Coast to Coast: Canada’s Literary Women

Dawn of the Firebird

by Sarah Mughal Rana

Khamilla Zahr-zad’s life has been built on a foundation of violence and vengeance. Every home she’s known has been destroyed by war. As the daughter of an emperor’s clan, she spent her childhood training to maintain his throne. But when her clansmen are assassinated by a rival empire, plans change. With her heavenly magic of nur, Khamilla is a weapon even enemies would wield—especially those in the magical, scholarly city of Za’skar. Hiding her identity, Khamilla joins the enemy’s army school full of jinn, magic, and martial arts, risking it all to topple her adversaries, avenge her clan, and reclaim the throne.

To survive, she studies under cutthroat mystic monks and battles in a series of contests to outmanoeuver her fellow soldiers. She must win at all costs, even if it means embracing the darkness lurking inside her. But the more she excels, the more she is faced with history that contradicts her father’s teachings. With a war brewing among the kingdoms and a new twisted magic overtaking the land, Khamilla is torn between two impossible choices: vengeance or salvation.

Venom Lake

by Emma White

On a weekend getaway for their true-crime book club, four women retreat to the sole cottage on isolated Snakebite Island. But what was supposed to be a fun weekend of getting trashed on rosé and talking serial killers takes a dark turn when a member of the group is found dead on the shore. Murdered. By one of her supposed friends.

Under the surface, there’s turbulence in the group. Blackmail, affairs and addiction. Financial misconduct. A missing husband. All of the women are hiding dangerous secrets, but how far are they willing to go to keep them?

The murder creates a dilemma for the three surviving book club members: report the death and have their own lives shredded by an investigation or use their true-crime knowledge to stage their friend’s disappearance on the lake.

The consequences of their decision will ripple outwards, creating new risks and threatening to unravel their entire net of lies.

Wonderland Road

By Carrianne Leung

Pauline has not spoken to her sister, Mei, in two decades, not since before the world changed. A rare letter arrives asking Pauline to return to their old neighbourhood to care for Mei’s young daughter while Mei goes to find work.

Twelve-year-old Jing is living in the Children’s House, where all the parentless children stay while their parents work at the Farms. She hasn’t heard from her mother in months and the food deliveries they were promised have dwindled. Her only friends in the neighbourhood are a crow named Iris, an older boy named Julian, and the ghosts of her ancestors in their abandoned apartment.

Julian, once a star athlete and student with a bright future, is one of the only young men left on Wonderland Road. He can’t leave his parents, and he knows there is nowhere left to go. But Julian dreams of a boy he met and a kiss shared in what feels like another lifetime.

These three people will cross paths on Wonderland Road, a community trying to survive in a world of massive disruption and uncertainty. When the future feels poised on a knife’s edge, they must find a way forward.

The Wild Beneath

by Kelly Anderson

For fans of Greenwood and Remarkably Bright Creatures, a love story as fierce and mysterious as the sea itself Annie MacLeod always knew she was different, growing up on a sailboat in the Pacific Northwest, navigating by the stars and swimming in the ocean. But when a tsunami shatters her world and her parents are swept away, Annie is stranded on land, grief-stricken and forced to confront just how unconventional she is, despite her enduring love for her childhood sweetheart, Evan. In the wreckage, she rescues a wordless man named Walker, who emits a hum only she can hear. Their connection is instant, elemental. When Walker disappears—along with any explanation he might hold about who she really is—Annie is forced to decide between evacuating with Evan or staying to unlock a secret that feels vital to her survival. Six years later, Annie has buried the past. But when Walker’s otherworldly sound returns, it forces a reckoning with the wild life she’s left behind. Is the truth of the ocean more powerful than she knows? The Wild Beneath is a spellbinding story of soulmates, homecoming and the ancient bonds that tie us all to the natural world.