• Bully 101

    Bully 101

    Created by: Doretta Groenendyk
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Bully 101 is an irreverant look at a familiar and ongoing issue. It explores both the temptations of bullying and the remarkable possibility of kindness. It is an excellent conversation starter for both families and schools, or anyone who hopes for peace. The illustrations are funky. The text rhymes and twists. Geared towards primary-grade 7 Bully 101 identifies ways in bullying occurs, (cyber, playground, bus,) the feelings that result (for both the bully and victim) and the simple notion that anyone can chose kindness instead. The book does not answer all questions surrounding bullying; it does not preach either. Rather, it will begin conversations on why we bully, or watch it happen and it presents the idea that everyone has the choice to not participate in it.

    $18.95
  • Ten Thousand Truths

    Ten Thousand Truths

    Created by: Susan White
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    A moving story of losing family but finding a new one. Thirteen-year-old Rachel is bad news, or so her foster care worker tells her. She’s been shuttled from one rotten foster family to another ever since her mother and brother died in a car accident five years ago, and she’s running out of options. So when she gets caught shoplifting and is kicked out of her latest home, the only place left to send her is the last resort for kids like her: a farm in the middle of nowhere run by a disfigured recluse named Amelia Walton, whom Rachel nicknames “Warty” because of the strange lumps covering her face and neck. Rachel settles into life at the farm, losing herself in her daily chores and Amelia’s endless trivia, and trying to forget her past and the secret she’s holding inside. But when a letter arrives for her out of the blue, Rachel soon realizes that you can’t hide from your past-or your future.

    $12.95
  • Here for the Music

    Here for the Music

    Created by: Laurie Brinklow
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Laurie Brinklow’s long-awaited first collection of poems beaches the reader on the shores of contemporary womanhood. Strewn with memories of the tumultuous journey through childhood to adulthood and the detritus of relationships chanced and abandoned, finally being “here” brings to devotion to daughters and friends and an Island place. Brinklow’s book contains the tidal pull of loss and renewal, departure and arrival that keeps a lover of islands so close to the edges of life and death. That’s the here. But what she is “here” for is both more magical and more pragmatic: the music. It’s the music of language and the dance of human relationships, the sex and love melodies that bewilder and beguile. Brinklow brings this music down to us where we live, with the earthy touch of the “angel-in-charge-of-things-as-they-really-are.”

    $17.95
  • Acadian Traditions on Candlemas Day Candles, Pancakes and House Visits

    Acadian Traditions on Candlemas Day Candles, Pancakes and House Visits

    Created by: Georges Arsenault
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Georges Arsenault’s latest edition to the Acadian Traditions series Most English-speaking people just associate the 2nd of February, or Groundhog Day, with superstitions related to the weather. In Acadian communities, however, it was known as Candlemas Day and at one time was an important religious and social festivity. Pancakes were the symbolic food of choice. In many villages, young Acadians went from door-to-door collecting food for a communal feast or to give to the poor. This book by Georges Arsenault enables us to discover a festivity rich in traditions and a significant part of the cultural heritage of Acadians everywhere.

    $19.95
  • All is Clam A Shores Mystery

    All is Clam A Shores Mystery

    Created by: Hilary MacLeod
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    It’s Christmas at The Shores. There’s no snow yet, but there are so many outdoor lights that the tiny coastal village can be seen from space. Apart from Ian Simmons’ place, and he’s considered odd, there’s only one house in the village that isn’t lit up. It’s been dark for years. That’s about to change. Wild Rose Cottage is about to come to life, and death, once again. Meanwhile, the villagers wish for snow to complete the Christmas portrait. When it comes, it’s with the body of newcomer, Fitz Fitsimmons, a former acrobat turned bully and drunk. Mountie Jane Jamieson has seen murder here before, but none where she’d rather not catch the killer.

