As we count down to the end of 2025, we would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has supported us throughout the year.
-Happy Holidays, Amy, Sue, Erin, Kiara, and Sydney.
As you may have noticed from the picture, Sophia is missing. Sophia left and opened her own bookstore in Sackville, FluffyCat Books. We were delighted to have Sydney join our team in May.
On October 9th, 2024, to celebrate our 10th anniversary of selling our very first Blind Date with a Book, we held our first Blind Date with a Book Speed Dating Night. It was such a fun and successful evening that we decided to host a Blind Date with a Book Speed Dating Night every four months. For these special events, we would invite local authors with great first lines in their books to be our guests. The reason for this is that the opening line or two serves as our Blind Date’s “Pick-Up” line.
For Galentine’s Day, we invited the queen of first lines, Jane Doucet, author of The Pregnant Pause, Fishnets & Fantasies, and Lost & Found In Lunenburg. We asked Jane to talk about her favourite first lines, the first lines from her books, and a little bit about her upcoming book. Then we jumped right into the speed dating. After everyone had picked out their Blind Date with a Book, we played a game called ‘Pass the Book’ with the leftover Blind Date books, and three lucky people went home with an extra date. #whychoose #ReverseHarem
In June, we had Cathryn Fox join us. Having authored many books, we focused on The Burbs and The Bees because of its famous first line. This time, we changed up the game at the end of the event. After all the dates were unwrapped, we had a blast playing a ‘Left-Right’ game using the leftover Blind Date books. Lastly, for our October event, we had special guest Amy Spurway, author of Crow, join us. For 2026, we have Deanna Foster (Friday, February 13th) and donalee Moulton (June) already lined up. Please see our upcoming Galentine’s Day event for the format of our Blind Date with a Book Speed Dating Nights. Stay tuned to our events listing as these events fill fast.
On Tuesday, May 20th, the first Readings at the Woodside was held at the Woodside Tavern, the oldest bar in Dartmouth. Dartmouth Book Exchange was invited to be the bookseller at this inaugural event. Special guests included: Charlene Carr, We Rip the World Apart, and Susan LeBlanc, The Nowhere Places. The event was moderated by bestselling author Donna Jones Alward, When the World Fell Silent. This was such a successful event that the organizers are planning to do two reading events a year with Dartmouth Book Exchange as the booksellers. Readings at the Woodside- Two was held on November 4th with special guests Donna Jones Alward, Ship of Dreams, and Brenda Tyedmers, Mrs. Walford, moderated by Susan LeBlanc, The Nowhere Places.
Cindy Campbell-Stone, a member of the Storytellers of Canada and the Storytellers Circle of Halifax, agreed to present her The Shadow in the Window program, not once but twice, at our store. Both performances were completely booked and had great reviews. An abandoned house with shadowy windows, a hand that floats in the air, a grey lady that vanishes…these are the “things” that have been witnessed along Nova Scotia’s shores. Storyteller Cindy Campbell-Stone tells a spine-tingling performance of unexplained encounters in folklore. On the second night, we had a special surprise guest for Cindy, Bee Stanton, author and illustrator of Atlantic Ghosts.
Cindy also presented her original program, Lady in the Lighthouse: The Catherine Gallagher Story. Assisted by a grant from the Helen Creighton Folklore Society’s Grant-In-Aid Program and over a decade of research, Cindy created and designed this one-woman show and has dedicated it to Max Gallagher and the Gallagher family. The production contains various stories from Catherine’s life, and seven of the forty songs that she sang for Helen. Due to the popularity of this original program, it was also repeated for two evenings.
On August 20th, we welcomed back Mary Janet MacDonald with her third and final book in her trilogy. In Tunes and Wooden Spoons: Come In, the Kettle’s On!, Mary Janet, and her daughter, Margie, take us on an incredible culinary journey into several Maritime kitchens where they find good company and tasty food. Grandmothers and grandfathers from throughout Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island invite us into their kitchens where they share their secrets to healthy eating and strong families. It features 39 grandmothers and 2 grandfathers. One of the grandfathers even came to our event.
We held twelve locally authored book club meetings, hosting several local authors, including Jessie Harrold, Mothershift, Marjorie Simmins, Search for Puffins, Karen Kelloway, Keepers of the PACT, and Susan Murtagh, We’re Not Rich. For our June meeting, Debbie Marshall, one of our regular book club members, presented Too Many To Mourn: One Family’s Tragedy in the Halifax Explosion by James and Rowena Mahar. Debbie is the niece of James and Rowena Mahar. The book was published in 1998 by Nimbus Publishing, and it won the Dartmouth Book Award in 1999. It was republished and arrived at the Nimbus warehouse on the day of our meeting. Her presentation was very informative and eye-opening. Our next Locally Authored Book Club Meeting will be held on Wednesday, January 21st, with special guest Bretton Loney, Unsettling Time.
Dartmouth Book Exchange participated in many events off-site this year, including Lesley Crewe‘s Book Launch for The Spirit of Scatarie at the Woodlawn Library, Booked for Murder at Halifax Central Library, Donna Jones Alward‘s Cream Tea at the St. Mary’s Boat Club, Jacqueline Halsey‘s book launch for her middle-grade novel, Joe and the Wreck of the Tribune, at the Alderney Gate Library, and Donna Jones Alward‘s Ship of Dreams book event at Prescott House Museum.
We had many more exciting events this year, including: An Event to Die For” with special guests donalee Moulton, Vernon Oickle, and Retired RCMP Officer Gary Grant. Together with 20 fans, a couple of pots of NovelTea’s Vlad’s First Bite Berry Bliss Herbal Tea, and a psychopath quiz, made this event not only fun but quite a success. Donna Jones Alward’s Ship of Dreams Release Day Party, A Meet & Greet pop-up with Lana Shupe, the author of the picture books: The Lonely Little Light House, and The Book Witch, The Wee White Dog, and the Little Free Library. Romance Reimagined, a Bookstore Romance Day event with Cathryn Fox, Nicole Northwood, and surprise guest Deanna Foster. We hosted Lori Weber‘s We Walked Him To The Door book launch. We had Meet & Greets with the Pottersfield Prize Winners for Creative Nonfiction for 2024: Co-authors James MacDuff and Mirriam Mweemba for The Illogical Adventure, and Matthew R. Anderson for Someone Else’s Saint. Also, Janice Landry, Every Little Thing. For Halloween, we had an In the Shadows Tea with authors Deanna Foster and B.R. Myers drinking NovelTea’s Bram Stoker’s Vlad’s First Bite Berry Bliss Herbal tea. Deanna also did short “Fear” 4-card tarot card readings at the end of the event. We had A Halifax Legal Thriller Showcase with Pamela Callow, the bestselling author of the Kate Lange thriller series. We also had several holiday events, including An Evergreen Christmas with Joyce Baxter, a Holiday Book Event with Denise Flint and Deana Foster, and to finish the year, we celebrated Jane Austen’s 250th Birthday with Michelle Helliwell, Nicole Northwood, and Kelly Boyce.
We had another wonderful year, filled with numerous fun events, some deliciously great-tasting tea, and several outstanding readings and programs. We hope to continue to make more community connections in the New Year, and we thank you for your continued support of the store. Visit our events page on our website for information on all our upcoming events and special guests.