New Releases by Rick Mercer

THE INSTANT #1 BESTSELLER At the end of his memoir Talking to Canadians, Rick Mercer was poised to make the biggest leap yet in his extraordinary career. Having overcome a serious lack of promise as a schoolboy and risen through the showbiz ranks—as an aspiring actor, star of a surprisingly successful one-man show about the Meech Lake Accord, co-founder of This Hour Has 22 Minutes, creator and star of the dark-comedy sitcom Made in Canada—he was about to tackle his biggest opportunity yet. The Road Years picks up the story at that exciting point, with the greenlighting of what would become Rick Mercer Report. Plans for the show, of course, included political satire and Rick’s patented rants. But Rick and his partner, Gerald Lunz, were also determined to do something that comedy tends to avoid as too challenging: they would emphasize the positive. Rick would travel from coast to coast to coast in search of everything that’s best about Canada, especially its people. He found a lot to celebrate, naturally, and was rewarded with a huge audience and a run of 15 seasons. The Road Years tells the inside story of that stupendous success. A time when Rick was heading to another town—or military base, sports centre, national park—to try dogsledding, chainsaw carving, and bear tagging; hang from a harness (a lot); ride the “Train of Death;” plus countless other joyous and/or reckless assignments. Added to the mix were encounters with the country’s great. Every living prime minister. Rock and roll royalty from Rush to Randy Bachman. Olympians and Paralympians. A skinny-dipping Bob Rae. And Jann Arden, of course, who gets a chapter to herself. Along the way he even found the time to visit several countries in Africa and co-found and champion the charity Spread the Net, which has gone on to protect the lives of millions. Join the celebration, and revive a wealth of happy memories, with what is Rick Mercer’s funniest, most fascinating book yet.

Canada''s beloved comic genius tells his own story for the first time. What is Rick Mercer going to do now? That was the question on everyone''s lips when the beloved comedian retired his hugely successful TV show after 15 seasons—and at the peak of its popularity. The answer came not long after, when he roared back in a new role as stand-up-comedian, playing to sold-out houses wherever he appeared. And then Covid-19 struck. And his legions of fans began asking again: What is Rick Mercer going to do now? Well, for one thing, he''s been writing a comic masterpiece. For the first time, this most private of public figures has turned the spotlight on himself, in a memoir that''s as revealing as it is hilarious. In riveting anecdotal style, Rick charts his rise from highly unpromising schoolboy ("Rick still owes 15 dollars to the chocolate bar fundraiser" was one of the less brutal items on a typical report) to heights of TV fame, by way of an amazing break as a teenager when his one-man show, "Show Me the Button, I''ll Push It. Or, Charles Lynch Must Die," became an overnight sensation—thanks in part to a bizarre ambush by its target, Charles Lynch himself. That''s one story you won''t soon forget, and this book is full of them. There''s the tale of how little Rick stole a tree from the neighbours that''s set to become a new Christmas classic. There''s Rick the aspiring actor—hitting the road as a new young punk in a vanload of hippies and appearing on stage in Shakespeare—and a wealth of behind-scenes revelations about This Hour Has 22 Minutes, Made in Canada, Talking to Americans and the coming of the mega-hit Rick Mercer Report. It''s a life so packed with incident and laughter we can only hope that a future answer to "What is Rick Mercer going to do now?" is: "Write volume two."

Canada''s pre-eminent satirical commentator brings down the curtain on his hugely successful show in this instant #1 national bestseller. Rick Mercer startled the nation when in 2017 he announced that the 15th season of Canada’s most-watched and beloved comedy show the Rick Mercer Report would be the last. As this book reminds us, he quit while he was way, way ahead. Final Report includes blisteringly good rants from the final five seasons and some of the very best rants from the show’s early years. And in three brilliant new essays that include a love letter to Parliament Buildings, how Doug Ford became Ontario premier (hint: it had nothing to do with talent) and how he managed not to freak out in the year after the RMR wrapped, Rick, a recipient of a 2019 Governor General’s Performing Arts Lifetime Artistic Achievement Award, reveals himself as a comic writer and entertainer at the very top of his game.

