Tag Archives: Adult Fiction

Judging a Book by its Title: Romance Novel Edition

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The Cover of Her Billion Dollar Bump by Dani Collins

I’ve missed Valentine’s Day by a couple of weeks, and Maya’s unusual romance novel post for it was as fantastic as we’ve all come to expect, but I have an idea, darn it, and I’m not letting it go to waste! It’s time for what might become the first of many Judging a Book by its Title posts, in which I source the silliest titles of a specific genre from my colleagues and then come up with my own back-of-the-book blurb for it before reading anything about the book. In this case, I’ve chosen to aim my snark at romance novels. Filling the new fiction display and coming across Her Billion Dollar Bump by Dani Collins inspired this bit of silliness. A lot of Dani Collins‘ titles could fit this post, honestly. No shame on you if these books are your jam, though! We carry them for a reason, and they’re here to be enjoyed, I only hope my having some fun with the silly titles doesn’t offend their readers. And if any of my takes on what the title could be are more interesting to you than the accurate description, please give me a shout-out in the acknowledgements section of the best-seller you write from my prompt1.

A disclaimer: I am not a romance reader. My takes on these titles are going to be based off of those same tropes that Maya was specifically avoiding in her post2. Am I making these books sillier than they really are? It’s possible, some might even say probable. But when you see some of the titles I’m working with, I think you’ll understand where I’ve come from.

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Celebrate Freedom to Read Week 2025

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This year, from February 23 to March 1, Canada will once again celebrate Freedom to Read Week in libraries across the nation.  Led by a few library steering organizations, this annual event encourages Canadians to think about and reaffirm their commitment to all expressions of intellectual freedom. Or in other words, the ability to access information and material without restrictions, something that libraries have always prided themselves on being able to provide to our communities.

While celebrating Freedom to Read Week has always been important, even before it’s official inception in 1984, it certainly has hit differently as we’ve come into the 2020s.  Reports of an exponential rise in book challenges and bans have been flooding in from the United States over the last few years, and Canada has not been immune.   According to this article on the FtRW site, in the 2022-2023 period book challenges in Canada went up from 46 and 55 the previous years to 118.  More than double the previous year, and that was only what was reported. These targeted books are labeled as ‘dangerous’, ‘obscene’, ‘harmful’, and other choice words. Certain people and groups have taken it upon themselves to keep books out of reach, driven by that person or group’s own sense of what is right, what is wrong and what is factual.

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Slithering into the Year of the Snake

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The Cover of It's Your Year, Baby Snake by Ariel Hsu

It’s still a week away when this post goes live, but Happy Lunar New Year! The Year of the Dragon returns to the rivers as the Year of the Snake slithers from the woodwork1. In the spirit of Sumayyah’s post last year, I thought I’d highlight some snake-themed items in our catalogue.

I’ll get to that in a bit, though, as I’ve gone down a bit of a rabbit hole with my research for this one. You see, growing up in York Region, this celebration was called Chinese New Year, which is hyperspecific but also an accepted2 name. In China, this is 春节3 (Chūnjié) or Spring Festival, and it kicks off the largest human migration on the planet as people travel to celebrate with family and friends and use the extended vacation for sightseeing in other parts of the country. I’ve been in China during a similar holiday period, and while it’s bonkers how many people are travelling, we got where we were going at the times we were supposed to get there. The issue is less about the efficiency of transit and more about getting a ticket in the first place.

The cover of Feasts of Good Fortune by Hsiao-Ching Chou and Meilee Chou Riddle

China isn’t the only country that celebrates this new year. As a couple of examples, it’s 節 Tết in Vietnam and 설날 (Seollal) in Korea. Hence, ‘Lunar New Year.’ But even this is a misnomer since it’s not a purely lunar calendar that determines when the celebration is, but rather a lunisolar calendar, aka the Chinese Calendar, which is why some prefer ‘Chinese New Year.’ Whatever it’s called and wherever it’s celebrated, it’s a time to gather with family and friends to celebrate and feast. I don’t know our menu for that day yet, but I’ve gotten pretty adept at crispy skin pork belly, so that’s an option.

But you’re not here to read about me getting side-tracked. Or maybe you are? And it’s not precisely a side track, more of an overview of why I’m doing this. Snake books, though. That’s what I’m supposed to be talking about, sssssso it’sssss time to sssssstart.

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