19 books you heard about on CBC Radio recently
Check out some of the books discussed on national CBC Radio programs between July 2-9.
The Age of Insecurity by Astra Taylor
Heard on: Ideas
In The Age of Insecurity, filmmaker and organizer Astra Taylor explores the pervasive insecurity in our current reality and how the institutions that promise to make us more secure actually contribute to this feeling. Throughout the book, Taylor argues that embracing this vulnerability is the key to more caring, sustainable notions of security.
Taylor was born in Winnipeg and currently lives in New York. Her other books include The People's Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age and Remake the World: Essays, Reflections, Rebellions.
Recipes for Murder by Karen Pierce
Heard on: The Next Chapter
The famed mystery writer Agatha Christie is often revered for her storytelling, but far less studied is her character's taste for culinary exploration. Canadian superfan Karen Pierce set out to uncover the late author's hidden recipes in Recipes for Murder: 66 Dishes That Celebrate the Mysteries of Agatha Christie.
Pierce is a Toronto writer, food lover and fan of all things mystery. As a devoted reader of Christie since childhood, Pierce noticed a lack of writing around the food mentioned in Christie's novels.
Wild Love by Elsie Silver
Heard on: The Next Chapter
Wild Love is the first book in the Rose Hill series, which is about a group of single dads finding love. Billionaire Ford Grant has returned to the small town of Rose Hill, B.C., to build his dream recording studio, make music with artists he loves and live a quiet life. When he runs into his best friend's sassy little sister Rosie, however, their fiery rapport picks up where it left off.
Rosie is reluctantly back in town living at home after her life in the city implodes. Ford hires her to help him set up the studio — and then a bombshell drops. A surprise 12-year old daughter named Cora turns up on Ford's doorstep needing his help. Between trying to dodge his chemistry with Rosie and learning to parent a preteen, Ford's dream of a quiet life is disappearing. Or is it evolving into a new one?
Elsie Silver is a B.C.-based writer of steamy romance novels. Her other books include the Gold Rush Ranch and Chestnut Springs series.
The Dixon Rule by Elle Kennedy
Heard on: The Next Chapter
Diana Dixon is a busy woman with her ballroom dance competition, varsity cheerleading team and two jobs too many. When hockey player Shane Lindley moves into her apartment building, he seems intent on sleeping with her teammates and she intends to shut him down. However, Shane isn't a player at heart. His longtime girlfriend broke up with him and he's done with rebounds.
When his ex reenters the picture, he cooks up a fake dating plan to make her jealous and Diana, dealing with ex issues of her own, finds herself agreeing to help. What started out as fake starts to feel very real.
Elle Kennedy, queen of campus romance, has been on most if not all of the major bestseller lists in North America. She recently announced that her 2023 romance, Girl Abroad, will be adapted into a TV series by Chris Van Dusen, the creator of Bridgerton. Her newest series is called Campus Diaries — the second instalment The Dixon Rule, hit the Globe and Toronto Star bestseller lists in May. She is currently based in Toronto.
Collide by Bal Khabra
Heard on: The Next Chapter
Romance lover and author Bal Khabra decided to write her own and self-published Collide in 2023. It went viral on TikTok, Khabra signed a three-book deal and her debut was re-released in May. It landed on Canadian and international bestseller lists and will eventually be published in seven languages. How's that for a homegrown success story?
Aspiring sports psychologist Summer Preston hates hockey, but when her thesis advisor gives her a research project, she's forced to work with the charming and confident team captain, Aiden Crawford. Summer's a no-fun type A with big goals and capital 'P' plans — and Aiden's a laissez-faire jock who takes nothing seriously.
Could their assumptions about one another be wrong? Once their fighting turns flirtatious, they must face the fact that they were wrong about how right they are for each other.
Khabra is a Canadian writer, romance enthusiast and book lover currently based in British Columbia.
Earls Trip by Jenny Holiday
Heard on: The Next Chapter
Archibald Fielding-Burton, the Earl of Harcourt, takes an annual boys' trip with his best friends, Simon and Effie. It's the highlight of their year. When Archie is asked to rescue an old family friend from a scandal, he's surprised to see how much Clementine Morgan has grown. And how well.
She's smart and beautiful and against marriage, determined to be a happy spinster. With Clem and her sister Olivia joining the gentlemen on their trip, how will Archie and his pals live it up, earl-style? Then Clem shocks Archie with a proposal to teach her the ways of the marriage bed — without getting married.
Holiday is an American writer currently based in London, Ont.
