Thinking-Training

The fashion business meets Kabbalah in Montreal’s garment district.In a novel that does for Chabanel Street what Mordecai Richler’s The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz did for St. Urbain Street, a 36-year-old Orthodox Jew, Gershon Stein, collects rent in a large industrial building in the heart of Montreal’s needletrade. Meanwhile, he struggles to reconcile his relationship with his ailing Holocaust-survivor father, find balance in his family life, and match wits with his arch-nemesis, Joey Putkin, an Israeli leather coat manufacturer leasing the basement of his building.Gershon’s days are occupied by an array of colourful tenants: Arnie Free, who makes footwear for Hasidic Jews and strippers; Sonny Lipsey, whose shtick is giving industry characters the perfect nicknames; and the delicate Michelle Labelle, whose face seems to emit a mysterious light. If there is one thing Gershon knows, it’s that life is rented and everyone has a debt to pay: to their landlord, their family, their community, and, most of all, to their soul.

Seven-year-old Chellamuthu's life--and his destiny--is forever changed when he is kidnapped from his village in Southern India and sold to the Lincoln Home for Homeless Children. His family is desperate to find him, and Chellamuthu anxiously tells th

You are so young. You may wonder what an old man like me could teach? I wonder as well. I certainly don't claim to know all the answers. I'm barely figuring out the questions....Life has a strange way of repeating itself and I want my experience to help you. I want to make a difference. My hope is that you'll consider my words and remember my heart. Harry Whitney is dying. And in the process, he's losing his mind. Afflicted with Alzheimer's disease, he knows his "good" time is dwindling. Wishing to be remembered as more than an ailing old man, Harry realizes the greatest gift he can pass on is the wisdom of his years, the jumbled mix of experiences and emotions that add up to a life. And so he compiles a book of his poems for his favorite granddaughter, Emily, in the hope that his words might somehow heal the tenuous relationships in a family that is falling apart. But Harry's poems contain much more than meets the eye....As Emily and her family discover, intricate messages are hidden in them, clues and riddles that lead to an extraordinary cache of letters, and even a promise of hidden gold. Are they the ramblings of a man losing touch with reality? Or has Harry given them a gift more valuable than any of them could have guessed? As Harry's secrets are uncovered one by one, his family learns about romance, compassion, and hope -- and together they set out to search for something priceless, a shining prize to treasure forever. They may grow closer in spirit or be torn apart by greed...but their lives will be undeniably altered by Harry's words in his letters for Emily.

Sang Ly struggles to survive by picking through garbage in Cambodia's largest municipal dump. Under threat of eviction by an embittered old drunk who is charged with collecting rents from the poor of Stung Meanchey, Sang Ly embarks on a desperate journey to save her ailing son from a life of ignorance and poverty.

A Fine Balance, Rohinton Mistry’s stunning internationally acclaimed bestseller, is set in mid-1970s India. It tells the story of four unlikely people whose lives come together during a time of political turmoil soon after the government declares a “State of Internal Emergency.” Through days of bleakness and hope, their circumstances – and their fates – become inextricably linked in ways no one could have foreseen. Mistry’s prose is alive with enduring images and a cast of unforgettable characters. Written with compassion, humour, and insight, A Fine Balance is a vivid, richly textured, and powerful novel written by one of the most gifted writers of our time.

A heart-wrenching novel in verse about a poor girl surviving the Irish Land Wars, by a two-time Newbery Honor-winning author. For Anna, the family farm has always been home... But now, things are changing. Anna's mother has died, and her older siblings have emigrated, leaving Anna and her father to care for a young sister with special needs. And though their family has worked this land for years, they're in danger of losing it as poor crop yields leave them without money to pay their rent. When a violent encounter with the Lord's rent collector results in Anna and her father's arrest, all seems lost. But Anna sees her chance and bolts from the jailhouse. On the run, Anna must rely on her own inner strength to protect her sister--and try to find a way to save her family. Written in verse, A Slip of a Girl is a poignant story of adversity, resilience, and self-determination by a master of historical fiction, painting a haunting history of the tensions in the Irish countryside of the early 1890s, and the aftermath of the Great Famine. A Junior Library Guild Selection A Bank Street Best Book of the Year

Mort Halbman is the prime suspect in an arson investigation when his family home burns down, and he feels compelled to continually return to the ruins and to the memories the place still holds for him. Haunted by the memories of his former home and life, Mort Halbman risks everything in a daring attempt at a last shot at redemption. Halbman is a crotchety, divorced, 65-year-old garment manufacturer, who laments losing the one true love of his life, the Montreal Expos. Now the dream home he built in the late 1960s in the exclusive Montreal suburb of Hampstead, where he lived with his family for 20 years, has burned down under mysterious circumstances, andMort finds himself the prime suspect in an arson investigation. Meanwhile, his estranged gay son, Jacob, has announced that he’s getting married and wants Mort to participate in the rabbi-officiated same-sex ceremony along with his ex-wife, Mona, and her insufferable boyfriend, Gordon, Canada’s book reviewer extraordinaire. It’s the last thing Mort wants to do. He feels compelled to continually return in his Jaguar to the burned-out ruin of his former home, and to the memories the place still holds for him. With pathos and humour, Halbman Steals Home tells the story of Mort’s daring attempt to risk everything for a last shot at redemption.

The new novel from the author of Guantanamo Boy. In Cairo, fifteen-year-old Aaron makes a living out of gathering garbage - as a member of the despised Zabbaleen, this is his fate. But Aaron has dreams. Every day he dreams of Rachel, who looks after the ponies who pull the carts piled high with garbage to and from the slum they call home. He dreams that they will make a life together, far from the smells, cruelty and squalor of their daily existence. Aaron's skill at sorting glass is the only thing that keeps him alive. His mother is dead, and his stepfather and stepbrother Elijah subject him to an endless regime of bullying and abuse. He is stuck with them - where else would he go? Shareen, the local beauty, is at once a source of excitement and torment to him. And always there is Rachel - serene, and seemingly untouchable. When Aaron steals some goods from a shop, bringing shame to his family, he is forced to work for the medical wasters - the lowest of the low, who risk their lives sorting through the piles of rubbish from the hospitals.Just as it seems he can sink no further, Aaron makes a choice that will change his life. And when Rachel looks at him in a new light, there may be hope for him, after all. '...has all the elements of a great story', writes the Sun Herald. Reviewed in the Saturday Age.

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