racism and patriarchy in Canadian society.

“Missing Women, Missing News demonstrates how journalism unwittingly upholds structures of power and domination.
David Hugill’s careful examination of the corporate news media shows how journalists routinely ignore central issues of race,
class and gender, allowing Canadian governments to escape blame for systematic legal, cultural and economic oppression.
This book should be required reading for every Canadian journalist.”
—Bruce Wark, Inglis Professor of Journalism, University of King’s College, Halifax, Nova Scotia

Charlotte: The Last Suffragette – Author Dave Mullington Signing November 20, 11am-1pm

charlotte.jpeg On Saturday, November 20, author Dave Mullington will be at Books on Beechwood signing his book “Charlotte: The Last Suffragette,” the story of Charlotte Whitton.

From the publisher:
“Passionate. Controversial. A trailblazer. Charlotte Whitton was all of these, which Ottawa native, Dave Mullington, has captured in his lively biography of the Ottawa Valley native.”
(…)
“As Canada’s woman newsmaker of the year six times during the 1950s and ’60s, Charlotte Whitton made headlines regularly as mayor of Ottawa. But she was no stranger to the spotlight. Prior to becoming the first female mayor of a Canadian city in 1951, Charlotte had already made an international name for herself as a driving force in the develping field of social welfare.”
(…)
“A determined feminist, Charlotte has often been credited with saying, ‘Whatever women do, they must do twice as well as men to be half as good. Luckily this is not difficult.’ It was this attitude that propelled her from humble beginnings in the Ottawa Valley to become advisor and combatant of legislators and policy makers, at home and around the world.”
(…)
“Charlotte Whitton has recently been nominated as a person of national significant interest, sparking much discussion and controversy. Charlotte would expect nothing less.”

About the author:
“As a retired journalist and the author of Chain of Office: Biographical Sketches of the Early Mayors of Ottawa (1847-1948), it was only natural that Dave Mullington would turn to Charlotte Whitton as the topic of his second book. He never met Charlotte, but remembers as a boy his mother’s enthusiastic support for the outspoken advocate.”

For more information on Dave and his books, visit his publisher’s website at www.gsph.com.

We hope to see you here at the store on Saturday, November 20 between 11am and 1pm. Come on down, meet the author, buy a book, and get it signed! See you all next Saturday!

“Conversations With Myself” by Nelson Mandela

nelsonmandela.jpeg There have been many books about Nelson Mandela, the South African hero, since his famous walk to freedom and his role in ending apartheid. This one shows another side of the famous man – a man devoid of self-pity and immune to the temptations of self-aggrandisement.

It is compiled from snippets of Mandela’s life, bits of his diary, calendars and letters he saved. Much of the material came from the hours of recordings by Richard Stengel who helped Mandela write his autobiogaphy “Long Walk to Freedom”. It also contains passages from a book Mandela was working on himself. There is a Foreword by President Barack Obama.

Mandela hoarded his notes and letters. Many written in prison make very touching reading, e.g. his request to attend his mother’s funeral, which was turned down, as was his request to go to his eldest son’s funeral after a car accident. But the book gives an upclose look at the prisoners’ feelings. The overthrow of apartheid was a distant dream, yet still one worth fighting for. Prisoner 466/64 could have been freed decades earlier if he had agreed to live in a black “homeland”, but he refused.

It is a very personal account of a very special man. In his last paragraph he writes: ” One issue that deeply worried me in prison was the false image that I unwittingly projected to the outside world: of being regarded as a saint. I never was one, even on the basis of an earthly definition of a saint as a sinner who keeps on trying.”

Review by Anne McDougall

Randall Denley Signing “One Dead Sister” on Sunday, November 14 from 1-3pm

onedeadsister.jpg Ottawa Citizen Columnist Randall Denley will be at Books on Beechwood from 1-3pm on Sunday, November 14 to sign his new book “One Dead Sister.”

From the book jacket:

“For Ottawa Citizen columnist Kris Redner, her Adirondack hometown is a place of bad memories buried deep in the past. Then she receives a videotape that brings the past into the present. Kris recognizes her sister Kathy, murdered nearly thirty years ago.
When Kris returns home to dig for the truth, she discovers that she’s the last loose end in a story that the town definitely doesn’t want told. One Dead Sister pits Kris against one of the most powerful men in America and a town that considers her sister’s death old, bad news.
One Dead Sister is a story about political power and the extreme measures that people will engage in to keep it. It is the third novel by Ottawa Citizen columnist Randall Denley.”

Come by on Sunday, meet the author, and get a book signed! We look forward to seeing you then!

“Becoming Canada” by Ken Dryden

becomingcanada.jpeg When it comes to talk of winning, best-selling author Ken Dryden knows what he is talking about. From l97l-l979 he was goal-tender for the Montreal Canadiens hockey team, during which time the team won six Stanley Cups.

Since then, Dryden was elected to the House of Commons in 2004, and re-elected as Member of Parliament in 2008. All this time he has watched Canadians accept themselves as easy-to-get-along-with but a bit self-deprecating and unambitious. In this book he writes about contemporary Canadian politics: the Liberal leadership race, the Conservative minority governments, prorogation, even the Vancouver Olympics. He points out that partisan politics often spoil the bigger story – of what Canada might do in the global world of climate change, starvation, peace-keeping. He thinks that if we realized more clearly what we have already achieved at home, outgrowing the Two Solitudes, taking in immigrants who know a new Canada, we would stop being a “Yes..but ” country and grow into a country of the heart and imagination with confidence to speak out with our own voice.

