Now You Know Canada: 150 Years of Fascinating Facts

Now You Know

by Doug Lennox

A Toronto Star Bestseller!
A new collection of the best Canadian trivia in honour of Canada's 150th birthday.

Just in time for Canada's 150th birthday comes this collection of the best in Canadian questions and answers, covering history, famous Canadians, sports, word origins, geography, and everything in between. In these pages, you'll learn the answers to questions like:
Where did the word Canuck come from? How did an aristocratic French girl become a Canadian Robinson Crusoe?
What famous explorer played hockey in the Arctic?
Who was the first black woman elected to Canada's Parliament?
What unlikely team beat Canada for the gold medal for hockey in the 1936 Winter Olympics? How did the Halifax Explosion occur?

Genres: Nonfiction, Canada

208 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 2017

About the author

Doug Lennox was an internationally acclaimed broadcaster, a veteran character actor, a commercial voice artist, and a bestselling author. He has appeared in more than 60 films and television features, including X-Men, Police Academy, Lonesome Dove, and Against the Ropes, and shared screen time with Meg Ryan, Hugh Jackman, Burt Reynolds, Holly Hunter, Eric McCormack, Gary Oldman, and a myriad of others.

Reviews

[The Sassy Bookworm · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a fun little book. Being Canadian I already knew a lot of what was in the book, but there was plenty interesting facts ranging from politicians, celebrities, sports (and much more) that kept me entertained.

[Diana · Rating 3 out of 5]

Book received from NetGalley.

It's been a while since I read this book, but I remember really enjoying it. It was a quick read and I learned quite a bit about our neighbors to the North. I was more interested in the history, geography, and people of Canada rather than the sports. I have to admit my attention waned when I got to that part. I may have to get a copy of this to add to my shelves.

[Carla · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a great way to celebrate Canada's 150th birthday. This book is packed with facts all about Canada and Canadians. It is written in a question/answer format which touches on various topics and themes. The author covers a variety of subjects from geography, sports, disasters, war and heroes. Being an avid hockey fan, I loved this section and was not surprised that this was the largest section in the book. I thought I knew a lot about our country, but was surprised with the many things that were new to me. I like that I can not read and find out more about topics of interest that I was not familiar with. It was like reading a bunch of teasers, just enough information to make me want to find out more. It was fun to read about so many Canadians who helped shape this country and in many cases the world into what it is today! I definitely recommend this book to school libraries! The publisher generously provided me with a copy of this book via Netgalley.

[Damaris · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a really cute book! I love the cover and the design throughout - Dundurn always does a really great job with formatting and design throughout all of their books.

Not only is it cute, it's also informative! I learned a lot of things in the short time it took to read Now You Know Canada: 150 Years of Fascinating Facts. For example: Did you know that in the 1942 movie Captains of the Clouds, starring James Cagney, Billy Bishop played himself as a Royal Canadian Air Force officer presiding over the graduation of cadet pilots? Or, that D-Day was the first time the Canadian army fought under the Red Ensign? Before that Canadians had fought under the British Union Jack. Or, did you know that Hockey Night in Canada is the longest-running sports show in the world? The program began in 1952 and is still airing today on CBC!

Now You Know Canada also has a really lovely 'Question and Feature List' at the back that provides a quick and easy reference for when you want to know an answer to a fascinating fact. I think this is such a great addition to an already great book! It makes it so much more accessible and reusable.

In short, I really do think Now You Know Canada is a wonderful book. I was talking with a friend recently who told me she thought American history was more interesting than Canadian history. I politely had to tell her that I disagreed; that Canadian history is just as interesting as American, but that Canadians are sadly often more educated in American history than Canadian. And that's sad. Thankfully, books like Now You Know Canada: 150 Years of Fascinating Facts are helping Canadians becoming acquainted with Canadian history - and bravo to Dundurn for that!

[Thebooktrail · Rating 5 out of 5]

I do know Canada better now so it's worked!

Visit the book locations Now you know Canada 150



This is just the fun book you would hope to read to find out more about a country. Lots of questions you might not have thought of before but once you know the answers you’ll wonder how you never thought to ask.

I bought books similar to this when living there as I love to get underneath the skin of a country and its different ways. Things I knew before going there and things learned when in a country are very different but this book manages to merge the weird and whacky, serious and otherwise without it feeling like a history lesson. Written in the form of questions is good too – links and flows well. Answers are educational without you feeling you’re sat in a classroom. All books make you wiser and richer and this one definately does!

