In FILM STUDIES, 15-year-old Cass is so cool she's cold. That's what people think. But she struggles to decide what role to play in life — an act that swallows her whole. It's her director father, long absent, who leaves her struggling for an identity. The one thing she knows for sure is that she's fed up with her mother's ever-changing boyfriends. Then along comes a school film project and things get strange. But so what if the boy she likes films her twirling around half naked? Her father makes porn, doesn't he?

This special bundle unites two books, one of short stories and one novel, by one of Canada's premier short fiction writers. The Sky Is Falling deftly intertwines themes of first love, sexual confusion, and the dread of nuclear disaster with the comical infighting of a cast of well-meaning political activists, and the timelessness of the great Russian classics. A story for our own age of paranoia and terror, Caroline Adderson's witty, accomplished novel returns the reader to another fearful era, when the world teetered on the brink of nuclear annihilation and the end of world seemed inevitable.Pleased to Meet You collects nine razor-sharp stories. Stylistically varied and linguistically confident, these are compulsively readable stories that plumb the complexities of the human heart. A dying Finn, a philandering photographer recovering from an emergency splenectomy, a young woman heavy with an hysterical pregnancy - these are just some of the surprising characters...

Now in its 49th year, Best Canadian Stories has long championed the short story form and highlighted the work of many writers who have gone on to shape the Canadian literary canon. Margaret Atwood, Clark Blaise, Tamas Dobozy, Mavis Gallant, Douglas Glover, Norman Levine, Rohinton Mistry, Alice Munro, Leon Rooke, Diane Schoemperlen, Kathleen Winter, and many others have appeared in its pages over the decades, making Best Canadian Stories the go-to source for what's new in Canadian fiction writing for close to five decades. Selected by guest editor Caroline Adderson, the 2019 edition draws together both newer and established writers to shape an engaging and luminous mosaic of writing in this country today—a continuation of not only a series, but a legacy in Canadian letters.

Pudding Tat is born on the Willoughby Farm in 1901 — just another one of Mother Tat's kittens. But it turns out that Pudding is anything but ordinary. He is pure white with pink eyes that, though beautiful, do not see well, and hearing that is unusually acute. He finds himself drawn to the sweet sounds of the world around him — the pattering heartbeat of a nearby mouse, the musical tinkling of a distant stream.Soon the sounds of adventure call to Pudding, too. But before he can strike out into the wide world on his own, he hears a voice — coming from right inside his own ear. A flea has claimed Pudding as his host. The bossy parasite demands that Pudding take him away from the lowly barn and the drunken singing of his fellow fleas. He doesn't want adventure but a finer life — one where he can enjoy a warm bed and blood flavored not with mice, but with beef tenderloin and cream.Fortunately for this mismatched pair, the world is an extremely...

In the spring of 1890, Russian playwright and short story writer Anton Chekhov embarks on an investigative voyage to the Sakhalin Island penal colony, a gruelling six-month trip that could be fatal to someone suffering from tuberculosis. Everyone in Moscow knows he is escaping not only his current creative crisis but also the first woman the famously unattainable Chekhov has ever fallen in love with.In this witty, colourfully peopled novel, celebrated writer Caroline Adderson explores the complicated relationship between the iconic Chekhov and the beautiful, vivacious Lika Mizanova—and the colluding role his sister Masha played in it. An aspiring painter and for years her brother's amanuensis, Masha provided Chekhov with numerous lovers from her circle of friends, always with the unspoken understanding that marriage to any of them was out of the question.But the appearance of Lika Mizanova sets off a Chekhovian convolution of unrequited love, heartbreak,...

Isabel and Rollo are back ... but, who's in the doghouse now?Isabel's dog, Rollo — "the cutest, funniest puppy" — just doesn't seem like himself lately. Besides not fitting into her best friend Zoë's doll clothes anymore, he's become much harder to handle. Like when he pulls away from both girls to chase a squirrel — then keeps running! Or when he eats everyone's ice cream right off the table! Sure, Isabel bent the rules (or, um, had no rules?) for Rollo when he was a baby. But now he's a teenager — and he's out of control!! Is there a cure for this?Has Isabel created a monster?! Kids won't be able to look away!

Longlisted for the 2024 Giller PrizeShort stories about disparate characters consider what it means to find happiness.On New Year's Eve, a pair of addicts robs a string of high-end parties in order to fund their own recovery. A recently separated woman relocates to a small northern town, where she receives a life-changing visitation, and a Russian hitman, suffering from a mysterious lung ailment, retrieves long-buried memories of his past. In the nineteenth century, a disparate group of women coalesce in the attempt to aid a young girl in her escape from a hospital for the insane. These are but some of the remarkable characters who populate these stories, all of them grappling with conflicts ranging from mundane to extraordinary. Caroline Adderson's A Way to Be Happy considers what it means to find happiness—and how often it comes through the grace of others.