    $22.95
  • My Mother is Weird

    My Mother is Weird

    Created by: Rachna Gilmore
    Artist: Brenda Jones
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    A hilarious look at a child’s view of a mother’s bad day. Originally published in 1989 by Ragweed Press, this book is considered to be a P.E.I. classic. This unique view of mother’s “bad day” through the observant eyes of a child is a weird and wonderful story for parents and children. My mother is so weird. Some mornings, when she wakes up, she has horns on her head and long pointy teeth and claws. She speaks in a voice like a jackhammer. But after her morning coffee, Mom’s horns disappear, and her teeth and claws shrink back to normal. She speaks in a soft, smooth voice. But, one morning…we ran out of coffee…

    $9.95
  • The Reluctant Detective

    The Reluctant Detective

    Created by: Finley Martin
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    A young widow, orphan and mother, Wilhelmina Anne Brown is just beginning to find some stability in her new home in Prince Edward Island when she is forced to deal with the death of her beloved uncle, Bill Darby. Darby, a Charlottetown private investigator, leaves Anne and her fourteen-year-old daughter a small savings account and his business, where Anne has worked as office manager for six years. What follows is Anne’s struggle to protect her family, find justice for her clients, and forge a new life for herself in this page-turning thriller.

    $17.95
  • Ghost Boy of MacKenzie House

    Ghost Boy of MacKenzie House

    Created by: Patti Larsen
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Ten-year-old Chloe Sutton arrives on Prince Edward Island from her home in Ontario after the tragic loss of her parents in a car accident. Her Aunt Laverne (Larry) is a doctor and her only relative able to take her in. Chloe isn’t sure what to make of her aunt’s big old house on the red cliff overlooking the Northumberland Strait, or the skinny, red-haired and heavily freckled boy who wants to be her friend. Her first night in her new home, Chloe is tormented by the loss of her mother and father and hides in the dark to speak to them. When she does, she unknowingly invites the attention of a ghostly boy who inhabits the oldest part of the farmstead. Terrified but intrigued by the encounter, Chloe decides to uncover his history, setting her off on a set of adventures. When she does finally find the ghost boy’s secret, she realizes he has been blaming himself for years for the death of his brother, much like she has been blaming herself for surviving her parents. With the wrong made right, Chloe is finally let go of her own grief and accepted her new life.

    $11.95
  • Dreamtime

    Dreamtime

    Created by: Deirdre Kessler
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    The soothing rhythms and sounds of the words of this story will work their magic on children at bedtime. Written by award-winning author Deirdre Kessler and illustrated by the talented young artist Christina Patterson, this book evokes a quiet nighttime in Prince Edward Island-a perfect going-to-bed story. Dreamtimeis sure to be a classic of the 21st century.

    $15.95
  • Elaine Harrison: I am an Island that Dreams I am an Island that Dreams

    Elaine Harrison: I am an Island that Dreams I am an Island that Dreams

    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Elaine Harrison was born in Petite-Rivere in Nova Scotia, but moved to Prince Edward Island to teach in 1938. There, she and her companion spent their summers at “Windswept,” the 200 year-old farmhouse on the cliffs near Seacow Head, where they lived a simple life, and for over fifty years were involved in the intellectual life of the Island and beyond, playing host to numerous summer visitors and corresponding with some of Canada’s top writers. In 1968, retirement gave Elaine the freedom to turn to her interests: her poetry, the campaigning for favoured causes, but above all her painting. Inspired by the Group of Seven, she found her subject matter in the cliffs and waves at Windswept, the sunflowers in her garden, the trees of the local hardwoods, and latterly her own cats and kitchen. In the early days she frequently gave her paintings away to anyone who appreciated them, but from the 1970s she began to get the recognition and financial returns they merited. She died in 2003, but her work is still much-loved by Islanders.

    $24.95
  • An Island Christmas Reader (Updated edition)

    An Island Christmas Reader (Updated edition)

    Created by: David Weale
    Artist: Dale McNevin
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    An Island Christmas Reader is a book about Christmas past and present on Prince Edward Island. In 22 stories and essays, David Weale combines reminiscences of Islanders with his own musings to rekindle the memory of Christmas, where imagination and magic work hand in hand to create the “unsullied wonder of childhood vision.”

