FREEHAND BOOKS FALL 2 0 2 1 Message from the Publisher
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FREEHAND BOOKS FALL 2 0 2 1 Message from the publisher It’s a new chapter for Freehand! We send our heartfelt gratitude to our former owner, JoAnn McCaig, who was instrumental in developing Freehand’s publishing program and helping us grow into the bold, fearless publisher we are today. And we extend a warm welcome to our new owner, Glenn Rollans, a book publishing veteran who also owns Brush Education. In our new chapter, we continue to present beautiful books with exceptional writing. Dawn Dumont brings us The Prairie Chicken Dance Tour, a delightful, laugh-out-loud about a group of Indigenous dancers who embark on a madcap tour of Europe. Sharon Butala has penned This Strange Visible Air, a moving, witty, and acerbic memoir about aging. Cary Fagan delivers another winner with his short story collection Great Adventures for the Faint of Heart, about ordinary people taking steps into the unknown. And we’re delighted to introduce Georgina Beaty with her debut, The Party Is Here, a collection of edgy short fiction about volcanoes and rare turtles and our place within the precarious natural world. Thank you so much for supporting local Canadian authors and independent publishers like Freehand! Kelsey Attard Managing Editor, Freehand Books sept 2021 The hilarious story of an unlikely group of Indigenous dancers who find themselves thrown together on a performance tour of Europe The Tour is all prepared. The Prairie Chicken dance troupe is all set for a fifteen-day trek through Europe, performing at festivals and cultural events. But then the performers all come down with the flu. And John Greyeyes, a retired cowboy who hasn’t danced in fifteen years, finds himself abruptly thrust into the position of leading a hastily-assembled group of replacement dancers. A group of expert dancers they are not. There’s a middle-aged woman with advanced arthritis, her nineteen-year-old niece who is far more interested in flirtations than pow-wow, and an enigmatic man from the U.S. — all being chased by Nadine, the organizer of the original tour who is determined to be a part of the action, and the handsome man she picked up in a gas-station bathroom. They’re all looking to John, who has never left the continent, to guide them through a world that he knows nothing about. As the gang makes its way from one stop to another, absolutely nothing goes as planned and the tour becomes a string of madcap adventures. The Prairie Chicken Dance Tour is loosely based — like, hospital- gown loose — on the true story of a group of Indigenous dancers who left Saskatchewan and toured through Europe in the 1970s. Dawn Dumont brings her signature razor-sharp wit and impeccable comedic timing to this hilarious, warm, and wildly entertaining novel. praise for dawn dumont isbn 978-1-988298-87-0 $24.95 cdn “The sassy, spirited humour just keeps barrelling along. There 5.5 × 8.5 paperback 300 pages is nothing quite like laughter to erase intolerance and embrace canadian rights cultural differences, and this is one of the best antidotes to FIC059000 fiction / indigenous FIC016000 fiction / humorous racism on bookshelves to date.” — St. Albert Gazette FIC019000 fiction / literary ISBN 978-1-988298-87-0 dawn dumont is a comedian and columnist for the StarPhoenix and Eaglefeather News, and is the award-winning novelist of Nobody Cries at Bingo, Rose’s Run, and Glass Beads. Dawn gives keynotes across the country on the power of humour to decolonize and disrupt stereotypes. From the Okanese First Nation, she lives in Saskatoon with her son. sept 2021 A collection of essays on women and aging from Canadian legend Sharon Butala In this incisive collection, Sharon Butala reflects on the ways her life has changed as she’s grown old. She knows that society fails the elderly massively, and so she tackles ageism and loneliness, friendship and companionship. She writes with pointed wit and acerbic humour about dinner parties and health challenges and forgetfulness and complicated family relationships and the pandemic — and lettuce. And she tells her story with the tremendous skill and beauty of a writer who has masterfully honed her craft over the course of her storied four-decade career. Butala gives us a book to be cherished — an elegant and expansive look at the complexities and desires of aging and the aged, standing in stark contrast to the stereotyped, simplistic portrayals of the elderly in our culture. This Strange Visible Air is a true gift. praise for sharon butala “[Butala] addresses head-on the physical, emotional, and spiritual challenges of aging women. The protagonists in these stories to not just rage against the dying of the light; they grab it by the throat, forcing the reader to confront uncomfortable and revelatory truth concerning