Love, Lies and Cherry Pie by Jackie Lau
Heard on: The Next Chapter
Thirty-something Toronto novelist and barista Emily Hung's four sisters are married with thriving careers, and her mother is obsessed with Emily finding a husband. Enter Mark Chan, a sweater-vest wearing engineer her mother hand picked herself.
When Emily and Mark meet, she's not interested, but to get her mother off of her back, Emily suggests they pretend they've started dating. Mark, intrigued, agrees. Once her mother questions the truth, they begin "fake" dating for real, getting to know one another. Did Emily's mother actually get it right?
Jackie Lau is a Toronto-based author of over a dozen romantic comedies, including Donut Fall in Love and the Holidays with the Wongs series.She went to school for engineering and worked as a geophysicist before writing romance novels.
The Takedown by Lily Chu
Heard on: The Next Chapter
Dee Kwan is having a rough few months. She lost her dream job as a diversity consultant, and her parents and cranky invalid grandmother have moved into her home. She finds fun playing an online game, where the teasing rivalry she has with another player keeps her on her toes. When they meet IRL, he's unexpectedly handsome.
Dee lands a new job at Celeste, a luxury fashion house desperately in need of diversity training. She meets the CEO's son Teddy Marsh — surprise, he's her online game rival turned crush! And his dad isn't interested in changing the toxic culture at Celeste. When Dee and Teddy band together to takedown his father, things get very complicated in business and love.
Lily Chu writes romantic comedies set in Toronto with strong Asian characters. Chu's debut romance novel was The Stand-In. She is also the author of The Comeback.
The Catch by Amy Lea
Heard on: The Next Chapter
The final novel in Lea's Influencer trilogy, The Catch stars fashion influencer Melanie Karlsen whose influence is in need of a power boost. She jumps at the chance to collaborate with a quaint B&B in a small Nova Scotia seaside town — it's fresh content for her American audience.
The owner, burly and surly lobster fisherman Evan Whaler, is not a fan of influencers, but when he's in a boating accident she's mistaken for his fiancee. The pair agree to fake their engagement for one week to help his family's B and B and her social media status.
Amy Lea is an Ottawa-based contemporary romance writer and Canadian bureaucrat. Her previous novels include Woke Up Like This, which was on the Canada Reads 2024 longlist, Exes and O's and Set on You.
Rules for Second Chances by Maggie North
Heard on: The Next Chapter
Liz Lewis and her husband, popular adventure guide Tobin Renner-Lewis, are not in a good place. Her introverted personality never fit into the world of wilderness expeditions and she feels invisible next to Tobin's outsized charm. When things with Tobin deteriorate and then she's mistaken for a server at her own 30th birthday party, Liz decides to shake things up with improv classes.
For an introvert, it's going terribly until she accepts help from natural comedian Tobin, who's determined to save their marriage. As Liz rediscovers what she loved about him in the first place, she also discovers some truths about herself that may change everything.
Maggie North is a writer of romantic comedy currently based in Ottawa, Ont. Rules for Second Chances is her debut novel.
Just Playing House by Farah Heron
Heard on: The Next Chapter
When fashion stylist Marley Kamal gets the opportunity of her career — to be a personal shopper for a rising movie star — she's overjoyed until she finds out he's the prom date who ghosted her after sleeping together. Adding to this awkward dilemma is the fact that she's about to undergo an elective double mastectomy and breast reduction.
Actor Nikhil Shamdasani needs a stylist to boost his image and he wants Marley. He offers to move in and help take care of Marley during her recovery. The pair slowly find their way back to each other as she lets Nik into her home and life.
Farah Heron is a writer from Toronto. She is also the author of the romantic comedies The Chai Factor, Accidentally Engaged, Kamila Knows Best and the YA novel Tahira in Bloom.
Fall With Me by Becka Mack
Heard on: The Next Chapter
Becka Mack's series about fictional NHL team the Vancouver Vipers is peak hockey romance. Fall With Me is the fourth book in the series, featuring badboy defensive player Jaxon Riley, who doesn't need a relationship as long as he has his cat, Mittens. Jaxon is a fighter on the ice and a playboy in the streets.
When he meets photographer Lennon Hayes on her honeymoon alone, their chemistry is explosive. What was supposed to be another one-night stand for him and a quickie rebound with a stranger for her gets complicated when Lennon accepts a job as the Vipers' new team photographer. Various circumstances lead to her becoming Jaxon's roommate and surrogate mom to Mittens. Will these two hurt people heal and fall in love?
Mack is an Ontario-based writer of hockey romance novels. The other books in the Playing for Keeps series are Consider Me, Play with Me and Unravel Me.
