The Fraser Valley Current's local book gift guide

I once had a friend who bought several copies of the Communist Manifesto and gave them out as Christmas gifts to everyone she knew.

She was half-joking and I thought it was funny—but I don’t think everyone else did.

Buying books as gifts can be tricky. As a book-lover myself, I’ll find any excuse to give someone a book. But I've come across a few challenges. I can’t always just buy copies of the best thing I’ve read that year and wrap them up, because everyone’s tastes are different. But it’s also a little tricky to figure out what someone might like without asking them outright and completely spoiling the surprise. (The better you know the person in question, of course, the easier it gets.)

One good option is to find a book that’s not only about a topic that person might like, but also has a strong connection to a place they love. Your odds of intriguing that special person have just doubled. 

Poetry:

For award-winning Indigenous poetry: Joseph Dandurand, a celebrated Kwantlen poet and storyteller, has written seven books of poetry (and several children’s books.) His poetry and writing tells stories from his life and from his family’s history, touching on survivor’s experiences of residential schools, homelessness, and including themes of nature and greater Kwantlen tradition. Dandurand recently won a Canadian poetry prize for his body of work. Read the Current’s profile here. Find his books here. 

For poems about dealing with trauma, rebirth, fire and nature: In her poetry collection, Burning Sage, Lytton-resident Megan Fandrich writes about dealing with the grief of watching her town and business burn, and about living in a complex, uncertain world. Endorsed by legendary Canadian poet Lorna Crozier and luminaries like Elizabeth May, Burning Sage is an account of a person and a community dealing with trauma and trying to overcome it. Read the Current’s profile of the freshly-minted poet here. Find the book here. 

For poetry about prison and a personal journey: Pick up a copy of UFV Alum and Abbotsford man Bradley Peters’ Sonnets from a Cell, a poetry collection written while the author was incarcerated. His pieces explore his personal experience in the prison system. The collection juxtaposes depictions of young men finding their way with those of the criminal justice system in pursuit of a nuanced perspective. Find the book in local bookstores or order it online.

Nonfiction

For the true-crime reader: Or, perhaps more accurately, for the true crime obsessee whom you’re a little worried about, check out Colleen Brown’s If you lie down in a field, she will find you there. Brown is currently Maple Ridge’s writer-in-residence and recently finished a year-long residency in Harrison Hot Springs. Her book, a sharp criticism of society’s obsession with true crime as a genre, examines the circumstances surrounding her mother’s murder in Saskatchewan in 1974. Her mother’s life, distorted by the way it ended at the hands of a serial killer, comes back together in the book’s pages through interviews with her siblings and the memories of Brown and her sister. Find the book online or in local bookstores.

For the local environmentalist: If you read everything Tyler wrote about Sumas Lake (from award-winning stories to several thousand words on a single chart last week) and still wanted to read more, we have a full list of local titles that you should check out. Some of the books on that list may be tricky to find or take some time to ship, but Before We Lost The Lake, largely regarded as the most detailed history of Sumas Lake written so far by Chad Reimer, is in stock at many local book stores, museums and gift shops. 

For the local history buff:

Now more than 20 years old, A Stó:lō-Coast Salish Historical Atlas is probably the most ambitious work ever written about the history of the Fraser Valley. Covering more than 10,000 years, featuring contributions from dozens of people, and including an array of photos, maps, and graphics, the book provides an exhaustive look at an era that most popular histories only hint at—which is to say almost the entirety of life in the region. You can find the book at many local museums and online.

 Abbotsford, a Diverse Tapestry is a recently-published collection of stories that make up the history of the town. Aiming to provide a better picture of the diversity that those narratives encompass, it starts with oral histories from Indigenous communities. Part of the history focuses on the role of Sumas Lake in Indigenous culture and the lasting effects of the lake’s disappearance. Other portions profile residents from a wide range of backgrounds. Pick up the book in local shops or find it online. 

In Chilliwack, check out The Chilliwack Story, a 2007 coffee-table book tracing the municipality’s history.

For the Western-movie fanatic: Ian Brown’s Hallowed Ground: Stories of the Yale Pioneer Cemetery covers the lives and stories of Yale pioneers—and forgotten everyday folk—who came to Yale, died, and were buried in the small town’s century-old cemetery. The book includes stories like the killing of the town’s doctor and the pursuit of his killer, and also provides insight into the tragic toll of the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway. Find the book at the Hope Visitor Centre.

For the memoir-lover: For the person on your gift list who “doesn’t really read fiction,” you won’t go wrong with Harrison Mooney’s Invisible Boy. Invisible Boy is an often-hilarious coming-of-age memoir that chronicle’s Mooney’s life growing up in Abbotsford as the adopted Black son of a white evangelical Christian family. Mooney takes readers inside the big-tent revivals, churches, and schools he grew up in on a journey towards self-discovery and understanding. Read more about the process Mooney went through to write his story here—and read about his eventual return to Abbotsford here. 

For the nature lover: Natalie Lang grew up on Sumas Mountain, watching her father occasionally fall trees, and walking the tangle of trails through the forest. In her book Remnants, Lang writes about the place she grew up, and how her perspective has changed as she has learned more about its pre-colonial history—and as she watched the devastation of the 2021 floods below on Sumas Prairie. Find the book online, or at local bookstores.

For a personal history of World War 2: Former Abbotsford Mayor Henry Braun’s book, Follow the Black Lines: The Story of George and Margaret (Siemens) Braun, was released earlier this year. The book follows Braun’s parents as they fled the Ukraine to Paraguay among thousands of other Mennonite families during the Second World War, and their eventual settlement in Abbotsford. Read about how the book came to be in this article. Find the book in local museums.

For kids learning about Sumas Lake: The Reach Gallery Museum published a children’s book about the history and importance of Sumas Lake three years ago, on the 100th anniversary of the draining of the lake. The book, Sema:th Xo:tsa Sts’olemeqwelh Sxo:tsa (Sema:th Xo:tsa Great-Gramma’s Lake) follows a boy and his grandmother on a drive around the area that the lake. It is illustrated in part with historic archival photos, altered digitally to show the lake’s history.

Where to find local books: The obvious place to start when shopping for the book-lover in your life is your community’s locally owned bookstores. But if you come up empty, other local institutions you may not have thought of may have the perfect book. In Hope and many other communities, the local visitor centres stock books specifically catering to people who want to learn more about the area. Most museums and many art galleries also have a gift shop filled with a wide array of books about locally relevant topics—not to mention other gift ideas. And, finally, small businesses like independent coffee shops, mom-and-pop general stores, inns, and other tourist-focused enterprises (especially those along Highway 7, north of the Fraser) also stock local books near the front counter. 

Did you use this story to buy a gift for a family member? Email us and tell us what you bought and where!