Thomas King’s Featured Books

Indians on Vacation

“From the first page, King’s sardonic and very funny voice leads us to places we never expect to go …European and Indigenous history collide and there’s no one better to examine the aftermath.” 
– Toronto Star

Meet Bird and Mimi in this brilliant new novel from one of Canada’s foremost authors. Inspired by a handful of old postcards sent by Uncle Leroy nearly a hundred years earlier, Bird and Mimi attempt to trace Mimi’s long-lost uncle and the family medicine bundle he took with him to Europe. 

 “I’m sweaty and sticky. My ears are still popping from the descent into Vaclav Havel. My sinuses ache. My stomach is upset. My mouth is a sewer. I roll over and bury my face in a pillow. Mimi snuggles down beside me with no regard for my distress.

 ‘My god,’ she whispers, ‘can it get any better?’”

By turns witty, sly and poignant, this is the unforgettable tale of one couple’s holiday trip to Europe, where their wanderings through its famous capitals reveal a complicated history, both personal and political.

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Owl’s Nest Books | Shelf Life Books

Obsidian

“King’s Thumps Dreadfulwater is a marvelous character … any of King’s Dreadfulwater novels will take you right out of your reading chair and into the action.” – The Globe and Mail

Thumps DreadfulWater’s world is turned upside down when Nina Maslow, the producer of a true-crime reality-TV show, turns up dead after working on a cold case that Thumps has spent years trying to forget. What’s more, someone seems set on taunting Thumps, leaving reminders of the Obsidian murder case around town. Is it possible that the elusive serial killer who murdered his girlfriend and her daughter all those years ago has resurfaced in Chinook? Or is this the work of a copycat looking to mess with Thumps by stirring up memories from his past? 

Dragged back into a case that has haunted him for years, Thumps DreadfulWater is determined to solve the mystery of the Obsidian murders. But as he works the case, he begins to realize just how dangerous the person he is dealing with is — and that he might be the next target. 

Thumps DreadfulWater, the sly, wry, reluctant investigator of Cold Skies and A Matter of Malice, returns in another irresistible mystery that only Thomas King could create. 

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Owl’s Nest Books | Shelf Life Books

77 Fragments of a Familiar Ruin

Seventy-seven poems intended as a eulogy for what we have squandered, a reprimand for all we have allowed, a suggestion for what might still be salvaged, a poetic quarrel with our intolerant and greedy selves, a reflection on mortality and longing, as well as a long-running conversation with the mythological currents that flow throughout North America.

King’s debut collection of poetry, 77 Fragments of a Familiar Ruin was shortlisted for the 2020 Gerald Lampert Memorial Award for Poetry.

Buy the Book:

Owl’s Nest Books | Shelf Life Books