Eli Cooper is a resolutely single, fiftysomething newspaper copy editor. He spends his nights obsessing over reporters' unnecessary "thats" and his days caring for a demented father he knows should be in twenty-four-hour care. Eli is too busy—and too self-absorbed—to acknowledge what's missing in his life. But then, on a single day in February 2008, Eli loses his job and his father. Alone and adrift, he begrudgingly accepts his sister's gift: a two-week forget-it-all vacation to Cuba. After a series of misadventures, he meets Mariela—an off-the-books, thirtysomething tour guide—and falls in love. But does Mariela fall for Eli, or is he just her ticket to a new life? Eli and Mariela each have secrets they're not ready to share—until they have no choice.

A bittersweet story that takes readers from Havana, to Halifax, to Miami, and back again, The Sweetness in the Lime is a charming, clever novel that peels back the rind to discover there really is sweetness in the lime of life.

Alexa McDonough’s impact on Canadian politics cannot be measured solely by election victories or seat tallies. As the first female leader of a mainstream Canadian political party, she helped transform Nova Scotia and Canadian politics. In the process, she transcended party affiliation and gender to become simply "Alexa" to Canadians across the country.

In this authorized biography, veteran author Stephen Kimber chronicles Alexa’s life and political career and with it, weaves a narrative of the changing attitudes towards women in politics, from her early battles as the lone female MLA in a hostile Nova Scotian legislature to her leadership of the federal NDP to her role as senior stateswoman in Jack Layton’s shadow cabinet. Along the way, Kimber delves into McDonough’s personal life to uncover the origins of her political career: her upbringing in a wealthy family committed to progressive politics, her tightknit circles of female friends, her personal metamorphosis from "wife-of" to "leader-of," and her emergence as a political leader whose importance goes beyond partisan politics. The result is an engrossing story of one of Canada’s most beloved politicians, whose common touch and life-long advocacy of progressive causes made her a significant player in Canadian public life.