New Releases by Allan Stratton

Zoe Bird is going nowhere fast. She’s angry and lonely, and her only true friend is her granny, whose Alzheimer’s is worsening. When her parents put Granny in a home, Zoe decides now is the time to break free. She smuggles Granny out and together they hit the tracks on a cross-country trip to find Zoe’s long-lost uncle. But there will be some home truths along the way. . . An emotional story about family, surviving school and being true to yourself for fans of The Art of Being Normal and Unbecoming.

"Comment peut-on ne pas vouloir sortir avec Jason ? il est ultra cool. [...] Jason, pour moi, c'est un rêve qui se réalise." Hélas pour Leslie, son rêve va vite tourner au cauchemar... Jason, le nouveau qui attire tous les regards, n'est pas le garçon bien qu'il paraît être. Lentement, il tisse sa toile autour d'elle. Pour qu'elle ne puisse plus s'échapper. Pour qu'elle lui appartienne. Corps et âme.

Depuis cinq ans, Cameron et sa mère déménagent constamment, fuyant le père abusif de Cameron qui les pourchasse de ville en ville. Du moins, c'est ce qu'affirme la mère de Cameron. Pour l'instant, ils sont établis dans une maison de ferme. Cameron y est témoin de manifestations étranges, mais comme il est seul à voir de curieux fantômes, sa mère s'inquiète. Cameron en est rendu à douter de lui-même. Cette sinistre maison serait-elle vraiment hantée? Et quel est le lien entre les événements passés, la rumeur qui court à propos de chiens et le père de Cameron?

Cameron and his mom have been on the run for five years. His father is hunting them. At least, that’s what Cameron’s been told. When they settle in an isolated farmhouse, Cameron starts to see and hear things that aren’t possible. Soon he’s questioning everything he thought he knew and even his sanity. ‘It’s about ghosts and terrifying danger and going mad all at once. I didn’t know what was real and what was imagined until the very last page. I loved it!’ Melvin Burgess ‘Brilliant, page-turning and eerie. Had me guessing to the very end’ Joseph Delaney

Bony Blithe Light Mystery Award 2015 — Nominated Faith healers, movie moguls, and social-climbing fraudsters collide in Depression-era Los Angeles It’s the Great Depression and Mary Mabel McTavish is suicidal. A drudge at the Bentwhistle Academy for Young Ladies (aka Wealthy Juvenile Delinquents), she is at London General Hospital when little Timmy Beeford is carried into emergency and pronounced dead. He was electrocuted at an evangelical road show when the metal cross on top of the revival tent was struck by lightning. Believing she’s guided by her late mother, Mary Mabel lays on hands. Timmy promptly returns to life. William Randolph Hearst gets wind of the story and soon the Miracle Maid is rocketing from the Canadian backwoods to ’30s Hollywood. Jack Warner, J. Edgar Hoover, and the Rockettes round out a cast of Ponzi promoters, Bolshevik hoboes, and double-dealing social climbers in a fast-paced tale that satirizes the religious right, media manipulation, celebrity, and greed.

An exhilarating fairytale adventure from the author of the Governor General's Award nominated The Grave Robber's Apprentice. The Dream Witch haunts the forest beyond the kingdom of Bellumen, waiting to collect on a horrible debt owed by the king and queen -- the heart of their only daughter, Princess Olivia. Until she has it, none of the kingdom's children are safe. As Olivia's thirteenth birthday approaches and the witch's deadline draws near, her desperate mother seeks help from Prince Leo of neighbouring Pretonia. But the treacherous prince seizes their castle instead, determined to marry Olivia and take over the kingdom. So Olivia makes a daring escape from the castle, two friends by her side: the peasant boy Milo and a curious talking mouse with a surprising past. Together, the friends face certain danger and fantastical adversaries to save their families and rescue a kingdom.