    $17.95
  • Mind Over Mussels A Shores Mystery

    Mind Over Mussels A Shores Mystery

    Created by: Hilary MacLeod
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Nothing big ever happens in The Shores. Ceilidhs, yes. Killings, no.

    That all changes when amateur sleuth, Hy McAllister trips over a body on the beach and tumbles head first into a murder case. Cottager Lance Lord, dressed like Jimi Hendrix, has had his head split open with an axe. As Hurricane Angus storms up the coast, Hy and Mountie Jane Jamieson vie against the elements to uncover the murderer in a village where almost everyone has something to hide.

    $22.95
  • The Little Book of Prince Edward Island

    The Little Book of Prince Edward Island

    Photographer: John Sylvester
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Award-winning photographer John Sylvester is back with a new book of stunning photography. Sylvester captures Prince Edward Island like no other photographer. With beautiful images of every corner of the Island in all seasons, The Little Book of Prince Edward Island is a charming and captivating look at the Island in all its colours. From the red dirt roads and green fields to the surrounding blue waters of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, John Sylvester’s imagery portrays the landscape that thousands of visitors from all over the world travel to see.

    $19.95
  • Prince Edward Island Seafood : Local Fare, Global Flavours

    Prince Edward Island Seafood : Local Fare, Global Flavours

    Created by: Paul Lucas
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Paul Lucas is the executive chef of a world-famous seafood restaurant on the Charlottetown waterfront. He draws on local, classical, and international flavours to inspire and create original true fusion cuisine that is truly his own. He lives in Stratford with wife Bethany and their two children.

    $12.95
  • The Year Mrs. Montague Cried.jpg

    The Year Mrs. Montague Cried

    Created by: Susan White
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Susan White was born in New Brunswick and moved from one New Brunswick city to another. As a teenager her family moved to the Kingston Peninsula and she only left long enough to earn her BA and Bed at St. Thomas University in Fredericton. Settling on the peninsula, she and her husband raised four children and ran small farm while she taught elementary school. Since retiring she is grateful to now have the time to work on her writing and the freedom to regularly visit her new granddaughter in Alberta.

    $12.95
  • Chung Lee Loves Lobsters

    Chung Lee Loves Lobsters

    Created by: Hugh MacDonald
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Mr. Chung Lee is a retired restaurant cook who buys one lobster a month with his old age pension cheque, takes the lobster to the seashore, and releases it into the sea. This book, a PEI favourite, was originally published in 1992 by Annick Press, but it has since gone out-of-print. New illustrations and fresh text will make it a favourite for a new generation of Islanders. This story won the L. M. Montgomery Children’s Literature Award in 1990.

    $9.95
  • Treasures to Find

    Treasures to Find

    Artist: Dale McNevin
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Dale McNevin is a much beloved PEI illustrator who has illustrated numerous books including Crosby and Me, Everything That Shines, and Three Tall Trees. Her characters from The True Meaning of Crumbfest were immortalized by the City of Charlottetown in re-created large statues painted by artists around the city.

    $12.95
  • At First, Lonely

    At First, Lonely

    Created by: Tanya Davis
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Best-known as a musician and a spoken-word performer, poet Tanya Davis has now taken to the page with At First, Lonely. In this collection, she reflects on life’s many passages: falling in love and out, the search for personal truth, the search for home. Davis’s style is one-of-a-kind: a blend of contemporary phrasing with profound personal expression. But her message is universal; over two million people have watched How to Be Alone, a film adaptation of her poem created by independent filmmaker Andrea Dorfman. Tanya Davis’ poetry challenges the intellect and touches deep places in the heart.

    $17.95
  • How Boys Grow Up

    How Boys Grow Up

    Created by: Sean Wiebe
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Sean Wiebe is an assistant professor of education at the University of Prince Edward Island. His recent research explores how poets have influenced teaching practice and are insightful theorists in understanding life’s complexities. He has edited two collections of poetry, The Last Red Smartie (1996) and A Nocturnal Reverie (1994), and has had his poetry published in several literary journals, including Standards: International Cultural Studies Journal, Cha: As Asian Literary Journal, Blue Skies Poetry, and Ascent Aspirations Magazine. He and his family live in Charlottetown.

