Book Me

Season 6, Episode 7 

By the end of "The Dirty Thirties", Saint John, New Brunswick was reeling from The Great Depression, and the world was inching closer to another war. But a fascinating group of painters, writers, and artisans who'd traveled and studied abroad found inspiration in this unlikely time and place to create great art.

Mark Blagrave sets his latest novel, "Lay Figures", in those anxious days, when the sparks of creation, argument, and romantic intrigue lit the artists' studios.

Mark spoke with Costas Halavrezos about the characters and his lifelong love affair with Saint John.

Season 6, Episode 6

After decades in Montreal, Brenda Jones returned to PEI to retire. She learned how important the landscape of her youth was to her well-being.

In "Medicinal Herbs of Eastern Canada: A Pictorial Manual", the award-winning illustrator of children's books turns her attention and artistic skills to wild plants - the nearly-lost knowledge about their healing properties, and the caution that some deserve.

She tells Costas Halavrezos about the science and traditional lore surrounding some of our region's most familiar plants.

Season 6, Episode 5

If you aspire to be something - say, an entrepreneur - it's good to study people who excel at it. Donald Savoie's latest book, "Thanks For The Business", introduces us to the region's most conspicuously successful entrepreneurs - K.C. Irving and his son Arthur, the driving forces behind the growth of Irving Oil.

As Atlantic Canada's most authoritative observer of economic development, Dr. Savoie talks with Costas Halavrezos about how the Irvings' relentless attention to detail, new opportunities, and customer service, as well as their refusal to recoil from the challenges of larger competitors and federal policies which favour Central Canada, can be a template for how to succeed in a region which so many label as "disadvantaged".

They also discuss the existential challenge faced by a petrochemical company in the era of dramatic evidence of climate change.

Season 6, Episode 4

No matter how much you think you know about Canada, you'll find brand new gems of knowledge in Elizabeth F. Hill's, "All 'Bout Canada: A Compendium of Canadiana" (with art by Alex MacAskill).

It's a book for all seasons that will sharpen your appreciation of Canadian characters, places, incidents, achievements, wildlife, inventions, and historical facts - not to mention quizzes, a crossword, and a verse to launch each chapter.

Elizabeth will also coach host Costas Halavrezos on ten different ways of using "eh".

Season 6, Episode 3

Real life can deliver more danger, action, courage, heroes, and villains than a thousand online games.

Award-winning author Joanne Schwartz's "Fight On!" covers a brief era in Cape Breton's history which provides all those elements for young readers. It was a 25-year period when matters of life and death mobilized men, women, and children to battle for the right to work in safe conditions and earn enough to stave off poverty.

She spoke with Costas Halavrezos about the events and the people who engaged in life and death struggles against corporate interests, government, and even the courts to reform the coal and steel industries.

Season 6, Episode 2

The dynamics between two siblings who are close in age can be wonderful. 

But such natural developments as the arrival of puberty and the first steps towards independence from the family can break the bond between the elder and a younger child. A sense of betrayal of that bond can lead to issues which last for decades.

In her interview with Costas Halavrezos, novelist Andrea Gunraj, author of "The Lost Sister", explains how she put together two women of different ages (13 and 60) and backgrounds to gain insight into how betrayals had changed their lives.

Season 6, Episode 1

What's the best way to tell people the history of a place? Through the lives of prominent citizens? Battles for control? Its economic ups and downs?

Joan Dawson's approach grants us an instantly relatable point of entry. "Nova Scotia's Historic Harbours: The Seaports that Shaped the Province" leads us around a coastline brimming with stories, from the earliest Mi'kmaq activities to the often violent struggles between Europeans for those most desirable locations to build communities.

Season 5, Episode 9.

Winnie has enjoyed an idyllic childhood in the Annapolis Valley, cycling around country roads and tubing down the Gaspereau River with her three best friends, who happen to be boys. But in a pivotal summer, Caleb, a newcomer from Vancouver, inserts himself into the group and undermines every vestige of their innocence.

As Winnie comes to understand his amoral manipulations, a battle for hearts and minds escalates into events that shatter lives and livelihoods in Nova Scotia's wine country.

Season 5, Episode 8

After 15 years in a psychiatric hospital, Elizabeth has been pronounced "well" and released to a group home.

With no memory of what led to her institutionalisation, she sets out to find the significance of names and words in her notebook.

Through first-person accounts by Elizabeth and her family, Laura Best has crafted a gripping novel describing the disintegration and eventual healing of a mind and relationships - before and after events in the early 1960s.

Costas Halavrezos interviews Laura about the challenge of creating Elizabeth's changing mental landscapes.

Season 5, Episode 7 

A sudden, one-way relocation to Halifax with her mother. For Annaka, the 10-year gap fills her with longing and questions. But an equally sudden return for her grandfather's funeral provides a chance to seek answers - with the help of two friends: her old pal Tia and an imaginary person named Clay.

In "Annaka", Andre Fenton has written what might be the first African-Nova Scotian fantasy book, filled with empathy, wisdom, and adventure.