Sami Mohammed Sabiri, est un jeune Américain de 16 ans, élevé selon des principes stricts. Son père, directeur de recherche dans un grand laboratoire de biologie, est un fervent musulman qui exerce sur son fils une autorité démesurée. Sami vit ainsi une relation difficile avec lui, car sa liberté est restreinte. Si M. Sabiri s'imagine avoir réussi l'intégration de leur famille, Sami mesure au quotidien combien cette idée est fausse. Et les événements vont lui donner raison. Une nuit, leur maison est prise d'assaut par des forces de police antiterroristes, et M. Sabiri est emmené, menotté, pour subir un interrogatoire. Le lendemain, Sami découvre horrifié que son père est soupçonné d'appartenir à un groupe terroriste qui préparait un attentat de grande envergure. L'adolescent a pourtant la certitude de son innocence. Il va se lancer à corps perdu dans cette affaire et partir à la recherche de preuves.

Hans doesn’t know who he is or where he came from. When he was a baby, he washed ashore in a wooden box and was adopted by the conniving grave robber Knobbe the Bent. Now fate has thrown him together with Angela von Schwanenberg, a young countess fleeing for her life from the evil Archduke Arnulf and his dreaded Necromancer. Together, these friends go on a daring quest to discover Hans’s true identity and save Angela’s parents from the archduke. Join Hans and Angela on their grand adventure as they ride through the depths of the great forest, sled down a mountain in a coffin and sneak along the secret passageways of the archduke’s palace. The Grave Robber’s Apprentice is a world of highwaymen, hermits and dancing bears—and of a boy separated from his family by the sea. In this world anything is possible with luck and imagination—even for a grave robber’s apprentice.

Like any girl, sixteen-year-old Chanda Kabelo has secrets. She is determined to be loyal to her rebellious friend Esther, she worries about passing her exams, and she wishes she didn't have to spend so much time listening to her Mama chat with their nosy neighbour Mrs Tafa. But one secret threatens to silence everything. All around her people are dying, and everyone is afraid to say why. But Chanda knows: it's because of AIDS. Chanda's Secrets is the tense and deeply moving story of one girl's struggle to rescue the people she loves from a tragedy that is destroying her world.

The truth is closing in. Life's not easy for Sami Sabiri since his dad stuck him at a private school where he's the only Muslim kid. But it's about to get a lot worse. When Sami catches his father in a lie, he gets suspicious. . . . He's not the only one. In a whirlwind, the FBI descends on his home, and Sami's family becomes the center of an international terrorist investigation. Now Sami must fight to keep his world from unraveling. An explosive thriller ripped from today's headlines, borderline is the story of a funny, gutsy Muslim-American teen determined to save his father, his family, and his life.

Chanda Kabelo, a teenaged African girl, must save her younger siblings after they are kidnapped and forced to serve as child soldiers in General Mandiki's rebel army.

Chanda’s mother is not herself, her younger sister is acting out, and her best friend needs help. A powerful story set amid the African HIV/AIDS pandemic. In this sensitive, swiftly paced story, readers will find echoes of To Kill a Mockingbird as Chanda, a 16-year-old, astonishingly perceptive girl living in the small city of Bonang in Africa, must confront the undercurrents of shame and stigma associated with HIV/AIDS. Through his artful style and dramatic storytelling, Allan Stratton captures the enduring strength of loyalty, the profound impact of loss, and a fearlessness that is powered by the heart. Above all, it is a story about living with truth. Proceeds from the sale of this book will be used to support organizations working to better the lives of Africans living with HIV/AIDS.

Read together, A Flush of Tories and Rexy! form comic bookends, the first viewing our current dilemmas in the context of Conservative leadership in the last century; the second, in the context of more recent Liberal leadership. A Flush of Tories was widely produced in Canada and adapted for a drama special on CBC; Rexy! won the Chalmers Award, the Dora Mavor Moore Award, and the Canadian Authors' Association Award.

David Pearce, Associate Professor of English, is giving a tutorial to a pretty co-ed who aspires to the lofty heights of poetical inspiration and romance. David is fending her off when the department chairman's wife barges in with plans to make her husband jealous by telling him she is having a torrid affair with David. David is shocked and worried about his tenure review. He is even more shocked when the chairman arrives, boiling, and finds his wife in one room and the love-smitten co-ed in another.