Dryden has written four best-sellers, including “The Game”. In this new book he talks about the Own the Podium slogan of the Vancouver Olympics – not in the way public relations picked it up but the way the athletes performed – clear-eyed, unrattled, and winning medals. He would like to see the rest of us behave this way.

Review by Anne McDougall

Roy MacSkimming Signing “Laurier in Love” on Saturday, November 13, 1-3pm

laurierlove.jpeg Come down to Books on Beechwood on Saturday, November 13 between 1pm and 3pm and meet Roy MacSkimming. He will be here signing copies of his latest novel “Laurier in Love.”

Quoted from his website, the publisher writes:
“Laurier in Love reveals Sir Wilfrid Laurier as Canadians have never known him: deeply enmeshed in a passionate, enduring love triangle as he leads his country into a new century.”
(…)
“Boldly imagined and brilliantly executed, Laurier in Love portrays Laurier the gifted statesman, emerging onto the world stage at Queen Victoria’s diamond jubilee; Laurier the silver-tongued orator, charming Americans in Chicago; Laurier the conciliator, bridging conflicts between English and French as Canada fights a distant imperial war in South Africa. Above all, we feel the joy and pain of two women who tie their destinies to the same man – until in the end he must act to resolve the impasse.”

Come visit us at the bookstore to meet the author, buy a book and get it signed! We look forward to seeing you all on November 13!

For more information about Roy MacSkimming and his other fiction and non-fiction titles, visit his website at www.roymacskimming.com.

Tim Cook Signing “The Madman and the Butcher” Saturday, November 6, 11am-1pm

madmanbutcher.jpeg Author and Great War Historian, Tim Cook, will be at Books on Beechwood on Saturday, November 6, from 11:00am to 1:00pm, to sign his new book “The Madman and the Butcher: The Sensational Wars of Sam Hughes and General Arthur Currie.”

From the jacket:
“Award-winning author Tim Cook turns his narrative powers to the conflict between two towering Great War figures: Sir Arthur Currie, Canadian Corps Commander, and Sir Sam Hughes, Canada’s war minister. Set against the backdrop of Europe’s battlefields and Canada’s political tumult, The Madman and the Butcher explores the nation’s discomfort with heroes, the need to place blame, and the very public war of reputations that raged on after the guns fell silent.”
(…)
The Madman and the Butcher is a powerful double biography of Sam Hughes and Arthur Currie. Using newly uncovered sources, Cook creates a haunting portrait of our greatest battlefield general and the man who tried to destroy him.”

Come down to the bookstore to visit with the author, buy a book, and get it signed! Refreshments will be served during this event. We look forward to seeing you here!

“Gold Diggers” by Charlotte Gray

golddiggers.jpg If you’ve ever wondered about what really happened in the Gold Rush, the Klondike, and Dawson City, this is the book to set you straight.

Biographer/historian Charlotte Gray has done a wonderful job of bringing these legendary spots to life. She takes six characters and follows their lives as the north beckons and gold may or may not fill their pockets. There are good clear maps and we can follow the miner as he backpacks ever further north; the saintly priest who keeps his “church” going long before any building was put up; the young writer Jack London who kept notes for his later books even though he could hardly stand up from scurvy. There was the spit ‘n polish Mountie and two unusual women: one a feisty business woman who wore starched blouses and ran a hotel, the other an imperious British journalist from The Times.

In the late l800’s these people first followed rumours of gold up in the Chilkoot Pass. Later they stampeded further north to what soon became Dawson City. The trail was horrendous; they had to carry in a year’s worth of food, clothing, equipment. Gray herself rafted down a section of the wide Yukon river in 2008 and gives vivid descriptions of the majestic countryside. There are also good photographs of the wild, muddy boom town that Dawson City became.

The Gold Rush produced many myth-makers, apart from Jack London, including Robert Service and the Canadian writer, Pierre Berton who was the son of a Klondike stampeder and spent the first ten years of his life in Dawson City. Like Charlotte Gray’s other books on historical figures in this country, this does not feel like myth – but rather the true story, and quite fascinating.

Review by Anne McDougall

“Extraordinary Canadians: Stephen Leacock” by Margaret MacMillan

leacock.jpeg Robertson Davies once said: “Don’t try to analyse Stephen Leacock”. Margaret MacMillan avoids this, but she does give a sympathetic, as well as provocative picture of perhaps the most extraordinary Canadian in this series.

She is of course the renowned writer/historian now warden of St. Antony’s College, Oxford. In his introduction to this book, John Ralston Saul says she is a master of the imperial mind, being a descendant of Lloyd George and equally at home in both the UK and Canada. Leacock was born in England, coming to Canada as a young boy in l870. For a long time England was “home” in all his public lectures, although he would change that as time went by. MacMillan understands his point of view – in both his professional life as a professor at McGill of Political Science and his humourous books, full of satire on Canadian life.

Leacock first discovered his ability to make people laugh when he published, at his own cost, “Literary Lapses” in l9l0 and “Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town” in l9l2. They took off in the UK and then around the world. Leacock said the best humour is dignified and gentle, about the incongruities of life. He also said it is blended with pathos, i.e. both tears and laughter.

MacMillan writes sensitively about Leacock’s private life. He was happily married but lost his wife in l925, when she was 45, he 55. More importantly their only son, born in l9l5, was showing a defect, and did not grow past five feet. Leacock was left to care for him on his own and young Stevie proved a tragic figure, not able to earn his living. Indeed Leacock’s last years were sad ones when he was retired from teaching at McGill and missed the congenial Montreal ambiance. But this is not what the world knows or cares about when chuckling over his books. They show the high courage Leacock displayed til the very end and still provoke laughter everywhere.

Review by Anne McDougall