[Helen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Originally posted on HellyReads

The subtitle of this book is "150 Years of Fascinating Facts" - I'm not sure that I would go so far as saying fascinating, but there was certainly some interesting stuff in here.

Written to celebrate Canada's 150th birthday this gives information about all kinds of things ranging from political figures (many of whom I had never heard of), geographical details, historical details about the rebellions (I never knew there were any), information about different spots, athletes and celebrities. Like I say, interesting, but not necessarily fascinating.

I imagine that anyone who is fascinated by trivia would love this, as I expect would any Canadians. I definitely learned stuff from this, although I'm not sure how useful it will be, or how long I will be able to remember it for!!

[Teena in Toronto · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm always interested in learning more about Canada. "Now You Know Canada" provides 150 facts in celebration of Canada's 150th birthday this year.

The chapters include:
* O Canada!
* Policy-makers and ground-breakers
* Rebellions
* Canada at war
* Heroes and legends
* Prodigies of science, invention and medicine
* Canadian disasters
* Intrepid explorers
* Entertain me
* The old ball game (baseball)
* Gridiron history (football)
* Canada's game (hockey)
* The beautiful game ... now in Canada (soccer)
* Scoops on Canadian hoops (basketball)
* Canada's other national game (lacrosse)
* Rocks and rolls (curling)
* Making a splash (swimming)
* Olympic feats
* More champions of Canadian sport

There was interesting information and trivia. I found it was really sports heavy, though ... half the book covers various sports. While I found some of it interesting, I was less interested in the sports stories and would have liked to have read more about entertainment, disasters, heroes, etc.

The information is laid out in easily digestible chunks. It would have been nice to have had more pictures to break up all the text (there were just a couple pictures).

Blog review post: http://www.teenaintoronto.com/2017/06...

[Jeimy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Read this one for Canada Day and learned a lot about the country, its history, and its people. While it was very informative, I did not like the Q&A format.

[What Angie Reads · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of great facts about Canada. My son and I had fun reading this.

[Jamie Bowen · Rating 5 out of 5]

A brilliant little book with some fascinating little titbits on Canada’s history. Well worth a read.

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Do I know Canada ?
Let’s see? --- For the most part, I think I do. It’s a big country with a lot going on. Come to think of it, I probably need a little refresher course.

What’s in the book ?
- 10 sections ranging from Canadian Disasters, Champions of Canadian Sports to Rocks and Rolls.
- Some great questions with straightforward answers

I liked the addition of the “Did You Know” after some questions. These additional tidbits of information were educational and fun to read.

- Who was the Cape Breton Giant ? (I didn’t have a clue)
- What popular board game was created by Canadians ? (I got this one)
- Who is Peter Puck ? (Ummmm…)

My only point of critique would be that it was a little too sports heavy for my liking. Other than that, it is a very entertaining book.

How you read this book depends on you. I’d find a chapter I was curious about and went from there. As I’d read I would ask my little ones – who are currently learning about the birth of Canada – questions from the book. I think it’s a great way to learn about history without burying yourself with too much detail, a nice springboard for diving further into a specific topic.

With my kids, it was a great way to get the discussion going on some topics they knew very little about. It’s one of those books you want to leave lying around. Instead of picking up your digital device for mindless social browsing, spend a few minutes getting to know your Canada with: Now You Know Canada.

Now You Know Canada is a gem of a book, perfect for inquisitive minds and trivia buffs.

Did I know my Canada ? Not as well as I thought I did. 

an e-galley was provided by the publisher in exchange for my honest review

[Lorrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of interesting facts about Canada in a wide variety of topics. I just wish there were photos to go with the facts. It would have added a lot to the overall appeal of the book. My other complaint about this book is that it is rather sports-heavy. Certainly we've contributed more to the world than athletes.

[Laura Lawson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great trivia and little facts. Lead to some interesting conversations as well.

[Alicia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Indeed fascinating facts. "Now You Know Canada: 150 Years of Fascinating Facts" is like a tray with all kinds of tapas: small digestible bits of general knowledge about Canada that you can pick in no particular order and read all at once or just a couple at a time. The book contains several categories and the information is divided into questions (Who was the first.... Did you know that...) followed by a paragraph with the answer and some of the story behind it. You can even find the list of questions in the afterword. There is something for everyone, from fun facts, history, politics and sports to women in history, science and legends.

