Top Ten Bestsellers on Canada's History

As of 17 August these are Canada's History's top bestsellers.

1. A World We Have Lost: Saskatchewan Before 1905. By Bill Waiser

A World We Have Lost examines the early history of Saskatchewan through an Aboriginal and environmental lens. Indian and mixed—descent peoples played leading roles in the story-as did the land and climate. Despite the growing British and Canadian presence, the Saskatchewan country remained Aboriginal territory. The region's peoples had their own interests and needs and the fur trade was often peripheral to their lives. Indians and Métis peoples wrangled over territory and resources, especially bison, and were not prepared to let outsiders control their lives, let alone decide their future. Native—newcomer interactions were consequently fraught with misunderstandings, sometimes painful difficulties, if not outright disputes.
By the early nineteenth century, a distinctive western society had emerged in the North—West-one that was challenged and undermined by the takeover of the region by young dominion of Canada. Settlement and development was to be rooted in the best features of Anglo—Canadian civilization, including the white race. By the time Saskatchewan entered confederation as a province in 1905, the world that Kelsey had encountered during his historic walk on the northern prairies had become a world we have lost. 

2. Capturing Hill 70: Canada’s Forgotten Battle. By by Douglas E. Delaney (Editor), Serge Marc Durflinger (Editor)

In August 1917, the Canadian Corps captured Hill 70, vital terrain just north of the French town of Lens. The Canadians suffered some 5,400 casualties and in three harrowing days defeated twenty-one German counterattacks. This spectacularly successful but shockingly costly battle was as innovative as Vimy, yet few Canadians have heard of it. Capturing Hill 70 marks the centenary of this triumph by dissecting different facets of the battle, from planning and conducting operations to long-term repercussions and commemoration. It reinstates Hill 70 to its rightful place among the pantheon of battles that forged the reputation of the famed Canadian Corps during the First World War.

3. The Vimy Trap: How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Great War. By Ian McKay (Author, Contributor), Jamie Swift (Author, Contributor)

The story of the bloody 1917 Battle of Vimy Ridge is, according to many of today’s tellings, a heroic founding moment for Canada. This noble, birth-of-a-nation narrative is regularly applied to the Great War in general. Yet this mythical tale is rather new. “Vimyism”— today’s official story of glorious, martial patriotism—contrasts sharply with the complex ways in which veterans, artists, clerics, and even politicians who had supported the war interpreted its meaning over the decades. Was the Great War a futile imperial debacle? A proud, nation-building milestone? Contending Great War memories have helped to shape how later wars were imagined. The Vimy Trap provides a powerful probe of commemoration cultures. This subtle, fast-paced work of public history—combining scholarly insight with sharp-eyed journalism, and based on primary sources and school textbooks, battlefield visits and war art—explains both how and why peace and war remain contested terrain in ever-changing landscapes of Canadian memory.

4. Tracks to the Trenches: Canadian Railway Troops
5. The Colour of Canada
6. Yakuglas’ Legacy: The Art and Times of Charlie James
7. The Promise of Canada: 150 Years
8. Father Bauer: The Genesis of Canadian Olympic Hockey
9. Imperial Plots: Women, Land, and the Spadework of British Colonialism
10. Backs to the Wall: The Battle of Sainte-Foy