Conundrum’s Fall 2026 Lineup
Conundrum Press is thrilled to announce an exciting fall 2026 lineup!
Starting the fall season off in September are two new editions of previously published Conundrum Press titles. First up is the second edition of Cole Pauls’ Iłēge zedle s̱on nes̱it’īn (Tahltan for We See Stars Only at Night) a surrealistic landscape of Tahltan shapes, culture and motifs. Originally created for the Nanaimo Art Gallery’s group show “Gutters are Elastic” between July 15 – September 23, 2023, Pauls decided to expand the work into a full length book. Playing with the connection between land, regalia, performance and heritage, Pauls follows in the footsteps of Tiger Tateishi, Hironori Kikuchi and Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas with his dream-like narrative. This is a second edition new format reprint of the original Conundrum 25 book, printed in duotone and in landscape format to better highlight the art.
Next up is the 12th anniversary edition of Meags Fitzgerald’s Photobooth: A Biography, in celebration of the release of “Photobooth: A Documentary” soon to be streaming on Crave (eyesteel films and Gorgeous Mistake Productions)! For almost a century chemical photobooths have occupied public spaces, giving people the opportunity to quickly take inexpensive, quality photos. In the last two decade these machines have started to rapidly disappear, causing an eclectic group of individuals from around the world to come together and respond. Illustrator, writer and long-time photobooth lover, Meags Fitzgerald has chronicled the photobooth’s fortuitous history and the events which gave rise to the desperate need to save them. Having traveled in North America, Europe and Australia, she’s constructed a biography of the booth through the eyes of technicians, owners, collectors, artists and fanatics. In this ground-breaking book Fitzgerald struggles with her own relationship to these fleeting machines, while looking to the future.
In October we have Borderline. In her highly anticipated first book Mi’kmaq artist Zeta Paul tells her story as an Indigenous urban youth, her perspective of the world transitioning into a digital era, straying from nature and into a gray monochromatic capitalist society that is constantly reinforcing the ideology that ‘life could be better’. The title ‘Borderline’ refers to both a diagnoses of Borderline Personality Disorder but is also a reflection on a home life that has no stability, no control, no voice, and how growing up in borderline circumstances has affected her life and how it continues into adulthood.
Also in October we have Donald Calabrese’s COADY. COADY explores Moses Coady’s personal triumphs and misgivings alongside a contemporary historian’s attempt to reconcile the spirit of Twentieth Century revolutionary economics with the vanishing political resistance of post-industrial Atlantic Canada. Unlike other biographical work on Coady and the Antigonish Movement, Cape Breton native Calabrese uses archival material and the Coady papers to focus on private misgivings and personal struggles in addition to his contributions to the co-operative movement and social justice. It is also a metahistory that asks questions about how we mythologize our past and form our cultural identities.
Wrapping up the fall 2026 season is Emily Chou’s On Your Way, this year’s title from our YA imprint, EMANATA. Wallflower Allison Wong has three constants in her life: school, studying, and clandestine guitar lessons from a ghost named Keefer. After her mom sets her up with a peer tutor to fix her unacceptable chemistry grades, Allison finds herself thrust into the thriving indie music scene of the late 90s. Finally, Allison feels like she belongs somewhere, but she has to decide if she’d rather give up on her newfound friendships in order to keep her mom happy, or if she’s brave enough to fight for the person she’s becoming. Meanwhile, back in 1971, studious Katherine Chen lives in the shadow of her charismatic older brother, Keefer. She works tirelessly towards her dream of becoming a doctor, yet no one, least of all her father, takes her or her goals seriously. When she helps a mysterious shopkeeper, she is granted a single wish as thanks. Katherine can finally have everything she ever wanted, but at what cost? Set in Vancouver between and across the two time periods, On Your Way is a story about imperfect love, breaking patterns, and the music that carries us through it all.
Preorder all these titles from the Conundrum Press online shop now!