what it is to age in a female body . Poetic, flawless, and unflinching.” — 2019 Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize Jury “This is what we have come to expect from Sharon Butala. An articulation of love, hard and true and honest. A consistent also available: attempt to probe and comprehend the life and land around isbn 978-1-988298-96-2 her, the mystery of spirit, of nature, the meaning of grief. I was $24.95 cdn 5.5 × 8.5 paperback moved to tears by Butala’s strong, sure voice.” — Frances Itani 232 pages canadian rights sharon butala is an award-winning author of more than twenty LCO010000 literary collections / essays books, numerous articles and essays, poetry, and five published plays. SOC013000 social science / She has three times been a finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award, gerontology ISBNBIO007000 978-1-988298-96-2 biography & and is a recipient of the Marian Engel Award, the Saskatchewan Order of autobiography / literary figures Merit, the Cheryl and Henry Kloppenburg Award for Literary Excellence, and the City of Calgary W.O. Mitchell Book Prize. In 2002 she became an Officer of the Order of Canada. She lives in Calgary. sept 2021 Masterful, hopeful stories about ordinary people taking small, bold steps into the unknown These ten compelling and delightful stories highlight ordinary people, introverts, mostly living quiet lives — until they take the chance to leap toward small, meaningful adventure. A young woman is given a painting by Picasso by her stepfather, and she must acquire a wall to hang it on. A hippie family picks up a cello-playing hitchhiker who convinces them to get a television. And a man winds up taking his girlfriend’s son on a road trip — an unexpected expedition for them both. Filled with a sense of hope, these stories explore the tangled bonds of family and the complex web that holds them together. Cary Fagan is an undisputed master of the short story, and Great Adventures for the Faint of Heart is a brilliant and warm collection that expands our acceptance of human frailty and our unpredictable capacity for change. praise for cary fagan “Enchanting short stories of astonishing breadth.” — Publishers Weekly “Endearingly human. There is humour in these stories, pathos, and great yarn telling. Remarkable narrative gifts.” — Toronto Star “A natural storyteller.” — Quill & Quire “A reminder of what the sinews of short fiction are all about.” also available: — National Post isbn 978-1-988298-90-0 “Each story contains the emotional resonance of a novel. $22.95 cdn 5.25 × 8 paperback The best of what short fiction can do.” — Event 240 pages canadian rights FIC029000 fiction / short stories cary fagan is the author of six novels and four story collections (single author) for adults, as well as many award-winning books for children. His books FIC019000 fiction / literary include The Student (finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award ISBN 978-1-988298-90-0 and the Toronto Book Prize), A Bird’s Eye (finalist for the Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize), and the story collection My Life Among the Apes (longlisted for the Giller Prize). Cary was born and raised in Toronto, where he lives with his family. sept 2021 A memorable, edgy debut exploring the climate crisis and young women on the verge of transformation These hip, thoroughly modern stories introduce us to young women grappling with the climate crisis and trying to make decisions that will affect the rest of their lives. Two admirers of Anne Carson decide the path to liberation is to “become men” and embark on a mythic journey; a graduate student reports on the progressively unhinged unravelling of her climate change research project; a park ranger goes to extreme lengths to save his beloved tortoises; a woman freezes her eggs and then finds she can get glimpses into each potential life. As we travel with our protagonists to places at once familiar and thrillingly strange, Georgina Beaty fearlessly probes the ambitions and confusions of her generation. Wholly unexpected yet wildly entertaining, The Party Is Here daringly announces the arrival of a writer who brings explosive energy and an unforgettable flair all her own. isbn 978-1-988298-93-1 georgina beaty is a 2020–2022 Stegner Fellow in fiction at $22.95 cdn Stanford University. Her work has appeared in New England Review, 5.5 × 8.5 paperback 250 pages The Walrus, The New Quarterly, The Fiddlehead, and elsewhere. world rights She holds an MFA from the University of British Columbia and has been FIC029000 fiction / short stories (single author) supported by fellowships and residencies at MacDowell, the Canadian FIC044000 fiction / women FIC019000 fiction / literary Film Centre and The Banff Centre. She grew up in the Rockies and is now ISBN 978-1-988298-93-1 based in Tkaronto/Toronto.