    $16.95
  • Crosby and Me

    Crosby and Me

    Created by: Hugh MacDonald
    Artist: Dale McNevin
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    I’m off to play hockeybut I’m starting to thinkdad’s dreams are the reasonwe go to the rink.He’s doing the drivingwith Mum at his side,our frisky dog Crosbycomes along for the ride.

    $9.95
  • Snow for Christmas

    Snow for Christmas

    Created by: Doretta Groenendyk
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Mother of three young children, Doretta Groenendyk teaches art to young people, is active in her children’s school, and participates widely in the Nova Scotia artistic community, doing workshops around the province, including Word on the Street in Halifax. Based in Canning, NS, Doretta is the illustrator of Bounce and Beans and Burn, with text by Shannon Murray, which was shortlisted for the PEI Book Award in 2008, and I’m Writing a Story, her first book featuring her own stories and illustrations.

    $12.95
  • Vet Behind the Years

    Vet Behind the Years

    Created by: Bud Ings
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Bud Ings was born in 1926 on Prince Edward Island and graduated from the Ontario Veterinary College in Guelph, ON. He practised in rural King’s County, was a Liberal member of the legislative assembly, and served as agriculture and health ministers. A long-time member of the Queens County Fiddlers, Bud lives in Montague.

    $19.95
  • Revenge of the Lobster Lover A Shores Mystery

    Revenge of the Lobster Lover A Shores Mystery

    Created by: Hilary MacLeod
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    It’s lobster season at The Shores, a fishing village isolated from The Island in a storm surge. Parker, a collector of antiquities, has moved there with his partner Guillaume, a chef just out of rehab. “Hy” McAllister, a website writer looking for lobster recipes for a client’s newsletter, also needs a speaker for her Women’s Institute meeting. Enter Camilla, founder of the Lobster Liberation Legion, spouting crustacean right-to-life rhetoric. The legion starts freeing lobsters from their traps, angering the villagers and the man who runs Parker’s fisheries empire. In the tragic events that follow, the hidden connection between Parker, Guillaume and Camilla reveals itself.

    $22.95
  • I'm Writing a Story

    I’m Writing a Story

    Created by: Doretta Groenendyk
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Mother of three young children, Doretta Groenendyk teaches art to young people, is active in her children’s school, and participates widely in the Nova Scotia artistic community, doing workshops around the province, including Word on the Street in Halifax. Based in Canning, NS, Doretta is the illustrator of Bounce and Beans and Burn, with text by Shannon Murray, which was shortlisted for the PEI Book Award in 2008

    $12.95
  • Afternoon Horses

    Afternoon Horses

    Created by: Deirdre Kessler
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Deirdre Kessler teaches creative writing and children’s literature at the University of Prince Edward Island. Her poetry has appeared in a number of collections, including The New Poets of Prince Edward Island and Landmarks: An Anthology of New Atlantic Canadian Poetry of the Land, and in chapbook form: Subtracting by Seventeen. She is the author of five children’s novels, including the Canadian Children’s Book Centre Award-winning Brupp Rides Again, and six picture books, including perennial favourites Lobster in My Pocket, and Lena and the Whale.

    $16.95
  • Fixer-Upper

    Fixer-Upper

    Created by: Lorne Elliott
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Funnyman Lorne Elliott’s take on Island life. When Bruno MacIntyre decides to rent his ramshackle cottage to summer tourists, the wacky merriment begins. Lorne Elliott, comic master of mirth and mayhem, takes us to Savage Bay on the south shore of Prince Edward Island, where the hapless Bruno turns to his clever and caustic Aunt Tillie for help in securing tenants. First, the cottage, inherited with a bad reputation from Bruno’s ne’r-do-well father, must be renovated. Then, Bruno must duel with his aunt’s wry insults and sly plans, a sardonic would-be author, and two torrid tenants. Elliott’s celebrated gifts for sharp-witted repartee and vivid characterizations are in full force. So, too, are Elliott’s keen eye and ear for our fumbling aspirations, bittersweet banterings, self-deceptions, hard-won wisdom, surprising tenderness, and zany outcomes. The Fixer-Upper–the novella adaptation of his play, Tourist Trap–is classic Lorne Elliott, with a brash and cheeky Maritime flavour.

