Tilt by Alan Cumyn
Summary: Sixteen year-old Stan has a complicated home life. His parents are divorced and his mom often goes out at night to see her boyfriend. His little sister, Lily, is precocious, often making up stories to get attention. Stan is the stable one in the family, doing his best to make things easier on his mother and taking care of Lily. As a teenage boy though, Stan has dreams of his own. He’s worked all summer long to make the Junior Varsity basketball team, and has fallen for Janine Igwash, a girl others at school call ’tilted’ because they think she is into girls. When...
Read MoreHey Dad! by Brian Doyle
Summary: Thirteen year-old Megan is less than enthusiastic about her upcoming cross-Canada family road trip. Stuck in the backseat of a car with her younger brother and experiencing humiliation after humiliation when it comes to her father’s actions, Meghan starts planning her escape. When an opportunity presents itself she takes it, but the consequences of her decision cause her to see her father in a different way. Gradually Megan begins to realise that she won’t have her father forever, and his birthday celebration makes her determined to appreciate what she has. Number of...
Read MoreBoy O’Boy by Brian Doyle
Summary: Martin O’Boy lives in a distracted family. With a twin named Phil who has emotional and physical problems, a pregnant mother and a father who throws tantrums on a regular basis, the most reliable family member Martin has is his cat, Cheap. Paid to be in the boys choir at church, Martin and his friend Billy encounter a man named Mr. George who appears to be their friend but has more sinister intentions. After Martin has a traumatic encounter with Mr. George and his family is oblivious, Martin turns to others for help to stop the same thing from happening to his friend Billy....
Read MoreUp to Low by Brian Doyle
Summary: Young Tommy hasn’t been to his family cabin since his mother died two years before. Living now with his father and his Aunt Dottie, a woman with a serious germ-phobia, Young Tommy is looking forward to going back to the cabin, hoping he’ll run into Baby Bridget, the girl next door he cares for. Getting to the cabin means taking his life in his hands at times as he travels with his father and his father’s friend Frank, a notorious drunk who drives anyway. All along their journey the news is that Mean Hughie, Baby Bridget’s father, is dying of cancer, and when...
Read MoreGood for Nothing by Michel Noel
Summary: Fifteen year-old Nipishish comes home to life on the reserve from residential school with a lot of anger. Unsure of his place and his future, he is directed by the Canadian government to attend high school in another town and live with a foster family, but while the abuse has ended, Nipishish continually comes up against blatant racism. Caught between the world of the white man and the world of the Natives as a Métis, Nipishish has to work twice as hard to figure out who he is and how he fits in. A mystery involving his father’s death helps him clarify his own identity, and...
Read MoreAbout Amy
Amy Mathers has been passionate about reading from a very young age, and hopes others will share her enthusiasm for funding a teen book award. Read more Follow Amy
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