Book Club - Christ Church Deer Park

“Far To Go” by Alison Pick Wednesday, April 24, 2013. A powerful and moving story about one family’s epic journey to flee the ravages of war and to save the life of a six year-old boy
The Bishop’s Man by Linden McIntyre - Wednesday, March 27, 2013 @ 7:30pm - winner of the 2009 Scotiabank Giller Prize.
Short stories by Alice Munro - Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Dear Life by Alice Munroe. Alice Munro on Wiki » / Wednesday, January 30, 2013
The Alchemist by Paolo Coelho -
- (Pub. 1988). A remarkable tale about the most magical of all journeys: the quest to fulfill’s destiny. About the author: link » / Author's blog » / Author's website » / Wednesday, May 30, 2012
The True History of The Kelly Gang by Peter Carey - Winner of the Booker Prize. See author's book website here » (April 24, 2012)
The Birth House by Ami McKay. Author's website » / Publisher's page » Wednesday, March 28, 2012 #1 Canadian Bestseller, CBC Canada Read’s Finalist, Evergreen Award. Presented by the Ontario Librarian’s Assoc. Fiction Book of the Year – CBA Libris Award Author of the Year - CBA Libris Award Book Design of the Year (Kelly Hill) – CBA Libris Award Booksellers’ Choice Award – AIBA Long listed - International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award
The City of Joy by Dominique LaPierre. An American doctor, a French priest and a rickshaw driver living in Calcutta’s slums represent the juxtaposing of Western religion and science with Indian misery. Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Fifth Business by Robertson Davies. Wednesday, January 25, 2012 "Fifth Business is Davies' masterwork, the book that cemented his reputation as one of the great storytellers of our time" (review note at Amazon ») - A wiki backgrounder on the novel here » / on Robertson Davies here » or here »
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery. Backgrounder summary at Wikipedia » Wednesday, November 30, 2011
The Catcher in the Rye J. D. Salinger’s classic novel Wednesday, October 26, 2011:
False Impression by Jeffery Archer. . Visit the author's website here » Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortensen - “One man’s mission to promote peace...one school at a time”. / Book's official website » / Backgrounder about this book here » Wednesday March 30, 2011 -

Hotel du Lac

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Review from

Chapters.Indigo.ca

Three Day Road by Canadian writer Joseph Boyden. Backgrounder on the novel here » / backgrounder on the author here ». Three Day Road was Nominee for the 2005 Governor General's Awards, winner of the McNally Robinson Aboriginal Book of the Year Award, Winner of the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize 2005,and selected for inclusion in Canada Reads 2006, where it was championed by filmmaker Nelofer Pazira. Also Winner, 2006 Amazon/Books in Canada First Novel Award. See reader reviews here » Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Pope Joan by Donna Woolfolk Cross. Wednesday, November 17, 2010
- Official website of the novel here »
- "Peek inside", read a couple of chapters, reviews - Amazon.ca »
- Background on the historical character here »
The Book of Negroes, a 2007 award-winning novel from Canadian writer Lawrence Hill, won the 2007 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize and the 2008 Commonwealth Writers' Prize. Nominated for the 2008 Giller Prize. It was the winning selection for CBC Radio's Canada Reads 209, in which journalist Avi Lewis championed the novel. Plot summary here » About the author here » (Wednesday, October 27, 2010)
Nation by the Carnegie Medal-winning author Terry Pratchett (April 28, 2010)
The Private Patient - by P. D. James. March 31, 2010
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro Tuesday, February 23, 2010
- Read Margaret Atwood's review (!!) of Never Let Me Go - here » "... this is a brilliantly executed book by a master craftsman who has chosen a difficult subject: ourselves, seen through a glass, darkly.
- Author interview on YouTube »
- shortlisted for the 2005 Booker Prize (an award Ishiguro had previously won in 1989 for The Remains of the Day),
- shortlisted for the 2006 Arthur C. Clarke Award and for the 2005 National Book Critics Circle Award
- Time magazine named it the best novel of 2005 and included the novel in its TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005
- ALA Alex Award in 2006.
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak - On Wednesday January 27, 2010 "A beautiful and gripping story about the power of words and the ability of books to feed the soul."Watch a 4-minute interview with the author on YouTube » Backgrounder on the book - Wikipedia » The Book Thief is a best-selling novel by Markus Zusak published in 2005. It was a 2007 Michael L. Printz Award Honor Book.
"Death (the narrator) meets the book thief, a 9-year-old girl named Liesel Meminger, when he comes to take her little brother, and she becomes an enduring force in his life, despite his efforts to resist her. "I travelled the globe . . . handing souls to the conveyor belt of eternity," Death writes. "I warned myself that I should keep a good distance from the burial of Liesel Meminger's brother. I did not heed my advice." As Death lingers at the burial, he watches the girl, who can't yet read, steal a gravedigger's instruction manual. Thus Liesel is touched first by Death, then by words, as if she knows she'll need their comfort during the hardships ahead. .. Death, like Liesel, has a way with words. And he recognizes them not only for the good they can do, but for the evil as well. What would Hitler have been, after all, without words? As this book reminds us, what would any of us be?" [- From The Washington Post review]
Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society by Mary-Ann Shaffer Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Though it deals with a dark period in history, this first novel is an essentially sunny work. It affirms the power of books to nourish people enduring hard times—not so surprising, since Mary Ann Shaffer, who died earlier this year, had a long career as a librarian, bookseller and editor. Her niece Annie Barrows, a children's author, finished the manuscript after Shaffer fell ill; between them, they crafted a vivid epistolary novel whose characters spring to life in letters and telegrams exchanged over the course of nine months shortly after the end of World War II... - the Washington Post
- The book publisher website here » or here »
- Peek inside (Amazon) here »
- Visit the author's website link »
The Piano Tuner by Daniel Mason
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
- Read a few sample pages online at the book publisher website here »
- Read a book review - here's one in the Christian Science Monitor link »
- An interview with the author at BookReporter.com »

Barbara LaRocque was a soprano lead with the Christ Church Deer Park choir during the 70's and early 80's and subsequently with choirs in other Toronto churches. Returning under Bruce Kirkpatrick- Hill, she continues to sing with the present choir. Her father, Charles Wall, was posted to Wolfe Island in 1930 as lay-incumbent to Trinity Anglican Parish. Thus began a life-long love affair with the island, its history and its people.

Wolfe Island, situated about three miles south of Kingston, sits at the very crossroads of Canada’s history. From Champlain, through the arrival of the Loyalist settlers, rum running in the 30’s to today, it has been a place of historic and strategic interest and home to a hardy, independent people. After her father’s death, Barbara took it upon herself to complete the research he had begun on the history and people of the Island. The result, Wolfe Island, A Legacy in Stone, is a book both historically and personally fascinating.

This event was held Sunday, November 15, 2009 in the Holy Grounds Café (after 9:15 & 11 am services).