Authors celebrate Kenora Thistles’ win

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 18/02/2007 (6970 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

JAN. 21 was an important day in Canadian sports history — especially for the town of Kenora.

It marked the 100th anniversary of the day the Kenora Thistles won the Stanley Cup, making it the smallest town in Canada to ever attain the honour.

John Danakas and Richard Brignall celebrate the players and the excitement of that event in a book for young people called Small Town Glory (James Lorimer and Co., 120 pages, $10 paperback).

Young hockey enthusiasts aged eight and up can enjoy this account, part of Lorimer’s Recordbook series, highlighting great Canadian sports stories for reluctant teenage readers.

It includes not only pictures of the winning team, but also of the Ottawa “Silver Seven,” the Thistles’ rivals, plus century-old photographs of Kenora itself.

It also explains how in 1907 the Stanley Cup was a “challenge cup,” meaning that any team who thought they could win it away could challenge the holders, as the Montreal Wanderers did successfully just two months after the Thistles’ surprising victory.

Danakas, a Winnipeg author, has written a number of other sports novels your children, while Brignall is a former sports reporter for the Kenora Daily Miner and News.

There seems to be a trend in teen fiction to deal with more serious, even macabre subjects, and the following two books, while recommended, come with the warning that they fit this description.

In the Garage by Alma Fullerton (Red Deer Press, 181 pages, $13 paperback) opens with the funeral of a young man.

BJ (Barbara Jean) was born with an unsightly birth mark on one side of her face, which caused her mother to reject her. Her best friend is Alex, who keeps a journal in which he writes poetry and admits his insecurities.

BJ tries to become one of the popular crowd, and in doing so, betrays Alex. Facing the consequences of our behaviour is the valuable lesson left by this novel by a Midland, Ont., author.

Feeding at Nine by Saskatchewan writer R.P. MacIntyre (Thistledown Press, 188 pages, $18 paperback) also falls into the category of hard-hitting fiction.

In a series of short stories, MacIntyre explores the world through the eyes of different young people at different ages. The result isn’t always pretty, but it is always absorbing.

From eight-year-old Hughy, who makes friends with an old man across the street but thinks his friend has betrayed him, to Thomas, whose memory of a gorgeous red balloon comes back to him as he names his first son, these are character-filled, well-written stories that are contemporary and meaningful.

McIntyre won the 2005 Centennial medal for his contribution to the arts in Saskatchewan plus the Saskatoon Book of the Year Award in 1998 for his novel The Crying Jesus.

What are your dreams? Not the nighttime kind, the “If only I could…” kind.

Friesens Printers of Altona, as part of its 100th anniversary celebrations, has sponsored a special art book called Dream (TCP Press/The Communication Project, 32 pages, $24, hardcover), written by Winnipeg-born Susan V. Bosak with illustrations by 15 of the world’s top children’s illustrators.

From dreams of sunshine as a baby to the dreams of old age, “mostly they’re wishes for those who follow,” the book explores a lifetime of dreams with the emphasis on “the Believe of childhood, the Do of youth and the Think of experience.”

The most impressive thing about this book is the artwork, by such well-known artists as Barbara Reid of Toronto, Zhong-Yang Huang of Regina and Leo and Diane Dillon of New York.

It includes information about each artist, plus links to a website and to the Legacy Project, an international education initiative based in Washington, D.C.

Winnipeg writer Helen Norrie is a former teacher-librarian whose column appears on the third Sunday of the month.