Visit www.cbc.ca to learn about this year’s “Canada Reads” program which has the following information about a great Canadian celebration of books and reading. Canada Reads is an annual literary event on CBC Radio One where five celebrity panelists are asked to defend their favourite Canadian works of fiction. Day by day, books are voted off the list, until one panelist triumphs with the book for Canada to read this year. The half-hour debates will air from February 25 to February 29 at 11:30 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. No one is expected to love every title on the short list, any more than every one of the panelists is expected to love them all. Books are a matter of personal taste, and each one has its detractors and its fans. You’ll enjoy listening to the debates whether or not you’ve read the books, but reading them first will add to the fun. Visit the website for regular updates and features on this year’s panelists, books and authors. You can vote in a weekly poll and compare your reading preferences and habits against those of the nation....

Ontario has a new public holiday called “Family Day” to be celebrated on the third Monday of February. Our Library will be closed on Feb. 18. Ontarians are encouraged that day to spend some quality time with family and loved ones and to enjoy some of Ontario's favourite attractions. There is nothing more valuable to families than time together. And yet it seems tougher than ever to find, with so many of us living such busy lives. Check out the Ministry of Tourism's Winter in Ontario website for all kinds of fun ideas at www.ontariotravel.net/winter Throughout the year many residents borrow library books to discover new nooks and crannies of our area. Just published last year was “Niagara seasons” featuring photographs, paintings and text by Mary Friesen.“Frommer's Niagara region” shows...

“First Nations Public Library Week” which will be celebrated next week encourages First Nations libraries to feature their resources and services in their communities and invites all public libraries to promote related materials. The book “Ancient Thunder” by Leo Yerxa was the winner of the 2006 Governor General's Award for Illustration and honoured as the First Nations Communities Read selection. The book is available at the Victoria Avenue Library Library. A beautiful and visionary book, Ancient Thunder celebrates wild horses and the natural world of the prairies. Using an extraordinary technique, Yerxa, an artist of Ojibway ancestry, makes paper look like leather, so that his illustrations seem to be painted on leather shirts. Each shirt is accompanied by a rich song of praise for the wild horses that came to play such an important role in the lives of the First Peoples. Years in the making, the book is...

Everyone is invited to meet Niagara author Telsie Boese-Bell on Feb. 10 from 2pm to 3pm in the LaMarsh Room of the Victoria Avenue Library. Boese-Bell will take you on a journey through parts of her new book "The Soul". The book's goal is to help readers build a strong belief system that will ultimately support their destiny and help in times of trouble. It's mission is living in a world with peace and love.

The author notes that "writing about the journeys of my life, the lessons that have changed my belief system to include all faiths, all races and form a compassionate heart to assist the human soul to move through their life's journey, I begin a new chapter toward mastering my goals in my retirement years, seeing my life's dreams manifested into reality".

Boese-Bell life learning lessons include...