Category: Canadian books

Making Bombs for Hitler

In this companion book to the award-winning Stolen Child, a young girl is forced into slave labour in a munitions factory in Nazi Germany. In Stolen Child, Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch introduced readers to Larissa, a victim of Hitler’s largely unknown Lebensborn program. In this companion novel, readers will learn the fate of Lida, her sister, who was also kidnapped by the Germans and forced into slave labour — an Ostarbeiter.

In addition to her other tasks, Lida’s small hands make her the perfect candidate to handle delicate munitions work, so she is sent to a factory that makes bombs. The gruelling work and conditions leave her severely malnourished and emotionally traumatized, but overriding all of this is her concern and determination to find out what happened to her vulnerable younger sister.

With rumours of the Allies turning the tide in the war, Lida and her friends conspire to sabotage the bombs to help block the Nazis’ war effort. When her work camp is finally liberated, she is able to begin her search to learn the fate of her sister.
In this exceptional novel Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch delivers a powerful story of hope and courage in the face of incredible odds.
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Adrift at Sea: A Vietnamese Boy’s Story of Survival

AdriftAtSea_website
The first picture book to recount the dramatic true story of a refugee family’s perilous escape from Vietnam

It is 1981. In the middle of the Pacific Ocean, a fishing boat overloaded with 60 Vietnamese refugees drifts. The motor has failed; the hull is leaking; the drinking water is nearly gone. This is the dramatic true story recounted by Tuan Ho, who was six years old when he, his mother, and two sisters dodged the bullets of Vietnam’s military police for the perilous chance of boarding that boat. Told to multi-award-winning author Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch and illustrated by the celebrated Brian Deines, Tuan’s story has become Adrift At Sea, the first picture book to describe the flight of Vietnam’s “Boat People” refugees. Illustrated with sweeping oil paintings and complete with an expansive historical and biographical section with photographs, this non-fiction picture book is all the more important as the world responds to a new generation of refugees risking all on the open water for the chance at safety and a new life. Continue reading “Adrift at Sea: A Vietnamese Boy’s Story of Survival”

Dance of the Banished

Based on true events, a compelling story of love and hope published on the 100th anniversary of World War I.

Ali and his fiancée Zeynep dream about leaving their home in Anatolia and building a new life together in Canada. But their homeland is controlled by the Turkish government, which is on the brink of war with Britain and Russia. And although Ali finds passage to Canada to work, he is forced to leave Zeynep behind until he can earn enough to bring her out to join him.

When the First World War breaks out and Canada joins Britain, Ali is declared an enemy alien. Unable to convince his captors that he is a refugee from an oppressive regime, he is thrown in an internment camp where he must count himself lucky to have a roof over his head and food to eat.

Meanwhile, Zeynep is a horrified witness to the suffering of her Christian Armenian neighbours under the Young Turk revolutionary forces. Caught in a country that is destroying its own people, she is determined to save a precious few. But if her plan succeeds, will Zeynep still find a way to cross the ocean to search out Ali? And if she does, will he still be waiting for her?
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One Step At A Time: A Vietnamese Child Finds Her Way

One Step At A Time
One Step At A Time

Tuyet has found a loving family at last. Life in a strange new country presents many challenges for the young refugee, but she is determined to overcome them all, including the surgeries that will one day allow her to walk on her own in shoes that match.

Tuyet cannot believe her good fortune. Brought up in a Vietnamese orphanage and rescued from the invading North Vietnamese army, she has been adopted by a kind and loving family in Canada. Tuyet feels safe at last as she adjusts to a new language and unfamiliar customs. But polio has left her with a weak leg, and her foot is turned inward, making walking painful and difficult. There is only one answer; she must have a series of operations. Her dread of doctors and hospitals brings back troubling memories of helicopters, a field hospital, and another operation in Vietnam. It won’t stop Tuyet, despite her fears and her overwhelming shyness. She has always dreamed of having two straight legs, of walking and running, of playing with other children, of owning a pair of shoes that actually match. Now that she has been given a chance, Tuyet is determined to do what it takes to finally stand on her own two feet.In this sequel to Last Airlift: A Vietnamese Orphan’s Rescue from War, Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch continues Tuyet’s heart-wrenching true story of courage, family, and hope.
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Last Airlift: A Vietnamese Child’s Rescue From War

airliftcovernew1Last Airlift is the true story of the last Canadian airlift operation that left Saigon and arrived in Toronto on April 13, 1975. Son Thi Anh Tuyet was one of 57 babies and children on that flight. Based on personal interviews and enhanced with archive photos,Tuyet’s story of the Saigon orphanage and her flight to Canada is an emotional and suspenseful journey brought to life by the award-winning children’s author, Marsha Skrypuch.

Like the other children in the Saigon orphanage, Tuyet dreams of a family of her own. But she is one of the oldest, and polio has weakened her and left her with a limp. Nobody will adopt a girl like her. Instead, Tuyet cares for the babies and toddlers, hoping that if she continues to make herself useful, the nuns will let her stay.

