Best Selling Books by Don Gillmor

A Finalist for the 2026 Writers'' Trust Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing A journalist, and former roughneck, considers our long, complex, tortured relationship with oil. Oil has dominated our lives for the last century. It has given us warmth, progress, and life-threatening pollution. It has been a gift and is now a threat. It has started wars, ended wars, and infiltrated governments—in some cases, effectively become the government. And now oil''s enduring mythology is facing a messy, complicated twilight. In On Oil, Don Gillmor, who worked as a roughneck on oil rigs during the seventies oil boom in Alberta, looks at how the industry has changed over the decades and illustrates the ways our dependence on oil has led to regulatory capture, in Canada and elsewhere, and contributed to armed conflict and war across the world. Gillmor documents the myriad ways that oil companies have misdirected environmental action and misinformed the public about climate concerns and illuminates where we went wrong—and how we might yet change course.

An awesome adventure about a boy who makes time stop -- or so he thinks. Ten-year-old Tristan Burberry has endured many hours of unpleasantness lately. Time spent pinned under the disapproving gaze of his new teacher, time spent trudging through the mall after his older sister, and time spent sitting with the school bully on the bus. Tristan hates time. So he makes it stop. Or so he thinks... When the world comes to a confused standstill, Tristan thinks it''s his fault. In actual fact, time has stopped because the Time Keeper, who has been making time for centuries, has quit, fed up with people''s lack of appreciation. Then, unfortunately, the Time Keeper gets kidnapped by the nefarious Time Bandits. Tristan, along with his sister Bella, sets out on a long and complicated journey to find him, hoping to get time back. In the tradition of Roald Dahl, The Time Time Stopped is a funny and far-fetched adventure. With wonderful illustrations by Ashley Spires throughout, readers will love this whimsical look at one of the central preoccupations of our lives: time.

WINNER OF THE GOVERNOR GENERAL''S LITERARY AWARD FOR NON-FICTION An eloquent and haunting exploration of suicide in which one of Canada''s most gifted writers attempts to understand why his brother took his own life. Which leads him to another powerful question: Why are boomers killing themselves at a far greater rate than the Silent Generation before them or the generations that have followed? In the spring of 2006, Don Gillmor travelled to Whitehorse to reconstruct the last days of his brother, David, whose truck and cowboy hat were found at the edge of the Yukon River just outside of town the previous December. David''s family, his second wife, and his friends had different theories about his disappearance. Some thought David had run away; some thought he''d met with foul play; but most believed that David, a talented musician who at the age of 48 was about to give up the night life for a day job, had intentionally walked into the water. Just as Don was about to paddle the river looking for traces, David''s body was found, six months after he''d gone into the river. And Don''s canoe trip turned into an act of remembrance and mourning. At least David could now be laid to rest. But there was no rest for his survivors. As his brother writes, "When people die of suicide, one of the things they leave behind is suicide itself. It becomes a country. At first I was a visitor, but eventually I became a citizen." In this tender, probing, surprising work, Don Gillmor brings back news from that country for all of us who wonder why people kill themselves. And why, for the first time, it''s not the teenaged or the elderly who have the highest suicide rate, but the middle aged. Especially men.

The trouble with Justin is he''s messy. But finally he decides to clean up his room.

A brutal murder exposes secret real estate deals, a corrupt police force, and the dark heart of a city simmering with unrest. When two girls are found murdered in a rundown Toronto highrise, Jamieson Abel and his partner are first on the scene. Abel is a law school dropout turned police detective chronically at odds with his colleagues and perpetually on the brink of being terminated, and Davis is the department’s only female officer of colour. Both understand their being partnered as a form of banishment, but when the details of the murder go public at the start of an excruciatingly hot summer, they find themselves thrust into the centre of a front page investigation that will bring to a head the city’s long history of shady real estate deals and racist disenfranchisement. Intricately plotted and brilliantly layered, Cherry Beach is a gripping literary crime novel that examines class, race, and corruption in the most multicultural city in the world.

Longlisted for the 2023 Republic of Consciousness US and Canada Prize • An Oprah Daily Best Book of 2023 • One of the Globe and Mail''s Most Anticipated Titles of 2023 • Listed in CBC Books Fiction to Read in Fall 2023 • A 49th Shelf Fall Book To Put On Your List • One of the Globe 100''s Best Books of 2023 During the hottest summer on record, Bea''s dangerous new hobby puts everyone''s sense of security to the test. Forty-nine and sweating through the hottest summer on record, Beatrice Billings is rudderless: her marriage is stale, her son communicates solely through cryptic text messages, her mother has dementia, and she conducts endless arguments with her older sister in her head. Toronto feels like an inadequately air-conditioned museum of its former self, and the same could be said of her life. She dreams of the past, her days as a newlywed, a new mom, a new homeowner gutting the kitchen—now the only novel experience that looms is the threat of divorce. Everything changes when she googles "escape" and discovers the world of amateur lock-picking. Breaking into houses is thrilling: she’s subtle and discreet, never greedy, but as her curiosity about other people’s lives becomes a dangerous compulsion and the entire city feels a few degrees from boiling over, she realizes she must turn her guilty analysis on herself. A searingly insightful rendering of midlife among the anxieties of the early twenty-first century, Breaking and Entering is an exacting look at the fragility of all the things we take on faith.