    $16.95
  • Lookbook!

    Lookbook!

    Created by: Jordan McIntyre
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Jordan McIntyre teaches part-time in the History Department at the University of Prince Edward Island. She researches Canadian museums, aboriginal history, and art history. She is currently working to develop a hands-on Children’s Museum on PEI and was inspired to write this series after many delightful and educational trips with her three young children.

    $9.95
  • Acadian Mi-Carême

    Acadian Mi-Carême

    Publisher: Acorn Press

    The rich traditions associated with Mi-Car’me or Mid-Lent are firmly anchored in the folkways of Acadian communities. To celebrate Mi-Car’me, people visited each other’s homes dressed up in masks and costumes. In the midst of the merrymaking, a mysterious character called the Mi-Car’me gave candies to little children and sometimes even delivered babies. But this strange individual scared many young Acadians because they feared he would take them away if they misbehaved.

    $19.95
  • Butterflies in My Belly

    Butterflies in My Belly

    Created by: Jackie Mackay
    Artist: Brenda Whiteway
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Jackie MacKay is a therapist who counsels children in a play therapy setting. Butterflies in My Belly was inspired by her work with young children. Jackie works at The Children’s Centre, a division of the Catholic Family Services Bureau in Charlottetown. She has a Master’s Degree in Social Work from Sir Wilfred Laurier University. Jackie lives in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, with her husband and two children.

    $7.95
  • Shades of Green

    Shades of Green

    Editor: Brent MacLaine
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Brent MacLaine is Professor of English and a 3M Teaching Fellow at the University of Prince Edward Island where he teaches twentieth-century literature. He was born and grew up in the rural community of Rice Point, PEI, to which he returned after teaching at universities in Vancouver, Edmonton, China, and Singapore. In addition to numerous articles on modern literature and the literature of Atlantic Canada, he has published two volumes of poetry, Wind and Root (Vehicule 2000) and These Fields Were Rivers (Goose Lane 2004). He has also edited with Hugh MacDonald Landmarks: an Anthology of New Atlantic Canadian Poetry of the Land (Acorn 2001).

    $16.95
  • House of Bears

    House of Bears

    Created by: Orysia Dawydiak
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    When Luba Kassim reluctantly returns home to Northern Ontario, the strained relationship with her traditional Ukrainian mother only heightens her feelings of alienation and isolation. A family crisis reunites her extended family and reignites old rivalries and the pain of long-held family secrets. Slowly, Luba begins piecing together her family’s unspoken past, starting in the 1930s in Ukraine, followed by emigration to England and settlement in Canada. In the process, she uncovers some startling truths about her own identity, and learns that she and her mother have much more in common than she thinks.

    $22.95
  • Bubba Begonia You've Done it Again!

    Bubba Begonia You’ve Done it Again!

    Created by: Gerry O'Brien
    Artist: Dale McNevin
    Publisher: Acorn Press

    Gerry O’Brien writes humourous chapter books, picture books, and lyrics for 7-12-year-olds. His lyrics have been sung by Corduroy Bear, Franklin The Turtle, and The Care Bears, and his stories, poems and plays have won numerous writing awards. He lives in Argyle Shore, Prince Edward Island. This is his third Bubba Begonia book.Illustrator Brenda Jones is a native of Prince Edward Island, and is a commercial designer and film animator who now lives in Montreal. She has illustrated a dozen books, including Bubba Begonia, You’ll be Sorry!, Bubba Begonia and the Mudmen of the Koola Boola, My Mother is Weird, Bud the Spud and Buddy the Blue-Nosed Reindeer.

    $7.95