​About Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library:
Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library is a book gifting program that mails free, high-quality books to children from birth to age five, no matter their family’s income. After launching in 1995, the program grew quickly. First books were only distributed to children living in Sevier County, Tennessee where Dolly grew up. It became such a success that in 2000 a national replication effort was underway.
​By 2003, Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library had mailed one million books. It would prove to be the first of many millions of books sent to children around the world.

​Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library of Canada is a free book gifting program devoted to inspiring a love of reading in the hearts of children everywhere. Each month, enrolled children receive a high quality, age appropriate book in the mail, free of charge. Children receive books from birth to age five.
From a Toronto stage in November of 2006, Dolly Parton gleefully announced the Canadian expansion of her Imagination Library. It was the first international push for the organization. The development was thanks, in part, to an early agreement with the Canadian-based organization, Invest in Kids which proved to be just the beginning. Program coverage in Canada spans across Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Northwest Territories, Ontario, Saskatchewan and Yukon Territories.
Each year, more books featuring Canadian authors and illustrators are introduced into the program. Additionally, titles with themes and subjects that appeal to the Canadian readers are added.

Click Here to download and watch a Video on the program or view the video below.

The 2023 nominees for the Evergreen Award are:

1. Cobalt: Cradle of the Demon Metals, Birth of a Mining Superpower by Charlie Angus 
2. A Convergence of Solitudes by Anita Anand 
3. Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands written & illustrated by Kate Beaton 
4. Her First Palestinian: and Other Stories by Saeed Teebi 
5. Mad Honey by Katie Welch 
6. Sea of Tranquility: A Novel by Emily St. John Mandel 
7. Son of Elsewhere: A Memoir in Pieces by Elamin Abdelmahmoud 
8. This is Assisted Dying: A Doctor’s Story of Empowering Patients at the End of Life by Dr. Stefanie Green 
9. Toufah: The Woman Who Inspired an African #MeToo Movement by Toufah Jallow, with Kim Pittaway 
10. ​Valley of the Birdtail: An Indian Reserve, a White Town, and the Road to Reconciliation by Andrew Stobo Sniderman and Douglas Sanderson 

For more information on these titles, visit the Ontario Library Association Evergreen site.

What is the one book Canadians need now? That's the question at the heart of the next edition of Canada Reads, which will take place from March 27 to 30, 2017. Ali Hassan, from CBC's Laugh Out Loud, will host the show for the first time.
The debates will air on CBC Radio One at 11 a.m., will be livestreamed on CBCbooks.ca at 11 a.m. ET and can be seen on CBC Television at 4 p.m.
If you would like a poster for your libary, bookstore or classroom, you can download a PDF to print here.

​The former head of the international Inuit Circumpolar Council and nominee for the Nobel Peace Prize, author and activist Sheila Watt-Cloutier chronicles the impact climate change has had on northern communities and makes the case that this environmental crisis is indeed a human rights issue. Weaving together environmental, cultural and economic issues, Watt-Cloutier makes a passionate and personal plea for change.
Chantal Kreviazuk is defending The Right to Be Cold on Canada Reads 2017.

​When Hermes and Apollo make a bet about human happiness, they grant 15 dogs staying at a veterinary clinic the power of human consciousness. The dogs instantly become divided between those who prefer their old dog ways and those who want to take advantage of their newfound increased intelligence. What unfolds is a powerful story about what it means to have consciousness, and the good and the bad that comes with it.
Fifteen Dogs won the 2015 Scotiabank Giller Prize. The cover was designed by Ingrid Paulson.
Humble The Poet is defending Fifteen Dogs on Canada Reads 2017.
****CANADA READS WINNER****

New Arcadia is a city-sized oil rig off the coast of the Canadian Maritimes, now owned by one very wealthy, powerful, byzantine family: Lynch Ltd.
Hwa is of the few people in her community (which constitutes the whole rig) to forgo bio-engineered enhancements. As such, she's the last truly organic person left on the rig - making her doubly an outsider, as well as a neglected daughter and bodyguard extraordinaire. Still, her expertise in the arts of self-defence and her record as a fighter mean that her services are yet in high demand. When the youngest Lynch needs training and protection, the family turns to Hwa. But can even she protect against increasingly intense death threats seemingly coming from another timeline?
Meanwhile, a series of interconnected murders threatens the city's stability and heightens the unease of a rig turning over. All signs point to a nearly invisible serial killer, but all of the murders seem to lead right back to Hwa's front door. Company Town has never been the safest place to be - but now, the danger is personal.
A brilliant, twisted mystery, as one woman must evaluate saving the people of a town that can't be saved, or saving herself. (From Tor Books)
Tamara Taylor is defending Company Town on Canada Reads 2017.

When Stella, a young Métis mother, looks out her window one evening and spots someone in trouble on the Break - a barren field on an isolated strip of land outside her house - she calls the police to alert them to a possible crime.
In a series of shifting narratives, people who are connected with the victim tell their personal stories leading up to that fateful night. Lou, a social worker, grapples with the departure of her live-in boyfriend. Cheryl, an artist, mourns the premature death of her sister Rain. Paulina, a single mother, struggles to trust her new partner. Phoenix, a homeless teenager, is released from a youth detention centre. Officer Scott, a Métis policeman, feels caught between two worlds as he patrols the city. Through their various perspectives a larger, more comprehensive story about lives of the residents in Winnipeg's North End is exposed. (From House of Anansi)
Candy Palmater is defending The Break on Canada Reads 2017.

​In the indeterminate future in an unnamed western city, physical impediments to immortality have been overcome. With the threat of the brain's storage capacity being overwhelmed, people want to move forward into the future free from interfering memories. Thus, all traces of a person's past are erased. On occasion, though, cracks emerge.
Dr. Frank Sina specializes in sealing these memory leaks. He is satisfied in his own fiction. But one day, Presley Smith arrives in Frank's office, tortured by persistent thoughts. As he tries to save Presley, Frank finds clues that suggest Presley's past may be located in nuclear-ravaged Maskinia. His suspicions are only intensified when the Department of Internal Security takes an interest in Presley. As Frank tries to save Presley, cracks emerge in his own fiction, and the thoughts that sneak through suggest a connection with Presley. (From Doubleday Canada)
Jody Mitic is defending Nostalgia on Canada Reads 2017.

​The Canada Reads debates, which take place from March 27 to 30, 2017, will be hosted by Ali Hassan from CBC's Laugh Out Loud.
Find out how you can reserve tickets to watch Canada Reads live in Toronto by visiting Eventbrite. You can also order posters for your school, bookstore or library here.
Canada Reads 2017 will be broadcast on CBC-TV and CBC Radio One, and will be live streamed on CBCbooks.ca.