Don Gillmor''s brilliant new novel, Long Change, examines the world of oil through the life and loves of one man; both stories are epic. Fleeing his violent, Pentecostal father, as well as a crime he committed in the parking lot of the first bar he ever entered, Ritt Devlin leaves Texas at fifteen, crossing the border into Alberta. Big for his age, he soon finds work on an oil rig on the outskirts of Medicine Hat. But that''s not the life he wants, and he saves up to study geology. By the time he''s in his early twenties he''s the head of his own oil company. Spanning almost seventy years, and following the geology and politics of oil from Texas to the Canadian oil patch, to Nigeria, Equatorial Guinea, Azerbaijan, various political capitals, and the Arctic, Long Change is divided into three parts, each of them framed by one of Ritt''s marriages. The first, to his great love, Oda, shows the beginnings of his company; that marriage is cut short when Oda dies of cancer while carrying their first child. His second wife is Deirdre, an elegant lawyer who helps Ritt expand Mackenzie Oil, but who needs more than business from her marriage. Then there is Alexa, a late middle age fling, a bad idea on both sides, in some ways as violent and delusional as the oil business. The vision that drives Ritt throughout his life is to drill in pristine Arctic waters, and he pulls it off. But then comes the inevitable disaster. Ritt, now in his eighties, is not the man he was in any sense of the word. As he staggers away from the scene of the disaster, through the Arctic night, we know the dream of oil and of his own company is also burning in the night...

At the age of eighty, Don Gillmor''s grandmother let slip the defining secret of her life: her twin sister Jean was not her twin, but her aunt, and her family had emigrated from Scotland to Winnipeg to escape the stigma of her illegitimacy. That revelation set Gillmor off on what seemed at first like the most personal of quests: to track down his ancestors. The Desire of Every Living Thing is also the story of the New World, the story of Winnipeg, the story of this country. Both an evocative family memoir and a brilliant feat of historical imagination, the book''s most moving theme is how the discarded past haunts and shapes our lives without us even noticing.

In middle age, debt has become the most significant relationship in Harry Salter''s life. He was born to wealthy parents in leafy and privileged Rosedale, at a time when the city was still defined by its WASP elite. But nothing in life has turned out the way Harry was led to expect. He''s unsure of his place in society, his marriage is crumbling, his son is bordering on estranged, and on top of it all his father is dying. As he sits at his father''s bedside, Harry inevitably daydreams about his inheritance. A couple of his father''s millions would rescue him from his ballooning debt--maybe even save his marriage. But when the will is read, all that''s left for Harry is $4200. Dale Salter''s money is gone. Out of desperation and disbelief, Harry starts to dig into what happened to the money. As he follows a trail strewn with family secrets and unsavory suspicions, he discovers not only that old money has lost its grip and new money taken on an ugly hue, but that his whole existence been cast into shadow by the weight of his expectations.

Herman Oof is a giant. Sarah is a girl. Herman needs 140 hamburgers and 200 glasses of milk for a snack. Sarah does not. Herman takes to swallowing up entire cities and continents and drinking up lakes and oceans. Sarah is not amused. Herman has eaten her dog. When the island of Japan is all that''s left of the world, Herman confesses that he might burst if he eats another bite. "You''d burst?" Sarah asks "Absolutely." Herman replies. An idea is born. Sarah realizes that it just might be possible to restore the world with a loud WHOOSH and only a few teeth marks as proof of what might have been. Pierre Pratt''s inventive illustrations are the perfect accompaniment to this entertaining warning about the dangers of global over-consumption.

Every great romance begins with Yuck, a Love Story. Austin''s life is perfect until Amy moves in next door. He doesn''t understand why a girl has to live beside him, or why girls have to live anywhere for that matter. Despite having no use for Amy, Austin seems to be strangely affected by every comment she makes and everything about her - right down to the bows on her shoes. Yuck, a Love Story will touch the heart of anyone who has survived that earth-shattering first crush, and is written with the wit and wisdom of one who has been to the moon and back. Marie-Louise Gay''s charming illustrations express a youthful innocence that matches the text perfectly.

