NATIONAL BESTSELLER
From the BC doctor who has become a household name for leading the
response to the pandemic, a personal account of the first weeks of
COVID, for readers of Sam Nutt's Damned Nations and James Maskalyk's
Life on the Ground Floor.
Dr. Bonnie Henry has been called "one of the most effective public
health figures in the world" by The New York Times. She has been
called "a calming voice in a sea of coronavirus madness," and "our hero"
in national newspapers. But in the waning days of 2019, when the first
rumours of a strange respiratory ailment in Wuhan, China began to
trickle into her office in British Columbia, these accolades lay in a
barely imaginable future.
Only weeks later, the whole world would look back on the previous year
with the kind of nostalgia usually reserved for the distant past. With a
staggering suddenness, our livelihoods, our closest relationships, our
habits and our homes had all been transformed.
In a moment when half-truths threatened to drown out the truth, when
recklessness all too often exposed those around us to very real danger,
and when it was difficult to tell paranoia from healthy respect for an
invisible threat, Dr. Henry's transparency, humility, and humanity
became a beacon for millions of Canadians.
And her trademark enjoinder to be kind, be calm, and be safe became
words for us all to live by.
Coincidentally, Dr. Henry's sister, Lynn, arrived in BC for a
long-planned visit on March 12, just as the virus revealed itself as a
pandemic. For the four ensuing weeks, Lynn had rare insight into the
whirlwind of Bonnie's daily life, with its moments of agony and gravity
as well as its occasional episodes of levity and grace. Both a global
story and a family story, Be Kind, Be Calm, Be Safe combines Lynn's
observations and knowledge of Bonnie's personal and professional
background with Bonnie's recollections of how and why decisions were
made, to tell in a vivid way the dramatic tale of the four weeks that
changed all our lives.
Be Kind, Be Calm, Be Safe is about communication, leadership, and
public trust; about the balance between politics and policy; and, at
heart, about what and who we value, as individuals and a society.
The authors' advance from the publisher has been donated to charities
with a focus on alleviating communities hit particularly hard by the
pandemic: True North Aid with its Covid-19 response in Northern
Indigenous communities, and First Book Canada, with its focus on reading
and literacy for underserved, marginalized youth.
