Culture

Imagine hopping next door one day to deliver a package of used clothing to your neighbours, only to find one of them brutally murdered and her teenage, disabled daughter missing. That’s the premise of the new novel by Emily Elgar, Grace Is Gone, and it’s a page-turner that will keep your imagination running from start to finish.

Tomorrow is not only just a new day, and a new year, but a new decade as well. 2020 has been talked about for a long time now, with dreams of flying cars and space trips, and while many of those things won’t be happening in the New Year, there are still plenty of cool things to look forward to. Here are some of our favourites.

J.T. Ellison has taken us here before. The New York Times and USA Today best-selling author knows how to draw readers in, and hold them tight as she weaves her dark, psychological tale. Her latest thriller, Good Girls Lie is more of what you’d expect from one of her novels and yet different enough that you can’t see everything is coming.

Just before the start of the New Year a new novel by best-selling author Tarryn Fisher hits the shelves, and it very well could be the most talked about novel of 2020. It’s called The Wives, and it’s the type of novel that you need to keep reading until you pass judgement on it.

The Broadview Hotel represents one of Toronto’s considerable transformations. The evolution of the hotel continues with the addition of art in the form of photographs by notable Canadian photographer Caitlin Cronenberg. We caught up with Cronenberg as she gave us a tour of the hotel’s permanent collection of her work which guests can discover at the elevator banks at each floor and on the walls of the hotel’s restaurant bar.

Leonardo Da Vinci was a true renaissance man. He was a painter (most famously known for “Mona Lisa” and “The Last Supper”), a scientist and an inventor. He passed away over 500 years ago, but his work is still discussed and exhibited every day. Even so, galleries are still finding unique ways to display his artwork, such as the immersive experience London’s National Gallery has devised.

Last night at the 26th annual Scotiabank Giller Prize awards ceremony, hosted by Canadian singer-songwriter Jann Arden, author Ian Williams was named the winner for his novel Reproduction. On top of the esteem that comes with winning, Williams also receives a $100,000 prize courtesy of Scotiabank. 

Let’s face it, whether you love them or not, the holiday season is almost upon us. Stores have started playing Christmas music, parades have started running down main streets and the Hallmark Channel is playing holiday films all day long. While you may or may not have started with your Christmas shopping yet, you may want to start thinking of places you want to head out to over the next few weeks. Here are some of our favourites.

Toys R Us as a whole may have been struggling for the last couple of years, but the retailer has been standing its ground in Canada. Part of the reason why, is because it has been bringing unique experiences to its customer base and keeping abreast of the times. Now, the company has announced that it has partnered with Snapchat Portal Lens to create a unique augmented reality experience for its customers that can be accessed anywhere and anytime through the Snapchat app.

November’s one of those months where it’s not too cold to still go outside and enjoy a walk, yet not warm enough to keep the windows open all day or take a dip in the pool. That of course makes it a little tough to figure out what there is to do with your time, […]

Joe Hill’s one of those authors that might have slipped past you without you noticing. Over the years he’s written some great speculative fiction though, such as Horns, NOS4A2 and Heart Shaped Box, as well as 20th Century Ghosts and Strange Weather. The latter two are collections of his shorter works, and are great examples why short fiction works. For his latest novel, he once again turns to short fiction, collecting stories he’s published elsewhere over the last 15 years or so.

When the Booker prize judges decided to break the rules and award two winners their annual prize instead of one, they probably weren’t thinking that it would cause as much of an uproar as it has. But due to the fact that author Bernardine Evaristo, the first black woman to ever win Britain’s most prestigious literary award, now has to share it and the prize money with Margaret Atwood, people are letting their voices be heard.

Every Friday night until November 29th you have the opportunity to experience something unique. From 7:00 – 11:30 PM you can spend you evening roaming the Royal Ontario Museum, exploring the exhibits with a drink in hand, stopping for some delicious bites to eat, listening to some great live music and dance until your heart is content. Friday Night Live is back, and it’s a great way to unwind after a long week.

When you finished reading Rene Denfeld’s last novel, The Child Finder, you were left wanting more.  After all, the story’s lead character Naomi, the child finder herself, may have found the missing child she had been looking for, but she herself was far from complete. You wanted to know more about her story, and wanted her to find out not only who she was, but what had happened to her sister. Denfeld’s latest novel comes out two years after The Child Finder, and with it you get to delve deeper into Naomi’s story.

Two time Real Style Magazine cover-girl Tessa Virtue, and her longtime ice dance partner Scott Moir took to social media yesterday to officially announcement their retirement from the sport.