books on water

My Books Selling at Banyen Books & Sound, Vancouver

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Water Is… sits on the shelf at Banyen Books (photo by Nina Munteanu)

My books “Water Is… The Meaning of Water” and “A Diary in the Age of Water” are selling at Banyen Books in Kitsilano, Vancouver. While “A Diary in the Age of Water” is on Banyen’s virtual shelf for order, “Water Is…” sits on a shelf in the Water: Life-force & Resource / Ecology section.

“Water Is…” sits on the ‘water as life-force & resource’ shelf at Banyen Books, Vancouver (photo by Nina Munteanu)

Banyen Books is located in Kitsilano on the south side of W 4th Avenue on the corner of Dunbar under a grove of healthy oak trees. Across the store is Aphrodite’s Organic Pies, itself a destination for awesome pies. Banyen Books is a beautiful store. It is spacious and surrounded with the warmth of wood and plants. Its wonderful atmosphere invites you to browse the shelves and sit on the comfortable chairs to read. Banyen Books has become a destination for me whenever I’m in Vancouver.

Banyen Books on the corner of W 4th and Dunbar, Vancouver, BC (photo by Nina Munteanu)

Since opening in 1970 Banyen Books has become Canada’s most comprehensive metaphysical bookstore, offering a broad spectrum of resources from humanity’s spiritual, healing, and earth wisdom traditions. Here is how they put it:

Banyen is an oasis, a crossroads, a meeting place… for East and West, the “old ways” and current discoveries and syntheses. Our beat is the “Perennial Philosophy” as well as our evolving learning edges and best practices in a wide variety of fields, from acupuncture to Zen, from childbirth and business to the Hermetic Mysteries, from the compost pile to the celestial spheres. We’re “in the philosophy business,” on “a street in the philosophy district” (as an old cartoon wagged). We welcome and celebrate the love of wisdom, be it in art, science, lifecraft, healing, visioning, religion, psychology, eco-design, gardening… Our service is to offer life-giving nourishment for the body (resilient, vital), the mind (trained, open), and the soul (resonant, connected, in-formed). Think of us as your open source bookstore for the “University of Life”.

Whenever I’m in Vancouver to visit family and friends, I make at least one stop at Banyen Books and often come out with an armful of books. On my most recent stop, I purchased a book on plant intelligence and several beautiful journals (I use a journal for each book project I work on).

My latest purchase at Banyen Books (photo by Nina Munteanu)

Banyen Books & Sound:

3608 West 4th Avenue
Vancouver, BC
604-732-7912

HOURS:

Mon-Fri: 10am-9pm
Sat: 10am-8pm
Sun: 11am-7pm

19th Avenue in Vancouver, BC (photo by Nina Munteanu)

Nina Munteanu is a Canadian ecologist / limnologist and novelist. She is co-editor of Europa SF and currently teaches writing courses at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. Visit www.ninamunteanu.ca for the latest on her books. Nina’s bilingual “La natura dell’acqua / The Way of Water” was published by Mincione Edizioni in Rome. Her non-fiction book “Water Is…” by Pixl Press (Vancouver) was selected by Margaret Atwood in the New York Times ‘Year in Reading’ and was chosen as the 2017 Summer Read by Water Canada. Her novel “A Diary in the Age of Water” was released by Inanna Publications (Toronto) in June 2020.

When Water Speaks: quotes from A Diary in the Age of Water

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“There is no depression more debilitating than knowing that you cannot go back home, even though you’re already there.”

Lynna Dresden

“This is a significant book for our times … creative, inventive, and possibly prescient.”

DAVID CAMERON, Amazon Review

“Profound and brilliant.  Scary and comforting at the same time. Life will go on. Water will go on.”

NINA DARRELL Amazon Review
Bridge over creek in Trent Nature Sanctuary during heavy snowfall, ON (photo and rendition by Nina Munteanu)

When Water Speaks: quotes from A Diary in the Age of Water

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“What if water doesn’t like being owned or ransomed? What if it doesn’t like being channelled into a harsh pipe system or into a smart cloud to go where it normally doesn’t want to go? What if those hurricanes and tornadoes and floods are water’s way of saying that it’s had enough?”

Hilde Dresden

“Thoroughly researched and cleverly executed, A Diary in the Age of Water is a must-read, especially for those who are longing for nature, and touch, while fearing both.”

CARA MOYNES, Amazon Review

“This novel made my heart clench…An extremely detailed and downright terrifying look into the future of our planet. A Diary in the Age of Water will appeal to lovers of eco-fiction and hard speculative fiction.”

GOODREADS REVIEW
Maple tree branches hover over shallows of Otonabee River, ON (photo and rendition by Nina Munteanu)

When Water Speaks: quotes from A Diary in the Age of Water

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“The slow violence of free-market capitalism isn’t so much the deliberate and focused actions of a few evil men as the accumulated negligence of an undiscriminating collective of unimaginative humans.”

Lynna Dresden

“In her dystopian novel Canadian limnologist Nina Munteanu employs Solar Punk’s technique of using dystopic descriptions of present ecological catastrophe to predict the end of the world as we know it, and to indicate a utopian future.”

THE SONOMA INDEPENDENT
Reflections on a calm Otonabee River, showing old pumphouse, ON (photo and rendition by Nina Munteanu)

When Water Speaks: quotes from A Diary in the Age of Water

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“A society that does not believe in the objective pursuit of truth—even if it challenges your worldview—is doomed to servitude.”

