Last July, I was pleasantly surprised by a welcome interlude at a heated Flemingdon Park town hall about the controversial new fire station.
Before diving into a Q&A with City, fire service staff and residents, Coun. Jon Burnside invited Edward Brown, a local author and freelance journalist, to present his book: Flemingdon Park: No Mean Neighbourhood.
Brown briefly shared the work he’d undertaken to dive into the history of the place he called home growing up and hinted at the fun facts he’d learned along the way. “I also learned that the reason people like you are here tonight is because you care about your community. I think that’s significant,” he told the crowd on July 14.
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After connecting with Brown to learn more about his work and share mine as the neighbourhood’s Local Journalism Initiative reporter, he mailed me a copy of the book — I’ve been reading it on my commute to Flemingdon Park. That’s where the idea for this book list came from; I wondered: what other Toronto neighbourhoods have had the honour of their story, character and people so lovingly documented?
You might remember how earlier this year I mused about reading as a way to learn about a city’s vibe. This time around, I’m updating that to say reading hyperlocal literature is also a way to care about the places we spend time in, learning to love them with all their complexities. So, here are a few books not just about Toronto as a whole, but about the defining characters of its neighbourhoods.
First, check out these titles we hand-picked. If you want to know more about each book and why we’re recommending it, keep reading!
- The Beaches: Creation of a Toronto Neighbourhood by Richard White
- Flemingdon Park: No Mean Neighbourhood by Edward Brown
- Denison Avenue by Daniel Innes and Christina Wong
- Riverdale: East of the Don by Elizabeth Gillan Muir
- Yorkville: How a 1960s Coffeehouse Scene Rewrote Popular Music by Mike Daley
- Don Mills: From Forests and Farms to Forces of Change by Scott KennedyÂ
Flemingdon Park
Flemingdon Park: No Mean Neighbourhood is an insightful portrait of the communities that have made up this little pocket of the city for centuries. The book is divided into phases and chapters that follow deeply personal histories of Flemingdon Park through its residents — Indigenous nations in precolonial times, city boards laying out the first building plans, early mayors, the current councillor, notable locals whose names adorn recreational facilities, regular locals living out their day-to-day and even John Lennon and Yoko Ono.
You’re in for a detailed history lesson, punctuated by fun facts every now and then.
Denison Avenue
Historical fiction is among my favourite genres for easing me into the broader political and social context of a place. This book is a great example.
Denison Avenue is an illustrated fiction book tracing the story of an elderly Chinese woman in Toronto’s Chinatown and Kensington Market. With the very real themes of gentrification, aging in place and grief, you’ll follow the main characters along the city’s streets.
Riverdale
Riverdale is a historical account of how this neighbourhood came to be, from early settler families to more recent immigration waves from Italy, Greece and China. You’ll also get to learn about the origin of Riverdale’s street names and surprising facts about historic buildings that still stand there today. The book will provide you with great trivia to share with friends on your next stroll through the neighbourhood.
It was shortlisted for the Heritage Toronto Book Award in 2015. A Goodreads user even called the book “part history, part photographic essay and part good, old-fashioned love affair.”
Yorkville
How do you go from a cool, bohemian music hub to legendary rock venues to…what Yorkville is today?
Music historian Mike Daley conducted 100 interviews and dug into the archives to lay it all out in his book Yorkville.
Don Mills
There are actually a lot of books about the Don and its surrounding neighbourhoods.
Don Mills by Scott Kennedy is only one, and it takes great care to make sure to document the area as it was and no longer is, full of farms and forests.
Kennedy also wrote Willowdale, which covers some of North York’s farms, as well as many moments of the neighbourhood’s history from combat training for the Rebellion of 1837 to a Zoroastrian temple today.
The Beaches
The Beaches is a cherished Toronto neighbourhood, though it’s not necessarily associated with any major historic happenings. What Richard White digs into in his book The Beaches is the attractive character of the neighbourhood and how it came to be, from its development as a lakeside recreational community to a streetcar “suburb” and present day.
You’ll find an exploration of archival records, council minutes, plans of subdivision, newspapers, public land records, city directories, assessment rolls, historical photographs and the present-day landscape.
More books to check out
This list obviously doesn’t cover every neighbourhood. If you’re hungry for more, you can check out these two titles I previously recommended in 5 books to learn about Toronto’s hidden history:
- The Ward: The Life and Loss of Toronto’s First Immigrant Neighbourhood edited by John Lorinc, Michael McClelland and Ellen Scheinberg
- Housing for All: How Toronto Built the St. Lawrence Neighbourhood by Frank Lewinberg and Vincenzo Pietropaolo.
If you want to try and find a book about or set in your own neighbourhood, the Toronto Public Library has a super comprehensive list, Toronto in literature. While the titles compiled by TPL staff for this list are primarily fiction, you’ll also find graphic books and memoirs.
If you end up reading any book from the list, let me know what you think in the comments!
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