Written for students in a first course in a Computer Science curriculum using the C++ programming language, this thorough book emphasizes computing fundamentals while recognizing the relevance and validity of object-oriented programming. --

Finally, the actual date of the Exodus has been discovered! For thousands of years the epic stories of Moses, the Israelites and their exodus out of Egypt and into the Promised Land have been told to millions of awe inspired listeners. It is a grand tale of miracles and deliverance, cemented as the cornerstone of faith for both Judaism and Christianity. An historic battle of mighty heroes and evil villains clashing both on earth and in the heavens! But there''s one problem! No physical Egyptian proof has ever been found to corroborate these biblical stories. That''s right. No mention of Moses, Joseph, the Israelites, or the Exodus has been identified in the Egyptian historical records. Until now! This is a mystery that has perplexed biblical scholars and historians for thousands of years. How could it be that this historic collision of civilizations cannot be confirmed through the records of Egypt? Did they really happen? Has there been a cover up? Have the stories been somehow misinterpreted or embellished over the passage of time? I took on a mission to find the truth and the answers I discovered are truly astounding. It turns out the reason no proof has been found is because we have been looking in the wrong era! The evidence is plainly available, but until now no one has been able to put the puzzle pieces together. Now, for the first time, we are able to piece together the true timeline of the Hebrew origins and know, based on actual Egyptian records plus confirmed in the Bible, the true date of the Exodus... 1174 BC!

This book is a tale about a girl who was born into an unexpected reality. We laugh at the unexplained and tend to mock what we don''t understand. This girl was born into a world that didn''t want her.. She found love with her Grandmother in the northeastern farms of Thailand. At the age of six she encountered a near death experience that forever changed her life. During the course of her first seventeen years she experienced coming back from the other side: She witnessed a public suicide, and an old man being publically beaten to drive out a spirit that people believed made him ill: She was visited by spirits that would give even the strongest person nightmares. The book is very entertaining when you see how this child copes with everyday life experiences as well as the supernatural experiences. At the age of thirteen she was able to catch a thief. At an older age she was able to deal with spirits that wanted nothing more than to do harm, I mean physical harm. This book is about a little girl with more inner strength than most of us can possibly comprehend. She tapped into her inner self and found the courage to accept and to rationalize their very existence. This book is about a little girl named by a nurse because no one was around to give her a name. Her name is Nongnooch Mercer.

An all-new collection of furiously funny rants from the most recent seasons of the Rick Mercer Report plus three brilliantly written, previously unpublished pieces by Rick. Illustrated throughout with photos and snatches of dialogue from Rick’s encounters and exploits across Canada. “[Mercer’s] trademark one-camera rants against the Canadian parliamentary machine are more concise, and more believable, than any campaign ads.” —The Globe and Mail “The comedian of choice for viewers who read.” —Toronto Life “Canada’s hottest TV comic.” —Maclean’s "Week after week, Mercer continues to delight with his alternately giddy and cutting political humour.” —The Canadian Press “Canada’s leading political satirist.” —The New York Times “A good rant is cathartic. Ranting is what keeps me sane. They always come from a different place. Take the prime minister, for example. Sometimes when I rant about him, I am angry; other times, I am just severely annoyed—it’s an important distinction.” —Rick Mercer, from his introduction Within these pages you’ll find every rant that Rick has so brilliantly and blisteringly delivered since the publication of his previous bestseller, Rick Mercer Report: The Book. Together these rants form a chronicle of human folly, mostly featuring politicians, of course, but with honorable mentions going to people who don’t know how to use escalators and Canadian drivers who don’t think they need snow tires. Is Mercer getting better or are the fools among us getting worse? Whatever the inspiration—Rick Mercer’s ranting has never been stronger or more on target. There is a loud, cathartic laugh to be found on almost every page here—with the exception of Rick’s impassioned rant on bullying in schools, words that touched thousands of Canadians, went viral and helped widen the debate on a major problem. Also reprinted here is the rant encouraging students to vote, which resulted directly in a campus ballot and outrage in Ottawa. (People still are still standing on the left on escalators, and the prime minister is still very much the man he was, but you can’t win them all.) In addition, Rick has authored three new essays specially for this book: the hilarious behind-the-scenes story of his meeting with Rick Hansen, a hero who absolutely was not a disappointment in real life; a heartfelt reflection on public reaction to his bullying rant; and an account of his response—mystified, followed by delighted—to the news that he’d inspired a “vote mob.” Illustrated throughout with photographs and dialogue from Rick’s travels across Canada, A Nation Worth Ranting About will make you proud, will make you think, will make you almost as angry as Rick, and over and over again will make you laugh out loud.