Lynna Dresden

“An insightful novel…A cautionary tale rummaging through the forgotten drawers of time in the lives of four generations…This whirling, holistic and evolving novel comes alive, like we imagine water does.”

Mary Woodbury, DRAGONFLY.ECO
Jackson creek in late fall, ON (photo and rendition by Nina Munteanu)

“Water Is…” now selling at Banyen Books, Vancouver

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Banyen Books & Sound on corner of Dunbar and W 4th Avenue, Vancouver (photo by Nina Munteanu)

One of my favourite bookstores in Vancouver is Banyen Books & Sound  on the southwest corner of W 4th Avenue and Dunbar. So, whenever I go back to my home town to visit family and friends, I stop there to linger amid the shelves of wonder and erudite adventure. Then I usually cross Dunbar to Aphrodite’s Organic Pie Shop for a delicious fresh pie—usually peach, if it is available. So good! Two things I love: books and pie!

Aphrodite’s Organic Pies, next door to Banyen’s, Vancouver (photos by Nina Munteanu)
Pacific Spirit Regional Park, Vancouver, BC (photo by Nina Munteanu)

During my recent visit this year to Vancouver, my friends and I had a fulfilling walk one morning through the big tree forest of Pacific Spirit Park near UBC. Margaret suggested we go to Aphrodite’s Organic Café for lunch, located across 4th Avenue from Banyen Books (the sister restaurant to the pie shop). After a delicious lunch, we wandered into Banyen, like desert nomads looking for water, and lost ourselves in a treasure of books, magazines, crystals, cards, singing bowls and other spiritual/healing items. Like a braided river, we dispersed according to our wayward interests.

Water Is… at Banyen Books, Vancouver (photos by Nina Munteanu)

Then friend Anne soon found me and pulled my sleeve. “Your book is here!” She led me to where my book Water Is… stood, face out, on the top shelf marked ‘Water: Life Force & Resource.’ In truth, I already knew through Pixl Press that the book was selling there. But here it was, showcased so nicely! It sat rather stately amid Emoto’s Secret Life of Water and Ryrie’s Healing Energies of Water.

Banyen customers find Water Is… and find a chair to take a look

One of the perks of Banyen Books are the comfortable seats for easy browsing. When I teasingly asked one of the clerks if they noticed people lingering for the day, they said, “yeah! They might leave for lunch then come back for the afternoon!” I can see why; Banyen is an entire world to discover. It is called Canada’s most comprehensive Body-Mind-Spirit bookstore, “offering a broad spectrum of resources from humanity’s spiritual, healing, and earth wisdom traditions…Our service is to offer life-giving nourishment for the body (resilient, vital), the mind (trained, open), and the soul (resonant, connected, in-formed). Think of us as your open source bookstore for the ‘University of Life’.”

“Banyen is an oasis, a crossroads, a meeting place…for East and West, the ‘old ways’ and current discoveries and syntheses.”

This is how Banyen describes its birth in 1970:

“The Golden Lotus Restaurant and Natural Food Store on Fourth Avenue at Bayswater was a hothouse for spiritual seekers, new vegetarians and spaced-out hippies grounding through good work. Banyen was born in a tiny book corner of the Golden Lotus. That lovely place was a connection to India, meditation and spiritual growth from 1967 to 1970. As its sun set, what was to become the Naam restaurant, Lifestream, Woodlands, Nature’s Path, and Banyen Books arose.”

Along with Water Is… Banyen is also selling my latest eco-fiction novel A Diary in the Age of Water.

Nina Munteanu is a Canadian ecologist / limnologist and novelist. She is co-editor of Europa SF and currently teaches writing courses at George Brown College and the University of Toronto. Visit www.ninamunteanu.ca for the latest on her books. Nina’s bilingual “La natura dell’acqua / The Way of Water” was published by Mincione Edizioni in Rome. Her non-fiction book “Water Is…” by Pixl Press (Vancouver) was selected by Margaret Atwood in the New York Times ‘Year in Reading’ and was chosen as the 2017 Summer Read by Water Canada. Her novel “A Diary in the Age of Water” was released by Inanna Publications (Toronto) in June 2020.

When Water Speaks: quotes from A Diary in the Age of Water

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“The truth isn’t about telling; no one just tells you the truth. It needs to be coaxed, even tricked, out. The truth is carefully hoarded—like water—and only flows among privileged acolytes who have proven themselves.”

Lynna Dresden

“Those of us who are captivated by fear, who despair in a dead zone—we need to consider new ways to tell familiar stories, to envision different endings. A book like this can change the way that you see the world at this moment, can allow formulae to take root in fiction and grow into a different kind of solution.”

Marcie McCauley, THE tEmz REVIEW
Jackson Creek in early fall, ON (photo and rendition by Nina Munteanu)

When Water Speaks: quotes from A Diary in the Age of Water

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“There simply aren’t enough Canadians to protect our wilderness; but if there were enough of us, there’d be no wilderness left to protect.”

Lynna Dresden

“Strangely compelling.”

BURIED IN PRINT

“A Diary in the Age of Water, is simply and beautifully told, profoundly true; a novel that invites us to embrace the wisdom of ages. The story stirs its readers, teaches them about the importance of water, and leaves an imprint on the canvas of the literary and scientific world.”

LUCIA MONICA GOREA, author of Journey Through My Soul
Boys explore the shore of the Otonabee River, ON (photo and rendition by Nina Munteanu)