When the "grownup virus" hits, kids who live in the same apartment building must cope with strange new rules and extended time at home with parents and siblings.And they survive brilliantly, each in their own way. Twin boys throw themselves into an independent research assignment on prehistoric people and embrace their own devolution. A budding track star is encouraged to run laps on his balcony by a neighbor who has a secret crush on him. A classroom troublemaker reaches out to a teacher when his own father begins to exhibit signs of mental illness. A young entrepreneur saves himself and his hairdresser mother from financial collapse by renting out the family dog. And a girl finds a way to communicate with her hearing-impaired neighbor so that they can spy on the rest of the building. The stories follow the course of the pandemic, from the early measures through lockdown, as the kids in the building observe the stresses on the adults around...

At first Curtis isn't that worried when his mother doesn't come home from her all-night job at the local gas bar. She'll be back, he's ten out of ten positive. After all, she promised she would never leave him again.Besides, Curtis is used to looking after himself and his five-year-old brother, Artie, and for a time he manages things on his own, keeping their mother's absence a secret. He knows exactly what will happen if any of the teachers find out the truth. He remembers his last horrible foster home all too clearly.Curtis gets pretty good at forging his mother's signature, but when the credit card maxes out and the landlord starts pressuring for the rent, it's more than a twelve-year-old can handle. Just in time, Curtis and Artie make friends with Mrs. Burt, the cranky, lonely old lady who lives across the street. And when the authorities start to investigate, the boys agree to go with Mrs. Burt to her remote cabin by the lake...

Jasper is thrilled when he finds his dad's favorite childhood toy, Marcel Mouse, at his grandmother's place. He's so afraid to lose the family treasure that he keeps Marcel on a string around his neck. But sometimes Jasper has to take off the little plastic mouse, and that leads to all sorts of trouble. First, Marcel goes missing from under Jasper's pillow, then he gets sent to the principal's office and disappears again! Then one day, something TERRIBLE happens, and it seems Marcel might be lost forever...Will Jasper ever see Marcel Mouse again?

Isabel loves Jasper, and it's making life complicated. He just wants to play knights and dragons with Ori and Leon, but Isabel makes him play babies and tries to set up their wedding. The only good thing about Isabel is the trampoline at her house. But will the highs of their trampoline playdates be enough to cure Jasper's girl-itis? Jasper John Dooley: NOT in Love is the third in a series of chapter books featuring a charismatic and funny central character. An only child with active, loving parents (and a most impressive lint collection), Jasper John Dooley is a true original.

In this witty, compelling, and genre-bending novel, a single mother navigates the loves, lusts and losses of middle-age to arrive at a final, bitter-sweet contentment. Ellen McGinty: sexy, impulsive, loud-mouthed, chock full of regrets. In middle age she sells the house she raised her daughters in, slips the shell of her old life, and steps out for a first, tentative foray into real contentment -- directly into the path of a man twenty years her junior. Her story explodes into multiple points of view. Through the eyes of her lover Matt, her ex-husband Larry, her two daughters (one a former addict), her grandson, and a friend who both supports and betrays her, we watch Ellen negotiate the last year of her tumultuous life as the pieces of who she is finally come together. In its entirety, Ellen In Pieces explores love in its varied forms, the nature of regret (and the possibility of recovery from it), and that greatest human test, mortality. Exquisitely...

A village is torn apart by its residents' inability to communicate, until a little girl shares the gift of punctuation in this humorous illustrated parable.Chaos reigns in the village of Babble! All day, the residents fight, yell and argue, and no one is heard or understood . . . until a mysterious little girl arrives and gives the locals something very strange: a period. But what is this thing that looks like a freckle or a spot? The villagers don't even know how to ask. However, as the girl begins to share more gifts — a question mark, quotation marks — the residents slowly learn how to communicate. But when more fights arise and disaster strikes, can punctuation truly save the day?

Boys and girls alike will love this chapter book about a quirky but endearing boy who finally gets to be his school's Star of the Week.

Jasper John Dooley's beloved Nan is leaving on a cruise for a whole week! He feels so pththth. All he can think about is Nan missing out on their Wednesday card game, and whether it's raining where she is, too, and if she will ever come back. But each day something happens, from a stapling mishap to a hamster escape, and Jasper realizes that waiting for someone to return from an adventure takes forever ... unless you're having an adventure, too.Jasper John Dooley: Left Behind is the second in a series of chapter books featuring a charismatic and funny central character. An only child with active, loving parents (and a most impressive lint collection), Jasper John Dooley is a true original.