Dear Canada: A Prairie as Wide as the Sea


Book Description

Ivy Weatherall is just 11 years old when her family leaves England for the promised riches of Canada's expanding West. They've come to join her uncle for the available land, the lush harvests, and the opportunity for success. But in Milorie, Saskatchewan, their dreams crumble into dust when they reach Uncle Alf's small sod hut and discover that jobs are scarce, and that they can barely make ends meet. Ivy's relatives pack up and head back to England, but to Ivy, Canada is full of wonder and beginning to feel like home. There are challenges in her new life, but Ivy's feisty character and her sense of wonder for a prairie as wide as the sea make her adventure one that readers won't easily forget. Vetted by a historical expert, this book contains maps, period illustrations/documents, and an extensive historical note.




Brothers Far from Home


Book Description

With more than 200,000 books in print, Dear Canada has fast become the historical fiction series for young girls. It has been two long years since Eliza's beloved older brother, Hugo, went away to war. Caught up in his enthusiasm, she couldn't understand her parent's less-than enthusiastic reaction. Now that her other brother Jack has also enlisted, she yearns for the safe return of both brothers. If only she had a friend that she could talk to about her feelings....




Dear Canada: A Season for Miracles


Book Description

Twelve original holiday stories from the top children's writers in the country! What an incredible gift book for Dear Canada fans! The twelve stories in this treasury are set around Christmas time and feature the young girls from a dozen previous Dear Canada books. Readers will be thrilled to reconnect with their favourites and get a glimpse of each character's life a year or so after the events in the actual diary are over. Anyone new to the Dear Canada series will be introduced to characters so compelling, they'll want to read more.




Exiles from the War


Book Description

When a frightened girl and boy arrive on the Twiss family's doorstep to escape the Blitz, Charlotte wonders how she will keep her war guests from missing their parents back home, or from cowering every time a plane flies overhead. Though the war is being waged across the Atlantic, Charlotte begins to feel its danger, as her brother George defies their parents and enlists in the Navy. After months of receiving letters from overseas, suddenly there is no word from him -- has the unthinkable happened and George's ship been sunk by a German submarine? Charlotte Twiss's diary shows her innermost feelings about her life on the Canadian homefront, as she helps her war guests "settle in" and wonders whether her brother is safe from harm.




That Fatal Night


Book Description

In the aftermath of the Titanic disaster, a young girl must come to terms with haunting memories from the voyage. It is May 1912, one month after the horrific sinking of the Titanic, and twelve-year-old survivor Dorothy Wilton is sent home from school in disgrace when she strikes another student. Although she's expelled, her sympathetic teacher encourages Dorothy to write an account of her experience on the ship, with the hopes that it will help Dorothy come to terms with her trauma. And so begins a truly remarkable story, which reads like a time capsule of the era: Dorothy writes about visiting her bohemian grandparents in England before setting sail back home, the luxurious rooms and cabins on board, a new friend she makes, and the intriguing people they observe. However, amidst all of this storytelling, a shadow lurks, a secret Dorothy is too traumatized to acknowledge -- a secret about her own actions on that fatal night, which may have had deadly consequences. Through young Dorothy's eyes, award-winning writer Sarah Ellis expertly takes a unique perspective on the Titanic tragedy, exploring the concept of survivor's guilt with devastating honesty.




Orphan at My Door


Book Description

Through the diary of 10-year-old Victoria Cope, we learn about the arrival of ragged Mary Anna, one of the thousands of impoverished British children who were sent to Canada at the beginning of the century. Mary Anna joins the Cope family as a servant and is treated well, but she has to cope with the initial apprehension of the family members and the loss of her brother, Jasper, who was placed with another family. Victoria vows to help Mary Anna find her brother, so they can be a family once again.




Turned Away


Book Description

This dramatic story tells of 11-year-old Devorah's efforts to help her cousin and pen pal Sarah emigrate from Paris before the Nazis deport the Jews to internment camps. Devorah learns that 5,000 Jewish children in France have visas to leave the country, but the Canadian government will not let them in, leading Devorah to desperately lobby the government to change its policies. Turned Away illustrates the restrictions on the life of Jews in Paris via letters from Sarah who is living in German-occupied France. It also reveals Canada's dismal record on Jewish immigration during World War II and depicts the impact of the war in Canada. In Winnipeg, one intriguing response to the war was "If Day," when local people posed as Nazis and staged a mock invasion to illustrate what it would be like if the city was occupied. Also included are fascinating period documents and photographs, many from the Holocaust Memorial Museum. The historical consultants for Turned Away were Dr. Irving Abella, co-author of the ground-breaking book None is Too Many, and Terry Copp, author of the remarkable book No Price Too High.




Whispers of War


Book Description

In the summer of 1812, as rumours of a looming war become a reality, Susanna, her mother and sister are surviving as best they can while the men are fighting. As news of various battles reaches them, Susanna becomes even more concerned for the safety and well-being of her beloved brother and father. She is also torn between the loyalties of her best friend and her mother -- both Americans living in Upper Canada -- and her father's and brother's allegiance to General Brock and the King. But the night of the Battle of Queenston Heights, Susanna's main concern is for survival.




Across the Wide and Lonesome Prairie


Book Description

In her diary, thirteen-year-old Hattie chronicles her family's arduous 1847 journey from Missouri to Oregon on the Oregon Trail.




Seeds of Hope


Book Description

A diary account of 14-year-old Susanna Fairchild's life in 1849, when her father succumbs to gold fever on the way to establish his medical practice in Oregon after losing his wife and money on their steamship journey from New York. Includes an historical note. Originally published with Scholastic's Dear America series, "Seeds of Hope" shares characters from "Across the Wide and Lonesome Prairie: The Oregon Trail Diary of Hattie Campbell, 1847."