Jonah’s Daughter by M.C. Conacher Published by Benchmark Press Review by Regine Haensel $16.95 ISBN 978-1-927352-02-1              Jonah’s Daughter is M.C. Conacher’s third published book, and is dedicated to the twelve other nurses who graduated with her from nurses’ training in Prince Albert in 1950.      The novel tells the story of Sedelia Lawson, “fifth and last child of Jonah and Margaret Lawson,” born during the Depression.  There are many details about family life in rural Saskatchewan in the 1940’s and 50’s, and about Sedelia’s brothers and sisters. The major part of the book deals with Sedelia’s training as a nurse at the Protestant Hospital in Prince Albert.  A happy, go-lucky girl, Sedelia likes the training and the work.  She goes out with young men in her spare time and enjoys life.      One evening, a planned date goes wrong for Sedelia, so on a whim she agrees to go to a gospel church with a couple of other nurses in training.  Marie and Dorothy are not Sedelia’s best friends by any stretch of the imagination.  Both of them plan to become missionaries, which Sedelia finds hard to comprehend.  However, Sedelia is mesmerized by the speaker…

To The Edge of the Sea by Anne McDonald Published by Thistledown Press Review by Regine Haensel ISBN 9781897235850 $19.95 Anne McDonald has been writing for many years, with publications in magazines such as “Descant” and broadcasts on CBC radio. In To The Edge of the Sea, her first book, she takes us on a journey into Canada’s past, the time of Confederation, the formation of a country. Her themes include connection, loss, risk, and hope. We meet John Alexander Macdonald, future first prime minister of Canada, who walks a metaphorical tightrope as he attempts to balance the wishes of the disparate regions. Young fisherman Alex leaves his home and family on Prince Edward Island, and boards a ship to follow the circus because he is fascinated by the tightrope walkers. Alex’s older brother Reggie is left behind, but finds his own way to leave the fishing life by joining the Tenant Leaguers, in order to improve the lot of tenant farmers. Mercy Coles, twenty-six years old, encounters John A. Macdonald at a social event, then follows, with other supporters, to Quebec City. At a dinner, “All of them laughed at McGee’s story of how the tightrope walker Farini had…

Creating the Prairie Xeriscape by Sara Williams Published by Coteau Books Review by Regine Haensel $34.95 ISBN 978-1-55050-461-3      I dove into Creating the Prairie Xeriscape in the first week of April while snow drifted down outside.  With winter refusing to loosen its grip on the landscape, the book was like taking a drink of cool water after wandering a dry desert for days.  Though given the subject matter, perhaps I should say taking a small sip of water that I had hoarded and conserved carefully! According to Williams, “Xeriscaping is an environmentally friendly approach to your yard and garden that leaves your piece of the world in as good or better shape than when you assumed stewardship.”      Well known and respected throughout the prairies, Sara Williams’ weekly gardening column appears in more than twenty-five newspapers.  For twelve years she worked as horticultural specialist at Extension Division, University of Saskatchewan.  In 2008, she received the Prairie Garden Award of Excellence, and will be inducted into the Saskatchewan Agricultural Hall of Fame in 2013.      Creating the Prairie Xeriscape is a revision and update (the number of plant species mentioned has nearly doubled) of the 1997 book of the same…

Thirty Years of Journalism and Democracy in Canada:The Minifie Lectures 1981 – 2010 Edited by Mitch Diamantopoulos Published by Canadian Plains Research Centre Press Review by Regine Haensel $39.95 ISBN 978-0-88977-225-0 In his introduction, editor Mitch Diamantopoulos, Department Head of the School of Journalism, states: “This collection profiles the best of Canadian journalism. Its contributors seek to alert, to inform and to protect the people against those who would conceal or distort the truth. In other words, this is also a book about the ongoing struggle for democratic vitality and press freedom in Canada from 1981 to 2010.” Lectures begin with Knowlton Nash’s “Cleopatra, Harlots and Glue”, and continue with other well-known journalists and broadcasters such as Peter Gzowski, Pamela Wallin, Peter Mansbridge, Wendy Mesley, and Evan Solomon. These are the cream of the crop, not only in Canada, but around the world. Their credentials include work with the CBC, MacLean’s Magazine, Southam News, The Globe and Mail, CTV, Good Morning America, and Al Jazeera English-language international news channel. Some lectures discuss problems and pitfalls of journalism, such as censorship. In his 1983 lecture William Stevenson says, “I was in Indonesia when the first rebellions began against Dictator Sukarno ….

Ducks on the Moon by Kelley Jo Burke Published by Hagios Press Review by Regine Haensel $18.95 ISBN 978-1-926710-07-5 Ducks on the Moon takes the reader into a multi-media experience that is part one-woman play, part self-help book. Kelley Jo Burke is an award winning Regina playwright, poet, director, documentarian and broadcaster. She is also the parent of a child with autism spectrum disorder, a combination that makes for a readable, informative and emotionally engaging book. A few pages in, we are caught by a side note: “A flavor like mustard, if tolerated, can mask many tastes and textures that are sensorially unacceptable to the child.” This captures the strange, wonderful, and demanding world that parents and others must enter if they are to live with, love, and help a child with autism. Burke’s one woman play takes us through the emotional highs and lows of giving birth, of discovering something is different about this child, and then into the long process of getting a diagnosis. After that comes the frustration of trying to find help, and learning how to cope with a life that will never be normal. One of the parents says, “It’s got its ups and downs…