Books and Backroads: A literary road trip

Nova Scotia's summer reading habit has a scenic route this year. Books and Backroads is back for its fourth season, the same series that pairs the province's best independent bookstores with its most drive-worthy stretches of road. It's a natural fit for anyone who likes to combine a good book with a bit of exploring, and this season it's grown a little larger than before.

The series started three summers ago in New Brunswick and has since expanded across the Maritimes, with public libraries in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island now taking part. CBC is collaborating again with rural public libraries to connect readers with local stories, and the whole thing is produced by the Nova Scotia Book Industry Council and the Nova Scotia Tourism Association. Over the course of the summer, you can follow a curated reading list of local authors, catch book club discussions on CBC Radio starting in July, and drop into live community events.

This year's list spreads across seven rural communities in the region, so it's as much about the places as the pages. In Nova Scotia, you'll find 'The Spoon Stealer' by Lesley Crewe over in Louisbourg, Cape Breton, and 'The Berry Pickers' by Amanda Peters at the Sheet Harbour Public Library. The rest of the list wanders into New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island, with titles like 'My Two Grandmothers' by Diane Carmel Léger, 'The Luckiest Ones' by Vicki Reddin-Gauthier, 'Secret Me' by Angel Jendrick, 'Run, Hide, Repeat' by Pauline Dakin, and 'Haunted Heart' by Laverne Stewart.

If you'd rather hear the books than read them, the discussions and videos end up on the series page, and the authors and conversations run on CBC Radio One's morning and afternoon programs — Mainstreet PEI, Information Morning in the Summer New Brunswick, Information Morning Mainland Nova Scotia, and Information Morning Cape Breton. There's also a bit of a contest built in: during the week of June 29, you could walk away with the complete 2026 Books and Backroads collection.

For a sense of what the live side looks like, there's a short video titled 'Books & Backroads: Postcard from Sheet Harbour' that takes you into a book club in that fishing village on Nova Scotia's eastern shore, where the latest read is 'The Berry Pickers'. Library staff Danielle Jackson and Tracy Lowe walk you through what makes the small community memorable, which is a nice preview if you're planning to make the drive yourself. The whole series is part of the CBC Collab public library collaboration program, so it's built around the libraries rather than any one bookstore.

Whether you're a regular at your local branch or just looking for an excuse to get out of the city for a weekend, it's an easy way to discover a local author and a new corner of the province at the same time. The reading list, the radio discussions, and the community events are all free, so the only real cost is the gas to get there. For the full list of books and where to find them, cbc.ca/booksandbackroads is the place to start.