The top non-fiction bestseller of fall 2000 was the authoritative and beautiful "Canada: A People''s History, Volume One. For fall 2001, M&S is proud to present the equally stunning and comprehensive second volume of this landmark work. This fall, on consecutive Sunday evenings starting on September 30, the CBC will broadcast eight new episodes from its spectacular - and spectacularly successful - series "Canada: A People''s History. Volume Two opens with the rebellion over property and language rights for the French-speaking Metis in Manitoba, led by the charismatic and troubled Louis Riel - a key event in our history and one that haunts us to this day. It closes with the less bloody but no less traumatic confrontation between the Mohawk and the army at Oka, Quebec, in 1990. Between these two harrowing events lie more than a hundred years of astonishing change and development in Canada. In those years Canadians have fought in two world wars, struggled through long, savage Depression years, adjusted to the post-war world, and peaceably accommodated themselves to wave after wave of immigrants arriving from around the globe. The political changes have been no less striking, with the eruption of nationalism in Quebec, women''s long fight for equal rights, and the creation of Canadians'' most cherished social service: universal health care. Even more than was possible in Volume One, this well-researched book tells the major events of the twentieth century as a story of people: the famous and occasionally flamboyant politicians and public figures are here, but the book''s strength lies in the stories of ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. The tremendous popularityand the impeccable historical accuracy of both the first year of the television series and the first volume of the book, surprised and delighted historians and reviewers alike. The second year of the series and the second volume of the book are both now poised to rocket to even greater success in 2001.

When Frederic Pipkin is born, his parents are sure he has musical talent, but it isn''t until after his unsuccessful lessons on various instruments that he finds his true calling.

The top non-fiction bestseller of fall 2000 was the authoritative and beautiful Canada: A People’s History, Volume One. For fall 2001, M&S is proud to present the equally stunning and comprehensive second volume of this landmark work. This fall, on consecutive Sunday evenings starting on September 30, the CBC will broadcast eight new episodes from its spectacular – and spectacularly successful – series Canada: A People’s History. Volume Two opens with the rebellion over property and language rights for the French-speaking Métis in Manitoba, led by the charismatic and troubled Louis Riel – a key event in our history and one that haunts us to this day. It closes with the less bloody but no less traumatic confrontation between the Mohawk and the army at Oka, Quebec, in 1990. Between these two harrowing events lie more than a hundred years of astonishing change and development in Canada. In those years Canadians have fought in two world wars, struggled through long, savage Depression years, adjusted to the post-war world, and peaceably accommodated themselves to wave after wave of immigrants arriving from around the globe. The political changes have been no less striking, with the eruption of nationalism in Quebec, women’s long fight for equal rights, and the creation of Canadians’ most cherished social service: universal health care. Even more than was possible in Volume One, this well-researched book tells the major events of the twentieth century as a story of people: the famous and occasionally flamboyant politicians and public figures are here, but the book’s strength lies in the stories of ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. The tremendous popularity and the impeccable historical accuracy of both the first year of the television series and the first volume of the book, surprised and delighted historians and reviewers alike. The second year of the series and the second volume of the book are both now poised to rocket to even greater success in 2001.

The unbelievable birth of the pharmaceutical industry When Harold "Carload" Ritchie died in 1933, Time magazine''s obituary noted that "he had good claim to the proud title of ''World''s Greatest Salesman.''" He was one of the richest men in Canada, and owned the largest sales network in the world. Yet little is known about him. He wasn''t part of the Canadian establishment, though the companies he came to own were more profitable than most of the country''s banks. He was born on Manitoulin Island, and in many ways, remaining on an island of his own making. Through Harold''s enigmatic life, we glimpse both the country in the first decades of the twentieth century, and the entertaining birth of the pharmaceutical industry.

Ivy does not like vegetables, but when she tries to hide her them in her pants pocket instead of eating them, disaster results.

Now an animated holiday special on Teletoon! Santa didn''t make many mistakes. But he made a big one when he asked what Anton Stingley wanted for Christmas. . . . . . Anton''s list was sixteen pages long. On Christmas morning, there was one thing under the Stingley''s tree. It was an orange. Anton was not pleased. He and his lawyer decided to sue Santa Claus. Everyone came. It was the trial of the century. But Santa Claus, alias Saint Nick, Kris Kringle, Father Christmas, Pere Noel - has a surprise up the sleeve of his old blue suit. Anton was stunned. What had he done? With the sparkle and snap of a holiday cracker, Don Gilmor and Marie-Louise Gay deliver The Christmas Orange, a witty, fun filled treat for all.

From the author of Canada: A People''s History comes a novel of Canada written in the tradition of such great epics as The Source and Sarum. Kanata was inspired by the life of David Thompson, a Welshman who came to the New World at the age of fifteen, and went on to become its greatest cartographer. He walked or paddled 80,000 miles and mapped 1.9 million square miles, cataloguing flora and fauna as well as the language and customs of the Natives. But though he has been described as the greatest land geographer who ever lived, he died impoverished and unknown. Following the lives of Thompson''s illegitimate son and his descendants, Kanata takes readers on a fictionalized, multi-generational journey through millennia and across a continent to examine the stories, myths, and legends of those who formed the country and who were formed by it. Kanata is the story of the invention of a nation.