Lesley Choyce

Raising Orion tells the tale of an eccentric, timeless woman, Molly, a second-hand bookshop owner, and her childhood as the daughter of the last lighthouse keeper of Devil’s Island at the mouth of the Halifax Harbour. At its core, Raising Orion is a novel of discovery, and a chronicle of intense individualism where to believe you can set the stars in the sky will make it so.
Molly is an enigmatic person, powerful over her own destiny. She is at the centre of an eclectic, unlikely group of people — customers of  her bookstore that have become her friends — searching for meaning in their own lives through the books they find in her store. Their test begins when Molly is on the verge of being criminally charged for interfering with authorities in rescuing a young cancer patient. Her dedicated book-customer friends must help save her, which, given Molly’s eccentricities, philosophical outlooks, and strong independence, isn’t an easy task.

• Longlisted for the 2011 ReLit Award for Fiction