One day in April, the babies and toddlers are packed into small boxes and frantically loaded into a van.The driver places Tuyet in the back of the van as well. As she and the younger children are taxied to the airport through streets filled with smoke, artillery fire and frenzied refugees trying to escape, Tuyet believes that her job is to look after the babies until they are airlifted to safety. But when the huge Hercules C-130 takes off from the burning city, Tuyet is not left behind after all. What will happen to her when she arrives in Canada? Will she be sent to an orphanage to look after new children, or will the people return her to Saigon to take her chances with the North’s invading forces?
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Unbound: Canadian Ukrainian Writing Home

Unbound
Unbound

What does it mean to be Ukrainian in contemporary Canada? The Ukrainian Canadian writers in Unbound challenge the conventions of genre – memoir, fiction, poetry, biography, essay – and the boundaries that separate ethnic and authorial identities and fictional and non-fictional narratives. These intersections become the sites of new, thought-provoking and poignant creative writing by some of Canada’s best-known Ukrainian Canadian authors.

To complement the creative writing, editors Lisa Grekul and Lindy Ledohowski offer an overview of the history of Ukrainian settlement in Canada and an extensive bibliography of Ukrainian Canadian literature in English. Unbound is the first such exploration of Ukrainian Canadian literature and a book that should be on the shelves of Canadian literature fans and those interested in the study of ethnic, postcolonial, and diasporic literature.

The Best Gifts

The Best Gifts is the story of Sara and the important moments in her life. It starts with her birth and concludes when she welcomes her own baby. On each occasion, friends and family bring gifts to celebrate. In the end, though, the most cherished gifts are the ones that cannot be purchased. The first cherished gift Sara receives is her mother’s milk and the story comes full circle when she gives that same gift to her own baby.

Originally published in 1998, The Best Gifts has been fully revised, with all-new illustrations and updated breastfeeding resource information.

The Best Gifts has been a cherished baby book for fifteen years. This fully revised new edition with breathtakingly beautiful illustrations by Elly MacKay is sure to be cherished for generations to come.
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When Mama Goes to Work

When Mama Goes To Work
When Mama Goes To Work

When Mama Goes to Work follows several children and their working mothers as they move through their day. From morning to night, through the daily activities of work and play, children and parents keep each other in their thoughts even when they are apart.

Both children and parents will relate to the routine of work and play in When Mama Goes to Work. Secure in the knowledge that their mothers will return at the end of the day, confident children enjoy themselves and concentrate on learning and play while looking forward to being reunited with their mothers, when they will discuss their day, help with dinner, and other evening routines.
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Prisoners in the Promised Land

The heart-wrenching story of one girl’s experience at a Ukrainian internment camp in Quebec during World War I.

Anya’s family emigrates from Ukraine hoping for a fresh start and a new life in Canada. Soon after they cram into a tiny apartment in Montreal, WWI is declared. Because their district of Ukraine was annexed by Austria — now at war with the Commonwealth — many Ukrainians in Canada are declared “enemy aliens” and sent to internment camps. Anya and her family are shipped off to the Spirit Lake Internment Camp, in the remote wilderness of northern Quebec. Though conditions are brutal, at least Anya is at a camp that houses entire families together, and even in this barbed-wire world, she is able to make new friends and bring some happiness to the people around her.

Author Marsha Skrypuch, whose own grandfather was interned during WWI at  Jasper Internment Camp in Alberta, travelled to Spirit Lake during her research for the book. “When we got to the cemetery, I was overwhelmed with emotion. Imagine seeing a series of crosses, all grown over with brush and abandoned, and knowing that the real person you based a character on had a little sister buried there? That real little girl was Mary Manko. She was only six years old when she and her family were taken from their Montreal home and set to Spirit Lake Internment Camp. Her two-year old sister Carolka died at the camp. Mary Manko is in her nineties now and is the last known survivor of the Ukrainian internment operations.” explains Skrypuch.
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Call Me Aram

Call Me Aram
Call Me Aram

From the New Beginnings series, comes Call Me Aram, the sequel to Aram’s Choice. Aram Davidian, like his fellow orphaned Armenian refugees, is delighted with his new home on a farm in Georgetown, Ontario. But despite the excitement his new surroundings, Aram worries about his young friend Mgerdich, who was injured on the long trip to Canada and is recovering in France. And what is more worrying is that he and the other boys have been assigned new English names. How will their extended families find them one day if all the boys have new identities? Even when their translator assures them that their hosts want only the best for the boys, Aram cannot accept the name David Adams. When Mgerdich finally arrives at the farm, a relieved Aram finds the courage to lead the boys in a gentle revolt. Together, they must find a way to convince the Canadian adults that the boys, as grateful as they are for their new lives, cannot forget their old ones. Theymust keep their names.

Every incident in Call Me Aram is based on real events from the lives of the Georgetown Boys — from the boys’ reaction to porridge and cameras and weekly showers to their revolt to get their own names back. Marsha spent hundreds of hours listening to taped interviews of the original Georgetown Boys in order to glean these snippets of truth.
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