Big Mall by Kate Black
Heard on: The Next Chapter
In Big Mall, Kate Black examines the history of shopping and its place in capitalist structure. As places of pleasure, memory and pain, she pays particular attention to West Edmonton Mall — North America's largest mall where she spent a lot of time growing up.
Kate Black is a Vancouver-based writer whose essays have been published in Maisonneuve, The Walrus and The Globe and Mail. She was named one of Canada's top emerging voices in nonfiction by the 2020 National Magazine Awards and RBC Taylor Prize.
Sisters of the Spruce by Leslie Shimotakahara
Heard on: The Next Chapter
Toronto-based writer Leslie Shimotakahara drew inspiration from her ancestors' stories while creating her most recent novel, Sisters of the Spruce. The book is a thrilling story of female friendship, adventure and resilience in World War 1 era Haida Gwaii.
Leslie Shimotakahara is an award-winning author based in Toronto. Her other books include After the Bloom and Red Oblivion.
All the Things I Lost in the Flood by Laurie Anderson
Heard on: Writers and Company
Iconic artist and performer Laurie Anderson takes readers on an intimate tour of her life and career in her 2018 book, All the Things I Lost in the Flood. Along with an acclaimed new album, Landfall — a collaboration with the Kronos Quartet — the book was inspired by the devastation of Hurricane Sandy in 2012, which destroyed Anderson's archive of work and memorabilia.
Anderson is renowned for creating daring, innovative productions across the media landscape. She launched to fame with her hit single O Superman in 1980. Her virtual reality show Chalkroom was awarded Best VR Experience at the 2017 Venice International Film Festival, and her 2015 film Heart of a Dog — a reflection on the deaths of her mother, her dog and implicitly, her husband Lou Reed — was an award-winner in Venice, among other festivals.
And, Finally: Matters of Life and Death by Henry Marsh
Heard on: White Coat Black Art
British neurosurgeon Henry Marsh confronted aging and his own mortality following his diagnosis of advanced prostate cancer. But he also found sources of hope, which he calls the "most precious drug."
Marsh, 73, reflects on his successful medical career, much of it at St George's Hospital in London, in his 2022 book, And, Finally: Matters of Life and Death. Currently in remission, Marsh chronicles the effects of hormone therapy and the difficulty of accepting aging, which can bring loss of autonomy and dignity.
Henry Marsh is a British neurosurgeon and author, a pioneer of awake craniotomy techniques and of neurosurgical work in Ukraine.
All Our Relations by Tanya Talaga
Heard on: Ideas
In her 2018 CBC Massey Lectures series, titled All Our Relations: Finding the Path Forward, prize-winning journalist Tanya Talaga (author of Seven Fallen Feathers) explores the legacy of cultural genocide against Indigenous peoples.
For Talaga, that cultural genocide has led to a forced disconnection from land and language by Indigenous peoples. The need now, she says, is for Indigenous self-determination in social, cultural and political arenas.
Tanya Talaga is an investigative journalist. She authored Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death and Hard Truths in a Northern City in 2017, a nonfiction study of a community in northern Ontario trying to understand a series of Indigenous student deaths. The book won the 2018 RBC Taylor Prize. It also appeared on the Canada Reads 2018 longlist.
All the Worst Humans by Phil Elwood
Heard on: The Sunday Magazine
Phil Elwood is a veteran public relations operative in Washington, D.C., whose client list through the years has included dictators like Moammar Gadhafi of Libya and Syria's Bashar al-Assad. Elwood made a career out of working to get good press for international pariahs has made for an interesting, if morally-compromised career. Now he wants news consumers to better understand how stories are spun, and he's penned a memoir about it all called All the Worst Humans.
Carley Fortune is a Toronto-based journalist who has worked as an editor for Refinery29, The Globe and Mail, Chatelaine and Toronto Life. Her second book, Meet Me at the Lake was a contender for Canada Reads 2024, when it was championed by Mirian Njoh.
The Wendy Award by Walter Scott
Heard on: Q with Tom Power
In the Wendy series, Mohawk artist Walter Scott follows the character's journey as a comic book artist who must contend with both the art world and her personal life. Scott's latest installment in the series, The Wendy Award, follows Wendy struggling with imposter syndrome after receiving a nomination for the prestigious National FoodHut Contemporary Art Prize.
The previous books in the series are Wendy, Master of Art, Wendy and Wendy's Revenge.
Walter Scott is a Mohawk artist based in Toronto. Scott has published two other Wendy books, including Wendy's Revenge, and has appeared in The New Yorker and the Best American Comics anthology.