Rick Mercer Report: The Paperback Book is an updated, expanded remix of its bestselling predecessor, Rick Mercer Report: The Book, containing 10,000 words of new material from the show’s fifth season. Rick’s celebrated rants are some of the sharpest political commentary to be found anywhere in the country’s media, and certainly the funniest. They are featured here, along with other moments from the show—including encounters with Conrad Black, Jean Chrétien, and Anne Murray—and many additional pieces, some of which first appeared on his website. Because when he’s not jumping into a lake with David Suzuki or Bob Rae, or helping the leader of the Green Party kill a tree, Rick Mercer likes to relax by blogging. From Kabul, say. Or the bearpit of a leadership convention. Rick Mercer Report: The Paperback Book will help you make sense of five extraordinary years in the life of Canada—or at least laugh despite them.

This book takes an object-oriented approach, without getting lost in objects. It is suitable for use in a first programming course for computer science, physical science, and engineering majors. Objects are shown in detail and are used to solve problems, not just for show. The goal is to get students programming with a minimum of overhead. The fundamental concepts of computer science are interwoven throughout the textbook. All examples can be written, compiled and tested with free editors and compilers included on the CD that comes with the book.

Computing Fundamentals with Java is the current effort in the author''s 11-year journey of integrating object- oriented programming into the first computer science course, while retaining the commonly accepted fundamentals of computing. In addition to traditional topics and the newer objects and classes, this text provides three bonus chapters on object-oriented software development in the context of a case study. This book is written to clearly present fundamental concepts to beginning programmers.

The more than one million Canadians who watch "This Hour Has 22 Minutes" will recognize Rick Mercer''s "streeters"--the caustically funny rants that have become one of the best-loved segments of the show. Often called Parliament''s "Unofficial Opposition," Rick Mercer writes all his rants and is also one of the primary writers for the show. Photos and an eye-catching design set off Mercer''s memorable exposes of the pretensions of politicians and the foibles of our society. RICK MERCER RANTS ABOUT QUEBEC "If Quebec separates it''s only gonna get worse... The first thing they''re gonna do once they leave is come over. They''ll be like the next door neighbour with an Amway catalogue. How are you? I''m fine. No hard feelings, let''s start a carpool, can I stay in the guest room, use your currency, go halves on the army, by the way I''m a king now." RICK MERCER RANTS ABOUT JEAN CHRETIEN "I wish people would just get off Jean Chretien''s back. The man goes to China, he makes a few deals, makes us a pile of cash and what happens? Everyone is all up in arms just because of a few minor human rights violations. Look, Chretien has no choice. My next door neighbour and I, we go halves on firewood, I save money. It''s a great deal for me. But there''s some soft liberals out there would prefer if I didn''t even talk to the man. Okay so he ran over a couple of kids in his car because they were making a racket out on the cul-de-sac. And yes he''s got a bunch of youngsters chained to the furnace because they talked back. But hey, it''s not like I haven''t made my feelings known to the man. I''ve done my part. One time I said "That''s bad." He changed the topic, we went on with our business, had abeer, whatever. My conscience is clear and like Jean Chretien, I cannot afford to jeopardize this very special mutually profitable relationship with my neighbour just because of a few people chained up in his basement. And don''t give me any grief here. Hey, I''m only following my Prime Minister''s lead."

This book is designed for a first course in computing fundamentals following the guidelines described in ACM/IEEE''S Computing Curricula 1991. In addition to the traditional CSI topics, students learn the concept of an object by first using objects, then modifying existing object classes in C++. A lab component is included at the end of each chapter.