Important Shipping Notice: Due to the ongoing Canada Post strike, delivery times may be longer than usual. Where possible, weโ€™ll use alternative shipping methods to help get your order to you sooner. We appreciate your patience and understanding as your order makes its way to you.

A note to US-based customers: All Lit Up is pausing print orders to the USA until further notice. Read more

Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

  • Chappy Hour: Broken Hearts Cocktail Red + Poems for Ingrid

    Chappy Hour: Broken Hearts Cocktail Red + Poems for Ingrid

    Valentine’s Day may be over, but love still lingers with Don Brestler’s Poems for Ingrid (Bayeux Arts), a collection of love poems of the hard-to-move-on variety. Pair with our Broken Hearts Cocktail Red and a box of kleenex, just in case. Read on for the recipe and a sample from the collection.ย 

  • Love is Love

    Love is Love

    Happy Valentineโ€™s Day! Love it or hate it, itโ€™s that one day of the year to celebrate that/those special someone(s) โ€“ even if itโ€™s yourself! Love doesnโ€™t fit a single mould, so no matter what kind of love youโ€™re celebrating today, we’ve got a few lit picks to help you make the most of the…

  • #ALULoves: Book A Date This Valentine’s Day (Quiz!)

    #ALULoves: Book A Date This Valentine’s Day (Quiz!)

    Hot and spicy or layed-back, relaxed and cozy…everyone has their own idea of what the PERFECT Valentine’s Day looks like. But if you’re anything like us, the best V-Day date is one spent cuddled up with a good book. Take our quick personality quiz to get your #ALULoves book recommendation!

  • Do-Lit-Yourself: Bookplates for Valentine’s Day

    Do-Lit-Yourself: Bookplates for Valentine’s Day

    Gifting your valentine a book this Valentine’s Day? Add a personal touch with our easy-to-glue downloadable bookplates (or gift them to yourself because self-love is sweet too.)ย 

  • In Review: The Week of February 4th

    In Review: The Week of February 4th

    This week we interviewed the inimitable Lindsay Wong (author of The Woo-Woo), admired Chantal Gibson’s How She Read, rounded up some very funny reads to beat the winter blues, and much more.

  • First Fiction Friday: La Brigantessa

    First Fiction Friday: La Brigantessa

    After stabbing a wealthy and violent landowner, Gabriela Falcone โ€“ a peasant girl โ€“ is forced to leave her life behind. Set in the period following Italy’s Unification in 1861, La Brigantessa (Inanna Publications) follows Gabriela as she flees for her life with the help of parish priest Don Simone. Together they find anything but…

  • From Winter Blues to BA-HA-HAs: 5 Books to Make You Laugh

    From Winter Blues to BA-HA-HAs: 5 Books to Make You Laugh

    With spring still feeling so far away here in Canada and that existential dread starting to set in from being cooped up for too long indoors, we could all use a few laughs โ€“ a chuckle, at the very least. To help you out with a little LOL’ing, we’ve compiled 5 books to lighten up…

  • Beautiful Books: How She Read

    Beautiful Books: How She Read

    Chantal Gibson’s genre-bending debut collection How She Read (Caitlin Press) is a poetic exploration and visual reflection of the representations of Black women in Canada that Lawrence Hill calls “a balm for our aching souls [that] sparks an inquiry and packs a wallop in every line and on every page.”

  • Writer’s Block: Lindsay Wong

    Writer’s Block: Lindsay Wong

    We sat down Proust-style with Lindsay Wong whose darkly funny, intensely readable memoir of family and mental illness The Woo-Woo (Arsenal Pulp Press) is a finalist for the upcoming Canada Reads debates to chat about five-year fantasy goals (which include pyjamas!), what happens after publication (public speaking!), what she’s working on now, and more.

  • In Review: The Week of January 28th

    In Review: The Week of January 28th

    This week we cheered for this year’s Canada Reads finalists, worked up an appetite for food-covered books, rounded up books for Black History Month, and much more.ย 

  • Quoted: Peter Norman’s Some of Us and Most of You Are Dead

    Quoted: Peter Norman’s Some of Us and Most of You Are Dead

    Peter Norman, author of Some of Us and Most of You Are Dead (Wolsak & Wynn), explains the use of the “terminal” in poetry, how this has inspired his work, and the process of wrestling with words to get at the clearest truths.

  • 8 reads in celebration of Black History Month

    8 reads in celebration of Black History Month

    With the long *cold* month of January almost behind us, we already have our sights set on February and that brings us to Black History Month. Check out this collection of 8 awesome reads that celebrate black Canadian authors and stories โ€“ part of Canada’s rich and diverse cultural fabric. We’ve also included a few…

  • Cover Collage: Tasty Eats

    Cover Collage: Tasty Eats

    These frosty temps have our comfort-food cravings on high so we’ve rounded up some food-covered books to feast our eyes on.

  • Poetry in Motion: Rouge

    Poetry in Motion: Rouge

    Adrian De Leon’s Rouge (Mawenzi House) sees city as poem in this collection inspired by the Toronto’s subway system. Mimicking the system in both form and structure, the poems in Rouge reveal Toronto through a diverse lens full of humour, and memories โ€“ both fond and heavy โ€“ as they recall Toronto’s deadly mass shooting…

  • In Review: The Week of January 21st

    In Review: The Week of January 21st

    The theme of the week was stars: book recommendations for every zodiac sign, an insightful interview with Stars author Lucy Hachรฉ, a new and shiny debut novel, and more.

Got any book recommendations?