VI Regional Library Port Renfrew

09/04/2026

🍂Please note that all of our branches will be closed Monday, September 7 for Labour Day. 🍁

Our online branch is open 24/7...check out something new at http://virl.bc.ca.

08/07/2026

🚗☀️ Hit the road, visit libraries, collect stamps and WIN PRIZES! 🎉📚

VIRL’s 90th Anniversary Passport Program is happening all summer long, and every library stop can get you closer to a prize!

Pick up your FREE passport at any Vancouver Island Regional Library branch, toss it in the glovebox, and start exploring. Visit branches across our incredible service area, collect unique stamps, discover new communities and enter for your chance to win!

- Visit any 5 VIRL branches to enter the Main Prize Draw (we have 39 branches!).
- Complete a passport region to enter one of 11 Regional Prize Draws PLUS earn another entry into the Main Prize Draw.
- With 11 regions to explore, from the South Island to Haida Gwaii and Bella Coola, how far will your passport take you?

Think you can visit more than FOUR VIRL branches this summer? 👀 Consider this your challenge. Visit an old favourite, then venture a little farther and discover a branch you’ve never been to before. You might just find a new favourite along the way.

No library card needed. No purchase required. Just stop by, explore and get stamped!

Keep collecting all summer and return your passport by October 31, 2026.

👉 Learn more: virl.bc.ca/90th

Grab your passport. Plan a road trip. Collect your stamps. Win prizes. Celebrate 90 years of VIRL! 🚙📚✨

07/30/2026

Postcolonial Reimaginings

Classic stories often reflect the empires, hierarchies, and assumptions of the worlds in which they were written.

Postcolonial reimaginings return to those works from the perspectives of people shaped by colonization, displacement, migration, and resistance. They may centre characters once treated as peripheral, question whose version of history became authoritative, or expose what the original story left unspoken.

These books do more than relocate familiar plots. They challenge the power structures beneath them—and ask how the story changes when the people once observed become the narrators.

07/29/2026

📚 Stock up before the long weekend!

All VIRL branches will be closed on Monday, August 3 for BC Day.

Borrow your next great read, movie, audiobook, or eBook before the weekend, or explore our digital collection anytime at virl.bc.ca.

Have a safe, happy, and relaxing BC Day! ☀️

07/28/2026

The Booker Prize longlist has been revealed. A few surprises.

The longlist for the Booker Prize 2026 has been announced, featuring two previous winners and three debut novelists

07/28/2026

Villains Reconsidered

Villains are often defined by the hero’s version of events.

Literary reimaginings can turn toward the witch, monster, rival, or feared outsider and ask what the original story left unexplained. These books may reveal prejudice, political conflict, trauma, or motives hidden behind the label of “villain.”

They do not always excuse harmful choices. Instead, they complicate the easy division between good and evil—and ask who had the power to decide which was which.

07/27/2026

Mark your calendar. Our Virtual Gardening series continues on Zoom with a timely session on water-smart strategies for sustainable gardening.

Learn all about being water-smart with a certified Master Gardener! This is a FREE course that will take place virtually …

07/27/2026

Before the Story Began

Prequels invite us to look backward.

They return to familiar characters and worlds before the events we already know, asking how a person became who they are, what shaped a conflict, or which choices set the original story in motion.

Some prequels fill in missing history. Others complicate a character we thought we understood. The best do more than explain the past—they change how we read the story that comes after.

07/26/2026

Do you have a favourite reimagined work? Or one that you wish were reimagined?

03/31/2026

📣🗣️Today, March 31, we recognize National Indigenous Languages Day, a time to honour the rich diversity of Indigenous languages and the ongoing work of communities to revitalize and share them.

Explore Indigenous language resources through our Indigenous Languages webpage: https://virl.bc.ca/read-watch-listen/audience/indigenous/indigenous-languages/

You can also visit FirstVoices, an internationally recognized platform where Indigenous communities share and promote their languages, oral cultures, and linguistic histories, including resources from Vancouver Island, Haida Gwaii, and the Central Coast: https://www.firstvoices.com/languages