Eldon Garnet's "Lost Between the Edges" is a novel surprising not just for the prose but also for the passion. It deals with the difficult subject of Ernst Zundel and the ARA in Toronto, using facts and footnotes, while undercutting facts to reveal deeper truths.

Garnet uses imaginary and real characters, such as Zundel, and creates a realistic, sometimes frightening, sometimes pathetic, image of him. The conversations with white supremacists and ARA members are so accurate that they may have been dictated.

Back when this was all occurring, I casually knew people on both sides of the bullshit. One of the book's early conversations with a neo-nazi named Hans is not just correct in spirit but in actual delivery. His characters use many of the same phrases and arguments that I have heard, the same style and the same irrational begging of the primitive emotions.

I smiled in recognition of the repeated questions about whether someone cares about their race, the fear mongering against the Asians, the sentimental and ill-founded dreams of a time past. And so forth. It was all dreadfully familiar. It was a bitter smile.

This book is important not just for its style and intelligence but because these pernicious forces at the edge of our civilization still remain. One only needs to read the hateful nonsense espoused daily on Craigslist's Rants and Raves to see that. The question, as always, is how best to counter them.

When I was a mere boy, I used to love to read my school's selection of true and amazing survival stories. They were the sort of nonsense where Johnny Hero fights off a bear with a penknife. The same people published books where Johnny Hero fought off space aliens with a flashlight. Since I was an aspiring kleptomaniac, I still have many of these books around. Now I've finally found a replacement.

"The Worst Case Survival Almanac: Great Outdoors" is the type of book that makes you appreciate the being indoors. (Preferably beside the fireplace, smoking a pipe and stroking a beagle.) This book may even stop Torontonians from wandering into the forest with cases of beer and bags of mushrooms. But I doubt it.

It contains true and amazing adventure stories with how-to guides. Because you will probably never need any of this advice -especially if you're sane and inside-- the book is not afraid to have some fun. It tells you, for example, how to survive an encounter with Bigfoot. While such an encounter may seem unlikely, I think it is roughly as probable as the sudden need to build a wigwam.

So place this handsome little tome upon your toilet and read it as the mood takes you. It is a wise and fun way to use otherwise wasted time. While other people are merely defecating, you are becoming a hardened survivalist.

With Toronto already celebrating its first smog days, I picked up Lori Ryker's "Off the Grid Homes" with a bit of enthusiasm. Though I love the smell of progress as much as the next fellow, I have started thinking Toronto's pollution, created by coal fire and car engine, is becoming the fetid stink of the obsolete.

Unfortunately there was nothing of real help or import in this handsome volume. Most of these case studies are country mansions, which makes them rather exceptional cases. Ryker proffers no affordable solutions for the urban apartment complexes that the bulk of humanity calls home. These people as well as a billion Chinese will have to continue living on the grid until they can afford a house made from sustainable wood products.

The book is quite nice looking and leaving it upon your coffee table will inform your guests that you are an intelligent and liberal sort of person possessed by a deep concern for the environment. It is not so shallow looking as the photographic rockstar biographies you may otherwise be tempted to display.

Tomorrow evening, Burning Effigy Press is hosting its Spring Launch Party at the Victory Cafe. (581 Markham Street.) It starts at 7:30 and runs until 11. This should allow you plenty of time to change out of your church clothes and into your evening wear. Properly timed, you could perhaps enjoy a brandy and cigar before attending.

It's a free event, featuring readings by Timothy Carter (Section K), Jeff Cottrill (Guilt Pasta), and Brett Alexander Savory & Gord Zajac (The Distance Traveled: A Little Slice of Heaven). Burning Effigy Press' editor-in-chief, Monica S. Kuebler, will be your host.

Though rain has been forecasted, weathermen have all the credibility of astrologers. Should their baseless predictions turn out to be correct, just remember what my dear grandmother used to say: "It never rains in a pub."

Monica has offered three free books to you, the loyal BlogTO readership. To receive your copy, simply email me before they're gone at ryanoakley at blogto dot com. Please provide your mailing address. Then sit back, relax and wait for your little surprise to arrive.

Tish Cohen's "Town House" is a quirky book. It's about Jack Madigan, the agoraphobic son of a dead rock legend, whose money has run out and whose house is up for sale.

There are quite a few characters for any book, let alone one that is mainly set within a single home. These include an ex-wife, a strangely attired teenage son, a one eyed cat, an inept real estate agent, a geriatric psychiatrist and so forth. Every character is eccentric. Even the house doesn't fit in to its neighborhood.

Against this backdrop, Jack almost seems normal. His agoraphobia is just another personal quirk. A bit worse than his son's disco ball but not as bad as his real estate agent's hair. The difference is that the world leaves these oddballs in relative peace. It does not extend the same courtesy to Jack. He must deal with and try to overcome his craziness.

Richard Flanagan's "The Unknown Terrorist" is a comment on what can and does happen to people who live in a society governed by fear. It's about our world after Sept 11, where the media judges and convicts while pretending to analyze, where brown skin is considered evidence and the show trials happen before the real trials begin. If they begin.

It does not take place in America but in a Commonwealth country like our own, Australia, and in a city like our own, Sydney. It reminded me of the accusations against "The Toronto 17" and our rush to believe them guilty. What did we base that on? Their skin? Their religion? What the media or the police told us? Those are pretty wonky foundations at the best of times. Mixed with fear they can be deadly.

Although this book may sound like a hard and heavy read, Flanagan never neglects his characters. The protagonist, a stripper named Doll, is a symbol of the west, whose meaning changes and deepens as the story moves forward. But, more importantly she is a believable, if not completely likable, character. (I suspect that Mr. Flanagan carefully researched his local pole-dancing establishments.) Doll is a genuine person, both victim and victimizer, often seeing her own sins reflected back upon her.