What makes this ebook specially nice is that it is not tedious to read, the question & explanation format is great for reading on the go, when you struggle to digest long texts cramped with facts or if you feel like skipping one entire section (or jumping straight into it). My favorite bits were: Wolverine's Canadian heritage, Scotty's missing finger (yes, "beam me up Scotty") and Winnie the Pooh. Cant wait to use some of these as conversation starters!

[Moth · Rating 2 out of 5]

I ate the history section of this book. Sadly, most of this book is actually sports and I lost interest after the baseball section of this book, skipping until the Olympics section. I was very disappointed in how much was sports, the hockey section was expected and stretched the longest, but it was still more than the whole countries history. Up to this point, I was in love with this book and in love with the fact I got to discuss these things with my friend. But having skipped most of the sports, I finished the book in one day feeling disappointed. There really isn't much else to say about this one other than it was good and would have been better if it had paid a bit more attention to the history and people and not just the sports, making it more of a book everyone would have found enjoyable.

(Full review on my blog)

[Lisa Day · Rating 4 out of 5]

Apparently I wasn't paying attention in history class as I didn't know most of the "fascinating facts" found in Doug Lennox's book. (I also didn't know who Doug Lennox was until I looked him up.) I liked that the information was presented in short bits that left you with your questions answered, but you didn't feel like you were reading a boring history book. And it was the history facts that most interested me. I must confess, I didn't much care about the sports trivia, although I did know Youppi! was the mascot first for the Montreal Expos, before being signed to the Montreal Canadiens, making him the first mascot in pro sports to switch leagues.

[Ilana · Rating 4 out of 5]

A smart way to celebrate the 150 anniversary of the Canadian Confederation. The book has a lot of facts and interesting information about a country we hardly know besides the beautiful landscapes and some - usually stereotypical - views on multiculturalism. It is a real tour de force through history, women in politics and science, sports and a lot of other trivia facts. Strongly recommended to curious people keen to discover different stories about Canada.
Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review

[Jenn · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is packed with facts all about Canada and Canadians. The author covers a variety of subjects from geography, sports, disasters, war and heroes. What I enjoyed reading about the most - baseball, war, explorers and those who weren't afraid to lead the way and stand up for what they believed in. It was fun to read about some of the brave Canadians who helped shape this country into what it is today!

Thank you to Netgalley and Dundurn for a copy of this book.

[Duckpondwithoutducks · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a cute little book with a lot of interesting facts about Canada. The way they tried to introduce every fact with a question heading was a bit clunky, though. Also, half of the book was sports facts. That's a bit too many sports facts for me. I would have preferred ten percent sports facts, tops.

[Andrew · Rating 1 out of 5]

Rather then being about a broad range of accomplishments events, this book is mostly about sports trivia which I am not at all interested in. Yes there are mentions about the first woman to do this, first black or indigenous to do that. I am far more interested in the first PERSON to accomplish something rather then artificially promoting diversity.

[Tracee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Just a bunch of facts, ma'am

[Emily · Rating 2 out of 5]

Unless you’re really into sports, I’d take a pass.

[Ayham Alomari · Rating 3 out of 5]

A nice reference book. Not easy read cover to cover. First chapter is very much informative and interesting

[Robin Green · Rating 3 out of 5]

Decent, but a lot of sports stuff. Was disappointed that some of the things I knew about (like the slide at Frank) weren't in it.

[Linda Leafloor · Rating 3 out of 5]

Because I wasn’t interested in many of the sports highlighted in the book, I felt I couldn’t award more stars. But I found much of interest in other sections of the book.

[Kazia · Rating 2 out of 5]

It really was an interesting read—I did learn quite a bit and/or was reminded of things I learned in/recalled from the past, sometimes compelling me to look them up on the Internet for more information; however, I am disappointed that, if my calculations are correct, more than 50 per cent of the book was on sports. Some of the sports facts were interesting, and I understand that (certain) sports are a part of the Canadian identity (e.g., hockey, lacrosse), but I think dedicating half the book to sports makes the country, even as young as it is, a bit of an embarrassment? Have we nothing else to offer by way of "fascinating facts"?

Also, on one page, it says, "There is no record that lacrosse was ever made Canada's official national game." A few pages later, it says, "DID YOU KNOW ... that lacrosse is Canada's official national sport of summer, while Canada's official national sport of winter is ice hockey?" So, lacrosse is Canada's official national game/sport but only in the summertime, otherwise it's ice hockey?

[Sammm]

A digitized ARC of this book was provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Review WIP

[Andréa]

Note: I received a digital review copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley.