25 YOUR GUIDE TO BOOKS & AUTHORS th Anniversary FREE Year
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NEWNEW DIGS!DIGS! BCBC publishingpublishing keepskeeps growinggrowing afterafter D&MD&M schmozzleschmozzle See pages #40010086 7, 8, 10 11, 16, 19 GREEMENT A AIL
M Heidi Scheifley and Moreka Jolar, authors of Hollyhock: Garden to Table. UBLICATION P PENNY APPLE PENNY PHOTOGRAPHY
CONFIDENT MINING LONG BLACK EXPOSÉ BEACH LIKE THEM CANADA, NEW BAD BEFORE THE LANDMARK POETRY GUY ABROAD P. 2 7 TOURISTS P. 16 ANTHOLOGY P. 3 8
VOL. 27 • NO. 1 Storma Sire, SPRING 2013 ALERT BAY’S CRUSADING MATRIARCH P. 23 The Great Black North 2 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 3 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 PEOPLE
At 77, W.P. Kinsella topped a recent poll conducted by The Province to name the province’s most popular writer. He also recently received the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal (“I’m still not sure why.”) and was inducted into the Canadian
Sensational Victoria: Bright Baseball Hall of Fame as a baseball writer. Now there are plans Lights, Red Lights, Murders, afoot for a musical version of his story Shoeless Joe, the basis Ghosts & Gardens (Anvil Press $24) for the movie Field of Dreams. As well, Willie Steele has pub- by Eve Lazarus lished a new critical study, A Member of the Local Nine: Base- ball and Identity in the Work of W. P. Kinsella. Not bad for a guy who used to manage a pizza joint in Victoria. BCTOP* SELLERS
The Canadian Pacific’s Esquimalt & Nanaimo Railway: The CPR WP Kinsella, Steam Years, 1905–1949 1997 (Sono Nis $39.95) by Robert D. Turner & Donald F. MacLachlan
Making Headlines: 100 Years of the Vancouver Sun (Sandhill Book Market- ing $34.95) Shelley Fralic with research by Kate Bird
Start & Run a Home- Based Food Business (Self-Counsel Press $23.95) by Mimi Shotland Fix
The Right to a Healthy Environment: Revitaliz- ing Canada’s Constitu- tion (UBC Press $29.95) by David Boyd
Digging the City: An Urban Agriculture How Poetry Saved My Life: A Hustler’s Memoir (Arsenal Pulp Gurjinder Basran’s first novel Every- Manifesto (Touchwood Editions $16.95) $15.95), Amber Dawn’s sophomore book reveals the terrain thing Was Goodbye has been released in by Rhona McAdam of sex work, queer identity, and survivor pride. This story, told in the U.S. as a Pintail Book by Penguin Between Heaven and prose and poetry, offers a frank, multifaceted portrait of the au- Canada. After it won the First Search for (Seven the series, Earth thor’s experiences hustling the streets of Vancouver, and how those the Great BC Novel contest sponsored by Orca $9.95) by Eric Walters years took away her self-esteem and nearly destroyed her; at the Mona Fertig’s Mother Tongue publish- Father August Brabant: crux of this autobiographical narrative is the tender celebration of ing imprint—relocated recently from Saviour or Scourge? (Ronsdale Press $24.95) poetry and literature. Amber Dawn is also author of the Lambda Saltspring Island to Savary Island—it re- by Jim McDowell Award-winning novel Sub Rosa and was the 2012 winner of the ceived the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize and
Imperial Canada Inc.: Writers' Trust of Canada Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBT writers. was selected as a Top 5 Canada Reads Legal Haven of Choice She has an MFA in Creative Writing (UBC). 9781551525006 Choice for the BC/Yukon. A shortlist for for the World’s Mining Mother Tongue’s Second Search For the Industries (Talonbooks $29.95) by Alain Deneault & Playwright and actor Carmen Aguirre was in the news recently for being Great BC Novel contest will be announced William Sacher. Translated by owed $50,000 by her publisher, Douglas & McIntyre, for unpaid royalties result- at the end of March, and the winner at the Fred A. Reed & Robin Philpot ing from her Canada Reads bestselling memoir, Something Fierce. Undeterred, end of May. Shortlist judges reading sub- Words, Words, Words: she has moved forward with the publication of her latest play, Blue Box missions are Gurjinder Basran and David Essays and Memoirs (Talon $16.95), Aguirre’s one-woman show of terror and romance. Like her (New Star Books $19) Chariandy, and the final judge is by George Bowering memoir, it revisits the dangerous mountain passes of Chile, but Blue Box also Caroline Adderson. includes a perilous detour into the roller-coaster world of Hollywood, where Unlikely Love Stories the protagonist has an ardent love affair with a TV star… (Harbour $32.95) M.A.C. Carla Funk has won the 2012 Constance by Mike McCardell Farrant’s stage play, My Turquoise Years, runs at Vancouver’s Arts Club, April 4-May 5, based on her memoir of the same Rooke Creative Nonfiction Prize from the Toward Sustainable Carmen Aguirre Malahat Review for her story, ‘Returning,’ Communities: Solu- in Blue Box title, originally published by D&M as a comic coming-of-age tions for Citizens and story set in 1960, a time of postwar optimism… Mark selected from 125 entries by Their Governments , winner of the Leacock Humour Medal for final judge, Madeline (New Society Publishers Leiren-Young $22.70) - Fourth Edition by Never Shoot a Stampede Queen, has an adaptation of that book Sonik. Funk’s story ap- Mark Roseland about his stint as a reporter in Williams Lake running May 10-25 pears in issue 181 of
* The current topselling titles also at the Arts Club, starring Zachary Stevenson and di- Malahat Review, and she re- from major BC publishing Carla rected by . Blue Box: 978-0-88922-757-6; Turquoise: 978-1553650379 ceives a $1,000 prize. companies, in no particular order. TJ Dawe Funk
Publisher/ Writer: Publication Mail Agreement #40010086 Advertising & editorial: Contributors: John Moore, Joan Givner, Sage Birchwater, Shane McCune All BC BookWorld reviews Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to: BC BookWorld, 3516 W. 13th Ave., Mark Forsythe, Louise Donnelly, Cherie Thiessen, Writing not otherwise are posted online at Alan Twigg BC BookWorld, 3516 W. 13th Ave., Vancouver, BC V6R 2S3 Vancouver, B.C., V6R 2S3. credited is by staff. Design: Get-to-the-Point Graphics www.abcbookworld.com • Tel/Fax: 604-736-4011 Consultants: Christine Rondeau, Monique Sherrett, Sharon Jackson In-Kind Supporters: Editor/Production: Produced with the sponsorship of Email: [email protected]. Photographers: Barry Peterson, Laura Sawchuk Pacific BookWorld News Society. Publications Mail Proofreaders: Wendy Atkinson, Tara Twigg Simon Fraser University Library; BC David Lester Registration No. 7800. BC BookWorld ISSN: 1701-5405 Annual subscription: $25 Deliveries: Ken Reid, The News Group Vancouver Public Library. BOOKWORLD For this issue, we gratefully acknowledge the SPRING 2013 unobtrusive assistance of Canada Council, a Vol. 27, No. 1 continuous partner since 1988.
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Early Birds Paintings and story by Paul H. Jones Featured birds include Bullfinch, Life Goes On Grey Junglefowl, Koklas Pheasant, Losing, letting go & living again Adventures Over Sixty What Every Kid Needs Comrade Stalin’s Blood Pheasant, Fantail Flycatcher, Between The Covers by Gail Boulanger by Gail Boulanger and Money Can’t Buy Baby Tooth Hobby, Somali Buzzard, Waxwing, B&B • 250-537-2440 by Keith Pattinson Zebra Finch, Gyrfalcon, and How to gently and effectively Reflections on living and aging by Marina Sonkina 50 birds of Burma in colour. Writers' retreat, booklovers' navigate your way through grief wholeheartedly; greeting each This engaging, story-filled book relaxation on Salt Spring Island. Looking askance at Soviet society, To order a copy call: and loss. Distributed by Red new challenge as an adventure. shows how we can all raise healthy Book now for spring or summer. through the prism of satirical fiction. SELF Tuque Books. SELF Distributed by Red Tuque Books. SELF and responsible children. BIRD 604-261-4331 Private entrance and bathroom. HELP ISBN 978-0-9730802-1-6 • $22.95 HELP ISBN 978-0-9730802-3-0 • $22.95 HELP ISBN 978-0-9917132-0-2 • $18.95 FICTION ISBN 978-0986877629 • $29.76 PAINTINGS ISBN 978-0-9685498-5-8 • $25 B & B Free wifi. iniranbook.blogspot.ca poppyproductions.ca graciesgotasecret.com [email protected] emilymadill.com
“There’s a spunky energy in the writing” theboywhopaints.ca The Boy Who Paints — Dennis Lee by Richard Cole & Sounds of the Ferry K. Jane Watt Gracie’s Got a Secret In Iran: Text & Photos by Sara Leach by Heather Conn Following up on their adventures “After reading this by Adam Jones, Ph.D. Illustrated by Lillian Lai in the best-seller Mountain book, your kid will Canadian academic and Ages 2 to 6 Machines, author Sara Leach and The Captain Joe Series want a paintbrush.” Gracie the goldfish shows kids Howard Overend, photojournalist Adam Jones offers 9 x 12 ” illustrator Steven Corvelo board how to let go & go with the flow. an entertaining and visually sumpt- a ferry to explore the sounds and by Emily Madill Salmon Arm, author of Book Guy: 32 pages — Kirkus Reviews This fantasy adventure includes uous tour through one of the sights of a sea voyage. Nominated A Librarian in the Peace (2001), full-colour Life lessons for children. engaging questions. world's most historic civilizations. Chocolate Lily award 2012-2013. is struggling feebly at age 94 to ISBN 9780991714605 PICTURE / ISBN 978-0981257907•$11.95 each ISBN 978-0-9868776-0-5 finish Yon Far Country: Tales of iniranbook.blogspot.ca ISBN 978-0-9782818-2-3 • $9.95 $20 hardcover RHYMING Distribution: Sandhill Book Marketing Ltd. KIDLIT Available from Amazon.ca KIDLIT KIDLIT $9.95 • Published by MW Books AUTHOR the Peace. Great stuff to be sure. TRAVEL ISBN 978-0-9918522-0-8 • $5.99 amazon.ca [email protected] cambridge.org/9781107694736 amazon.ca BrotherXII.com www.davidtracey.ca
Eating Bitter Mr Churchill's A Chinese American Saga Memories of Profession by Maria Tippett The Kurrajong Tree Chekhov Statesman, Orator, Writer Living in a Brother XII Peter Clarke A richly textured biography of the Dangerous Climate: by Elinor Martin Edited by Peter Sekirin by Peter Clarke lives of Paul and Sonia Ho and the by John Oliphant is a Climate Change and Human Evolution A true family tale that reads Accounts of Anton Chekhov from A riveting untold literary history prejudices the family encountered The strange odyssey of a 20th-century Pender Island like an epic adventure story. his family, friends & contemporaries. author. about the writer behind the as immigrants to the U.S. by Renée Hetherington prophet & his quest for a new world. BIO- BIO- Order from Amazon.ca • 428 pp. BIO- ISBN 9780786458714 • $45 statesman, Winston Churchill. ISBN 978-1-4535-1690-4 CLIMATE Cambridge University Press / NY GRAPHY ISBN 978-0978097202 • $24.95 GRAPHY ISBN 978-0-9878243-0-1 • $29.95 GRAPHY Published by McFarland HISTORY ISBN 978-1-60819-372-1 • $21.63 HISTORY $9.99 (Kindle version) CHANGE ISBN 9781107694736 • $28.95 libroslibertad.ca marilyn-crosbie.com fentonstreet.ca georgeszanto.com garybotting.ca boudewynvanoort.com
Places of Her Heart Streaking! The Art and Life of Barbara Boldt Bog Tender by K. Jane Watt The Collected Poems of Gary Botting George Seferis: Memories of by Gary Botting Collected Poems Coming Home to Nature and Memory This biography of B.C. painter by George Szanto Jack Pickup Barbara Boldt contains over 200 Here collected for the first time are Translated by Manolis Also Tjideng Reunion Flying Doctor of British Columbia paintings. A lavish memoir of the Gary Botting’s hundreds of “An earthy, homespun and available: challenges and joys of a career as a A Nobel laureate and one of Amazon.ca A memoir of World War II on Java by Marilyn Crosbie published poems, “lyrical, satirical, Greece’s most important poets voyeuristically satisfying book.” woman painter in Canada. It is an 380 pages sentimental, sexperimental, abstract, of the 20th century. 282 pages. e-book: $9.99 by Boudewyn van Oort A portrait of one of the pioneers inspiring story — perfect for giving. —Kirkus Reviews of medicine along the B.C. Coast concrete — with and without feet.” The untold story of the Pacific War. ART Harcover: 9781553833314 • $50 POETRY ISBN 978-1-62516-309-7 • $15.95 POETRY ISBN 978-1-926763-23-1 • $25 MEMOIR ISBN 9781927366080 • $24.95 MEMOIR ISBN 978-1-4251-5159-1 • $25.95 MEMOIR ISBN 978-0-9682865-2-4 • $18 MEMOIR Softcover: 9781553833321 • $30
5 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 6 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 AROUNDBC
This Mack truck and its load of lumber were both destroyed on the Hope-Princeton Highway after an oil line caught fire and the trucker’s fire extinguisher ran dry. From Trucking in British KEEPKEEP ONON Columbia. Trucking in British Columbia (Harbour $49.95) is the first overview of the B.C. trucking industry since Andy Craig’s Trucking in 1972. In synch with the 100th anniversary of the B.C. Truckers Associa- TRUCKIN’ tion, this hardcover went like hotcakes at the annual Transpo convention of B.C. truckers in Kelowna. It was written by Dan Francis, the same guy who edited the Encyclopedia of British Columbia. A book about trucking won’t win the Giller Prize; it serves a local constituency. The same can be said for John Clarke: Explorer of the Coast Mountains (Harbour $29.95) by Lisa Baile. This tribute to a moun- taineering local hero attracted 700 people to a book launch in Penthouse streakers at the Vancouver Canucks North Vancouver. They stayed for six hours. D&M Publishers Inc. filed for bank- versus the New York Islanders game, Pacific “Books like these remind me why I went into publish- Coliseum, 1974. From Liqour, Lust and the Law. ruptcy protection but other publishers ing,” says Harbour boss Howard White. “There is a , , B.C. culture that needs to be recognized. And not one of in B.C. are still flourishing as Dal Richards Nardwuar the Human Serviette of and retired police officers those people who bought those books is going to buy an e- efficiently and effectively as ever. Randy Rampage D.O.A. who used to check on the club during its heyday. With pho- book.” tos of entertainers such as In February, White surprised the Ca- Louis , and nadian publishing industry by acquiring Armstrong Harry Belafonte , as well as exotic danc- approximately 500 backlist and in-print Billie Holiday ers, Liquor, Lust and the Law gives the titles of his long-time rival in our neck of impression it was mostly fun n’ games the woods, Scott McIntyre. Howard on Seymour Street, including the time and Mary White will now operate Penthouse owners hired streakers to sur- Douglas & McIntyre as their own sepa- prise hockey fans at the Pacific Coliseum. rate imprint. See story in Lookout sec- That same week, some 120 copies of tion, page 19. David Wong’s pictorial history of After a cache Chinese immigrants in western North America, Escape to Gold Mountain (Ar- of remarkable pho- senal $19.95) were sold during a launch at tos was recently the Dr. Sun Yat Sen Classical Chinese Gar- found at the infamous Penthouse night- den that included youngsters as well as club in Vancouver and incorporated into Chinese Canadian war veterans. Aaron Chapman’s Liquor, Lust, continued on page 8 and the Law (Arsenal $24.95), some The Brothers Philliponi: 250 copies were sold at the book launch Joe, Jimmy and Ross (and held at the old-school strip club in De- unidentified waiter), Penthouse, 1968. Joe would be murdered cember. The line-up to get into the event during a robbery in 1983. went around the block. Guests included
7 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 AROUNDBC Two hundred people attended SUCCESS STORIES ABOUND: Keith G. Powell reports a book launch in an airport hangar at the sales of his self-published South Cariboo Regional Airport, located An overflow crowd historical novel Raising Kain (Wild at 108 Mile Ranch, for Flyover: British Columbia’s attended the launch of Horse $19.95) at the Cranbrook Farmer’s market brought sales over the 1,000 copies mark. “It is known in the book Cariboo Chilcotin Coast, An Aviation Legacy (Country Flyover in a hangar at the Light $59.95 hc, $39.95 sc) with photos by Chris Harris industry that if a book sells 5,000 copies in Canada or 1,000 and text by Sage Birchwater. “We had to send a bri- South Cariboo Airport, in British Columbia it is considered a bestseller,” says Powell. gade to the restaurant next door to bring in more chairs,” 108 Mile Ranch. “So I guess at over 1,000 copies sold, it makes my second says Harris, the publisher. For Flyover, his eleventh book book a ‘Kootenay’ bestseller. Having accomplished almost since 1993, Harris also arranged events 70 first ascents or new routes on in Wells, Williams Lake, Port Moody, peaks throughout the Canadian Prince George, Bella Coola (Moose Rockies and 59 ascents (29 first as- Hall), Anahim Lake, Vernon, Salmon cents) in New Zealand, Conrad Arm, Langley, Vancouver, Whistler, Kain, who is buried in the Surrey, Kelowna, Kamloops, Fort Cranbrook cemetery, was “the Langley and Quesnel. prince of Canadian mountain The event at Anahim Lake School, guides” during the Golden Age of with less than 50 people, resulted in mountaineering in Canada. sales of 40 books. Born in Nasswald, Austria, Conrad Kain first came to Canada The airport gathering included a in 1909. He eventually settled in tribute to legendary local pilot Wilmer and died at age 50 after Gideon Schuetze who has accu- climbing Mount Louis. mulated more than 42,000 bush flying hours. Unable to make the initial launch at the 108 Airport, The century-long history of The Vancouver Sun entitled Making Schuetze attended subsequent launches in both Williams Lake Headlines (Sandhill $34.95) reputedly sold more than 6,000 copies from October to January. Com- and Bella Coola, communities 450 km apart. From his pi- piled by Shelley Fralic, Kate Bird and others, the lively compendium spans events in B.C. and lot’s perspective, it was not a big deal. He and his wife Dora around the world from 1912 to 2012. The long-serving and well-respected library manager for the newspaper’s enormously have a home in both communities. useful archives, Debbie Millward, the main person responsible for maintaining the archive that generated this bestseller, Although the 82-year-old Gideon is still flying, he drove was unceremoniously chopped from the newspaper’s payroll coincidental with the success of this book. It was a cost-cutting to the two launches he attended. measure by the newspaper chain’s head office, in deference to the incoming digital age.
Carrying a bag of newspapers on his shoulders, Vancouver Sun paperboy John Follett wades through Debbie Millward, former manager of the the flooded Milner-Fort Vancouver Sun’s research library, with Langley area in 1948. Margaret Atwood on a tour of the library.
8 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 9 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 AROUNDBC As the country’s leading producer of books for young readers, Orca Books of Victoria reports their new Seven series [see BCBW Au- tumn] is going gangbusters. Its Orca Soundings series marked its 10th anniversary with more than one million copies sold worldwide; and its Text2Reader program linked up with LearnNowB.C. A small busload of Orca titles were nominated for the 2013 YALSA Quick Picks for Reluctant Young Adult Readers COLLECTION List from the American Library Association, including all TURNER
seven of the titles in Seven (the series), plus four titles in the Orca Currents series, two from the ROBERT / Orca Soundings series, a threesome from Orca Sports, as PHOTO well as the graphic novel I, Witness by Norah McClintock and Mike Deas. CHANDLER “There was lots of enthusiasm
MAURICE about our books and authors in 2012,” says Orca Books’ pub- The E&N Railway on Vancouver Island was the first railway in Canada to make lisher Andrew Wooldridge. a complete switch to diesel power. The final days of steam on the E&N came in January and February of The series Seven has topped the 1949, as evidenced by this rare colour image of a train leaving Victoria, from The Canadian Pacific’s B.C. Children’s Bestseller List Esquimalt & Nanaimo Railway: The CPR Steam Years, 1905–1949 (Sono Nis $49.94 HC / $39.95 PB) by Robert provided by TBM Book Turner and Donald F. MacLachlan. This lavish topseller is a project of the B.C. Railway Historical Association. Manager. “Bob Turner was the first author my father signed on when he bought Sono Nis in 1976,” says his current publisher, Diane Morriss of Winlaw, “and here we are thirty-seven years later still publishing beautiful books together. His books have been the bread and butter of the press, helping sustain us through lean years that have felled many other small and large presses. Andrew The E&N history is his 16th on transportation history. Already we have many readers looking forward to volume two, Wooldridge coming out later this year. We have a huge list of people waiting to buy it.” HC: 978-1-55039-206-7; PB 978-1-55039-204-3
10 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 COVER
PHASE ONE
N 1985, CHRIS AND JUDITH PLANT WERE BACK-TO- the-landers of sorts, seeking the communal experience Itwenty miles down a gravel road from Lillooet, pro- ducing an environmental newspaper called The New Cata- lyst, a let’s-fix-the-world endeavor that soon led them into publishing books. Started in 1990, their fledgling publishing imprint called New Society eventually took over its sister company—New Society Publishers, Philadelphia—with whom they had worked for six years. “We made a conscious decision to do our bit for the ‘turn-around decade’ that was called for by David Suzuki and others,” says Chris ‘Kip’ Plant, “But somehow that GROW turn-around decade turned into two decades.” Based out of Gabriola Island, the Plants parlayed their ON YOUR OWN dedication to “bioregionalism” into a successful vehicle for promoting ecological consciousness and community action world-wide. uch admired as leaders of the sustainability movement, Having encouraged the use of recycled paper for books, the Plants received the James Douglas Award for outstand- Chris and Judith Plant are recycling themselves, buy- ing publishing in British Columbia in 2003. By 2005, they M were the first publishing company in North America, and only the second publishing company in the world, to declare ing back their New Society imprint from D&M Publishers Inc. themselves “carbon neutral.” Here’s the three-part story of how their healthy, homemade New PHASE TWO FAMILY HEALTH PROBLEM PROMPTED THEM TO RE- Society imprint continues to live up to its name. tire and sell New Society to Scott McIntyre’s ADouglas & McIntyre, often touted as the largest publishing house in Western Canada It’s possible Lone Pine in Alberta might have greater sales worldwide. D&M was by then Van- couver businessman Mark Scott’s company, since his purchase of the majority of the shares just prior to the acquisition of New Society, but McIntyre remained on board. “Their list had integrity,” Chris Plant said, “and we had obvious compatibilities with their Greystone imprint, David Suzuki’s publisher.” ✍ SO D&M PUBLISHERS INC. BECAME A CONSORTIUM of three imprints; New Society, Douglas & McIntyre and Greystone. The new owner, Mark Scott, was an acquaintance of Scott McIntyre. “One of the trickiest challenges any company faces is getting succession right,” McIntyre said in 2012, “and I’m very proud of the path we are embarking upon.” With McIntyre at the helm as its chairman, New Society D&M Publishers Inc., filed for protection from authors bankruptcy in November of 2012, having accu- Moreka Jolar mulated debts exceeding $6 million, including more and Heidi Scheifley at than half a million owing to authors. Hollyhock, The second phase of New Society—through Cortes Island no fault of the imprint—was in jeopardy. Judith Plant herself became one of D&M’s major creditors because The Plants’ first B.C.-grown book upon their return to the full purchase of New Society by the D&M consortium ownership harkens back to their roots in Lillooet—all puns had yet to be completed. intended—where communalism was viewed as a healthy and So what to do? natural necessity. It’s also a follow-up to Hollyhock Cooks (New Society 2004), co-authored by Jolar. PHASE THREE Now New Society also intends to deal head-on with 21ST HE PLANTS OPTED TO COME OUT OF RETIREMENT century technological challenges. “We’re already selling all and buy back their press, with the essential help of our books as e-books,” says Judith Plant, “and an increas- T of their financial angel, friend Carol Newell of ing volume of sales are electronic. Renewal Partners who had helped them from the outset. “The real challenge is adapting as a publisher to the broader Whereas almost the entire staff at D&M in Vancouver electronic culture. We must consider ourselves more as pur- was rendered jobless by the business failure, New Society veyors of information that can be parlayed in diverse forms has remained stable, staff-wise, and they’re now proceeding than strictly as a producer of books alone. Being fluid in with a full spring list with the usual range of sustainability such a world is crucial. titles and one book with a distinctly local flavour. “The intelligent, committed and passionate people on Signaling the phoenix-like resurgence of New Society, our staff, many of whom have spent most of their working Hollyhock: Garden to Table (New Society $24.95) by Chris and Judith Plant, 2009 lives with the company, are raring to go. So, yes, this amounts Moreka Jolar and Heidi Scheifley reasserts the pres- to a re-birth of sorts.” ence of a unique B.C. institution, Hollyhock, a centre for Based on thirty years of cooking, Hollyhock: Garden to This third phase of New Society will also provide an learning and well-being, B.C.’s Findhorn, created in 1982 on Table provides more than 200 new garden-inspired recipes opportunity for a partial employee buy-in to the company. the grounds of the former Cold Mountain Institute on Cortes as well as growing tips from Hollyhock’s own Master Gar- A portion of the shares are being made available for the staff Island. dener, Nori Fletcher. Moreka Jolar has been a chef at to buy anytime, and a further portion can be bought at a very Near its ocean-view kitchen, the world renowned learn- Hollyhock for fifteen years and Scheifley is a certified gour- attractive price, provided certain sales and profitability tar- ing centre of Hollyhock boasts a spectacular organic garden. met natural foods chef who has cooked around the world. gets are met. 978-0-86571-727-5
11 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 Our Spring Agenda
Tax Survival for Canadians: Stand up to the CRA by Dale Barrett • Written by a tax lawyer, you’ll learn everything you need to know about the CRA audit process. • Know your rights as a tax payer. • Learn how to win at the tax game! $22.95 Paperback
The Prenuptial Guide: Contracts for Lovers by David Greig and Ross Davidson • Avoid future disputes. • Decide how assets brought into the marriage are handled. • Use this guide when marrying or living together. $19.95 Paperback + CD-ROM
Supporting Parents with Alzheimer’s: Your parents took care of you, now how do you take care of them? by Tanya Lee Howe • Learn how to use a memory book to help your parent. • Figure out the right time to intervene. • Understand all the options available to you and your parents. $19.95 Paperback
Estate Planning for the Blended Family by L. Paul Hood, Jr. and Emily Bouchard • Blended families now comprise the largest segment of families in Canada. • Create your plan, make it legal, and ensure your assets go where you want. This Day in Vancouver is a compendium of little • Document an estate plan for known — as well as celebrated — facts about the great city your unique family situation of Vancouver. In fact, one for every day of the year :: and enjoy piece of mind. Everything Rustles is a memoir about the tangle of $24.95 Paperback + CD- midlife — the long look back, the shorter look forward, and ROM the moments right now that shimmer and rustle :: Glossolalia is a series of poetic monologues spoken by the Estate Planning through Family Meetings: 34 wives of Joseph Smith, founder of The Church of Jesus (without breaking up the family) Christ of Latter Day Saints :: Unus Mundus explores how by Lynne Butler we are shifting away from a union with the cosmos toward a • Hold effective inter- desire to conquer its mysteries and exploit its resources :: generational family meetings. This Drawn & Quartered Moon makes San • Talk to your family about Francisco its epicenter and from there launchs a critical sensitive estate issues. and passionate assessment of America at the turn of the • Document the plan and last millennium :: plus fine new editions of two “first” novels: make it legal. Teresa McWhirter’s Some Girls Do, and Annette $24.95 Paperback + Lapointe’s Giller-nominated novel, Stolen. CD-ROM www.self-counsel.com anvil 1-800-663-3007 www.anvilpress.com
12 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 INTERVIEW
• “No data” was available for more than a crises by increasingly controlling our envi- Ignorance dozen others. ronment so as to limit the amount of change But there is hope. with which we had to deal. We grew food, Renée Hetherington’s engaging irrigated crops, stored food, heated and not bliss recapping of both human and earth history, cooled our homes. We proliferated. Our domi- Living in a Dangerous Climate: Climate nance continued because our innovations UBC environmentalist Change and Human Evolution (Cambridge kept up with the relatively minor climate $28.95), explains how we got to the 21st and environmental changes we experienced. Renée Hetherington century as a dominant species, and why we However, when innovations and behavioural voices optimism. can rationally hope to exist for a few more adjustments did not keep up with a rapidly centuries. changing environment, extinction reared its ITH 7 BILLION PEO- Written to appeal to both a general audi- dreaded head as the demise of Maya and ple on the planet ence and an academic one, Hetherington Easter Islander civilizations attest. poses poignant questions about the innova- What is different about today? and billions more BW: W tion, survival and dominance of the Homo RH: Climate change is not new, nor are spe- expected to arrive over the next fifty sapiens species and provides insightful an- cies extinctions. What is new is the fact that years, we can innovate and change, swers: the level of carbon dioxide in our atmos- BC BookWorld: Why is innovation im- phere has escalated to levels never before or we can go extinct. portant? Renée Hetherington experienced by H. sapiens, or observed in According to the latest annual Global Renée Hetherington: Looking back the scientific records that stretch over the Environmental Outlook report from the on Earth’s history, we have seen that when a BW: What made H. sapiens innovate and last 800,000 years… Over the past 160 United Nations Environmental Programme crisis strikes, there are three options facing survive? years, the amount of carbon dioxide in the [UNEP], world leaders have signed up for species: (1) move out of the affected areas; RH: H. sapiens survived during previous atmosphere has increased by the same 500 international agreements in the past 50 (2) innovate and change; or (3) go extinct. rapid climate changes because of the three amount it increased over the previous 21,000 years, thereby generating “treaty conges- Humans are now the dominant species, but Cs: crisis, communication, and collabora- years, a period during which the Earth moved tion.” It takes years to negotiate these trea- our options to respond to change remain the tion. When crises hit, humans moved into out of a glacial deep freeze and into the ties, then most are willfully ignored. Having same. With 7 billion people on the planet restricted territories where they could sur- moderate climate of the 1800s. Yet although examined 90 of the major environmental and billions more expected to arrive over the vive. They brought with them different we are able to predict that this latest in- protection agreements in the world, UNEP next fifty years, we cannot migrate to some- ways, responses, cultures, and behaviours. crease in atmospheric carbon dioxide will has discovered: where new. We can innovate and change, or They communicated these different ways lead to future climate change, we are unable • “Some” progress was shown in 40 goals we can go extinct. of being with each other. Then they collabo- to feel its full effects here and now because (including expansion of protected areas, such BW: How innovative has the Homo spe- rated. Intelligence emerged, as did innova- it takes time for these rapid atmospheric as national parks, and efforts to reduce de- cies been? tive ideas and behaviours like complex stone changes to work their way through Earth’s forestation). RH: Innovation at the species level creates tools, agriculture and civilization. climate system. What is different is that our • “Little or no” progress was shown in 24 variety, and there has been much variety in BW: How did we become the most domi- current behaviour will have long-term im- goals (including climate change, fish stocks, our past – H. habilis, H. erectus, H. ergas- nant of all species on the planet? pacts on humanity and all species on Earth. drought and desertification). ter, H. heidelbergensis, H. neanderthalensis, RH: Around 10,000 years ago, humans be- So although we can predict, we cannot yet • “Further deterioration” was shown for H. floresiensis. But today, there is only one gan to control and exploit plants, other ani- feel the crisis – so little change is stimu- eight goals (including coral reefs). remaining Homo species – Homo sapiens. mals, and nature generally. We responded to lated. 9781107694736 “As west coast as it gets!”
THE 5 CENT MURDER 2nd novel in a series of 5 Alfred Cool’s e-novel THE 5 CENT MURDER, set in 1973, follows a narrator who takes a chokerman job in a remote B.C. coastal logging camp. He soon realizes the company has hired work-release prisoners to fill out the full crew— including a dangerous, serial rapist. In this narra- tive comedy, the author captures the local color, high-risk taking and humour of those who did “run or die!” in logging camps, culminating in a con- “U-235 & Me” to be frontation for the finale of the story. released June 2013 Contact: [email protected] www.bcboychronicles.com • bcboychronicles.blogspot.ca THE 5 CENT MURDER and DRY CAMP! are available in paperback: www.amazon.com, $14.95 / $9.95 • ISBN-13: 978-1481128674 or ISBN-10: 1481128671 Also available as eBooks: Barnes & Noble (for NOOK), Apple iBookstore (for iPad), Amazon (for Kindle), Copia, Sony, Baker & Taylor, Gardners Books, KOBO
13 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 Words, Words, Words Gardens Aflame Essays and Memoirs Garry Oak Meadows of BC’s South Coast by GEORGE BOWERING by MALEEA ACKER Find out what Canada’s first Poet-Laureate most cherishes about writers and writing: Victoria writer and environmentalist Maleea who Al Purdy was; what David McFadden’s Acker tells us about the Garry oak, its unique work pays attention to; when the world of and vanishing ecosystem, and the people who poetry changed; where Artie Gold appeared as have made it their life’s work to save this species a light fixture in our darkness; how bpNichol’s along with the environment ––– including the Martyrology legitimized the vernacular; human environment ––– it depends on. why we cannot read history without encountering Shakespeare.
Transmontanus 21
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The Shiva IKMQ by MICHAEL TREGEBOV by ROGER FARR
Set in Winnipeg’s Jewish community, The Avant-garde poetry infused with play and Shiva tells the story of a syndicate of buddies humour by Gabriola Island resident Roger Farr. from the local casino and their scheme to short- Follow the characters I, K, M and Q as they sell the 2008 mortgage crisis, and make a convert houses to commercial grow–ops, fortune for themselves. A hilarious, fast-paced, manufacture explosives, go all in on the flop, character-driven novel about greed and destiny, conduct meetings according to Roberts, plot a and two sons desperate for their aging mother’s prison break, score an all–important goal, get love. By the author of The Briss. the door for the pizza delivery boy, and get on with transforming the world through their revolutionary action.
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The Resurrection of Joseph Bourne Jack Hodgins
He Moved a Mountain: More Heat than Light: The Life of Frank Calder and the Sex-Difference Science & the Nisga’a Land Claims Accord Study of Language ½ Joan Harper ½ Deborah Cameron The first biography of Frank Calder, the Nisga’a Oxford Professor Deborah Cameron offers a chief who brought the “Calder Case” to the Supreme succinct refutation of claims that men and Court of Canada, the blueprint for world-wide women possess hardwired differences in their aboriginal land claims. 20 b&w photos. intellect and use of language, 9 b&w photos. 978-1-55380-227-3 6 x 9 220 pp $21.95 978-1-55380-221-1 5-3/4 x 9 34 pp $10.95 How Happy Became Homosexual Hannah & the Salish Sea ½ Howard Richler ½ Carol Anne Shaw An informative yet humorous account of the In the second book in the “Hannah” series, This new Ronsdale edition of the ever-changing meanings of words in the English poachers have moved into Cowichan Bay forcing language. Learn how “gay” morphed into Hannah and her friends into a desperate struggle GG-award-winning novel makes “homosexual” and thousands of other examples. to save the lives of the endangered animals. available to readers once again the 978-1-55380-230-3 6 x 9 250 pp $19.95 978-1-55380-233-4 5-1/4 x 7-5/8 272 pp $11.95 miraculously life-giving world of Port Annie, teetering on the edge of the Late Moon Cursed by the Sea God northwest coast of Vancouver Island, ½ Pamela Porter ½ Patrick Bowman forever threatening to slide into This collection of lyric poems by GG-winner The second volume in the series retelling the the sea – only to be reborn. Pamela Porter brims with a deep longing, an Odyssey, as seen through the eyes of Alexi, a Trojan 978-1-55380-239-6 6 x 9 288 pp $18.95 abiding thirst for truth, and finally, acceptance. boy who has been made the slave of Odysseus. 978-1-55380-236-5 6 x 9 110 pp $15.95 978-1-55380-186-3 5-1/4 x 7-5/8 208 pp $11.95
Available from your favourite bookstore or order from PGC Ronsdale Press Visit our website at www.ronsdalepress.com
14 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 PROFILE
F ASKED TO NAME B.C.’S topselling authors, most “The books I write are people might consider far more profound than I am.” IDouglas Coupland, or DAVID DAY W.P. Kinsella, or William Gibson.
Few would cite David Day whose publicity materials state his six titles about the fantasies of J.R.R.Tolkien alone have sold nearly 2.5 million copies in 20 languages since 1978. The first of his Tolkien six-pack, The Tolkien Bestiary, was originally published in B.C. but written after Day had moved to London. If it has truly appeared in over 180 editions in 20 languages, an argument can be made it’s the most widely-read book ever first published from B.C. TOLKIENTOLKIEN Coincidental with three Peter Jackson films based on The Hobbit, due in 2012, 2013 and 2014, Day’s six Tolkien- related books are now being reprinted in ANYONE?ANYONE? new editions. As well, Day’s book, Tolkien’s Ring, is Dealing in death illustrated by Alan Lee, the Oscar-win- ning artist and art director of Peter Jackson’s and fantasy has made Lord of the Rings Trilogy and The Hobbit perhaps the films. David Day David Day didn’t read Lord of the Rings foremost B.C. author until his late teens. He got the idea for an you’ve never heard of. encyclopedia of an imaginary world while taking a bibliography course at UBC. ✍ BORN AND RAISED IN VICTORIA, B.C. IN 1947, David Day edited his high school newspa- per, contributed sports articles to the Victo- ria Times and worked on Vancouver Island for five years as a logger. He travelled in Europe, staying mainly in Greece, where he wrote some of the po- ems that were included in his first book, The Cowichan (Oolichan, 1975; Harbour, he completed a non-fiction assignment for David Day holds a replica of the egg of Toronto. Gothic was adapted as a stage per- 1976). the provincial archives called Men of the the Elephant Bird (also known as the formance by magician Simon Drake at Rukh or Aepyornis Maximus), one of “The material for my first book came Forest (1977) and he co-edited Many Voices: the Royal Victoria Museum’s Magic, Sha- the extinct species featured in his out of journals kept in the late sixties and An Anthology of Contemporary Canadian book, Nevermore. It was ten feet tall, manism and Poetry Festival in 1987. His early seventies in the Caycuse and Nitinat Indian Poetry (J.J. Douglas, 1977) with lived in Madagascar, weighed half a 100-part television series Lost Animals, nar- logging camps in the Cowichan Valley. Marilyn Bowering. ton and became extinct around 1700. rated by Greta Scacchi, has been trans- “These were logging tales filled with the The first of Day’s half-dozen books of Its eggs were the largest ever to exist lated into 18 languages. on the planet. They were four times sound of diesel engines, chainsaws and fall- natural history was his Doomsday Book of Day has lived in Toronto, London, the size of any dinosaur egg and had ing timber mixed with the native Indian lore Animals (Wiley, 1981), with an introduc- a fluid capacity of two gallons, the Spain, Greece and Victoria, including a stint about wildlife: eagles, bears, mountain lions tion by HRH the Duke of Edin- equivalent to 200 chicken eggs. The working for McClelland & Stewart in On- and elk. burgh, chosen in 1981 as a Time Magazine estimated weight was 25 lbs. tario. “Most of the poems only began to ‘Book of the Year.’ In the mid-1980s, David Day brought emerge from those pages as finished works As an author, Day deals a lot in death. 1980), Karen Silkwood (murdered? Britain’s poet laureate Ted Hughes to over the next year and a half of living on the Doomsday Book of Animals was followed USA, 1974) and Guy Bradley (murdered, B.C. to read in Victoria and Vancouver; and Aegean island of Paros in Greece. by The Whale War (D&M, 1987) and Eco USA, 1905). later with Linda Rogers he organized “While in Greece, I sent a dozen poems Wars: True Tales of Environmental Mad- ✍ the Spirit Quest Festival in Victoria. Since to Robin Skelton at the Malahat Review ness (Key Porter, 1989). EARLY IN HIS CAREER DAVID DAY WROTE 2007, Day has lived in Toronto but makes in the hope that he might choose one, and I The latter is an encyclopedia of ecologi- for Punch in England. He has also written annual summer migrations to B.C. was astonished that he took the lot, editing cal activism that cites the deaths of Chico columns for Britain’s Daily Mail and ✍ them down to one long seven-page sequence, Mendes (murdered, Brazil, 1988), Dian Evening Standard. The Whale War was the IN 2012, DAVID DAY’S READING TOUR TO PRO- entitled ‘Logging: Cowichan Lake.’ Fossey (murdered, Rwanda, 1985), basis for a BBC television film of the same mote his newest book, Nevermore: A Book “Upon returning to Victoria, I entered Fernando Pereira (murdered, New name. of Hours: Meditations on Extinction UVic’s creative writing program. At this Zealand, 1985), Hilda Murrell (mur- Eco Wars was published in the United (Quattro $20), coincided with his father’s time, Gary Geddes was putting together dered, England, 1984), Valery States as The Environmental Wars. The 88th birthday and a totem pole-raising cer- Oxford University Press’s first anthology Rinchinov (murdered, USSR, 1981), Emperor’s Panda was adapted and per- emony on the grounds of the Lieutenant of B.C. literature, Skookum Wawa and he Joy Adamson (murdered, Kenya, formed by the Young People’s Theatre of Governor General’s mansion in Victoria by chose a couple of my poems. his old friend, Kwakiutl Chief Tony Hunt. “He then recommended me to Ron THE TOLKIEN SIX-PACK: Illustrated by four wildlife artists, Nev- Smith who was just starting Oolichan ermore: A Book of Hours is a medieval Books, and Ron published The Cowichan. Four new Day/Tolkien editions exclusive to Indigo-Chapters bookstores are being bestiary—part natural history, part human Over the next year, Ron and I had some- released as Tolkien’s World: A Bestiary (Bounty/Octopus), Tolkien’s Ring (Pavil- history, part mythology, and part literature ion/Anova), A Guide to Tolkien (Bounty/Octopus) and The Hobbit Companion thing of a falling out, and Howie White and poetry—as well as a book of remem- (Pavilion/ Anova). A fifth title in October, Tolkien: The Illustrated Encyclopedia at Harbour Publishing generously offered brance, updating his Encyclopedia of Van- (Simon & Schuster) will be followed by World of Tolkien: Mythological Sources of to publish a second edition with sepia ar- ished Species from 1989. Lord of the Rings (Bounty/Octopus 2013). These Tolkien-related titles were earlier chival photographs.” Day links the fates of extinct animals to ✍ released as The Tolkien Bestiary (Harbour, 1978), The Hobbit Companion (1997), Tolkien: The Illustrated Encyclopedia (1992), The Tolkien Companion (Mandarin- human characters—Julius Caesar to the IN THE YEAR DAVID DAY GRADUATED FROM Mitchell-Beasley, 1993) and Tolkien’s Ring (Harper-Collins, 1994). Aurochs, Jacques Cartier to the Great the department of creative writing at UVic, continued on page 17
15 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 HISTORY
IMES WERE TOUGH to see what they were up to. The locals, Peg everywhere in assumed, figured it was only a matter of Peg Whittington time before this brand of west coast living the 1930s, and on Long Beach, would get the better of the young pair. the Victoria cou- 1936 “A lot of people came in and took a look because they wondered, ‘Oh, these people ple had been won’t stay. Nobody will stay there that looking for a new long.’” At the time, the beach was not consid- direction. Dick first came out on T ered a prime location or a smart investment. foot, walking along a rough tel- It was just too far from anywhere. Walking egraph trail from Port Alberni to out to Tofino or Ucluelet along the rough trails could take three hours each way. Plus, Kennedy Lake. There, he was met it was a time when money was tight. Within by a friend from the west coast, and a few years of the Whittingtons’ arrival, for example, the property next door at Green the pair canoed down to the ocean Point was listed for $500, and nobody bought and spent a few days exploring it. “There was no money,” Peg recalled, “and [people saw] no future in the beach.” It was Clayoquot and Tofino. a far cry from two decades earlier, when Tibbs On his return trip home via Ucluelet, had sold his land for $5,000. Dick’s route took him down Long Beach. From the start, Peg and Dick envisioned Walking on the huge yet deserted beach, ser- building a few cabins as holiday rentals. Once enaded by the background rumble of waves their own home was finished, they started hitting sand, he fell in love with the place. in on building the guest cabins, working full Back in Victoria, he approached Peg about tilt to get them up. A day off was consid- the idea of making Long Beach their new ered a walk to beachcomb lumber. At first, home. Back in the days the Whittingtons didn’t have a name for “We were looking for something and when hippies were able their place, which they were reluctant ready to leap at anything that was different to live relatively undisturbed in lean-tos to call a resort. Nevertheless, they ran than city living,” Peg recalled years later. and other makeshift shelters, denizens a small newspaper ad in Victoria, and “Sure we argued it back and forth, pros and of Long Beach on Vancouver Island adventurous guests began trickling cons, and were we crazy or weren’t we, but in, arriving by boat at Ucluelet and often found long-sunken cars that had I was willing to give it a try.” then getting a ride up to Long Beach. emerged from beneath the sand, The $300 the couple brought with them The guest book’s first entry is dated unburied by the tides. They would light supported them for a year and financed the July 1937. these vehicles ablaze to signify the first house they built. They lived off the People typically came for a week, beach’s plenty, dining regularly on clams, fallibility of human technology. maybe two, bringing all their own sup- crabs, and salmon and supplementing that Those events were called plies. Each cabin had a stove, beds, and a with flour, sugar, and other staples from car-b-ques. few other basic items: “none of the luxuries, town. but all of the necessities,” Peg liked to say. The Whittingtons’ first task was to set Every night after sunset there was a bonfire up a camp. They put up their large canvas on the beach, and guests from the cabins gath- tent, moved their supplies in, and then ered around the crackling driftwood to visit, grabbed their machetes. They had purchased while out beyond the circle of light the sound the lot where Fred Tibbs had built his Tidal of distant breaking waves filled the dark. In Wave Ranch. His house was still standing, time, the resort was named Singing Sands. higher up on the cliff above the beach. To For a few years, most of the signatures get to it, the couple had to hack their way in the Singing Sands guest book were from up through the wall of salal. It took three nearby residents—Hillier, Stone, Donahue, weeks. One of them would cut the brush LONGLONG BEACHBEACH Lovekin—but slowly the guest range ex- and the other would clear it away. They panded, reaching to Port Alberni, Victoria, found the single-room cabin in rough shape. and beyond. Word was beginning to spread At least twenty years had passed since about a small resort out there on magnifi- Tibbs went off to build his islet castle near cent Long Beach. Tofino. The logs were rotten and wind blew LONGLONG AGOAGO In the summer of 1939, Edith Nelson through the walls, but the roof was sound. paid a return visit to her old friends. On Dick and Peg cleaned it out, chinked the leaving, she wrote in the guest book, “Once logs, and installed windows they’d hauled Long-time Long Beach resident Adrienne Mason more unto the beach, my friends.” Whether up the hill from the tent. The couple con- has done a terrific job digging up delightful stories and characters intentional or not, her entry, playing on tinued to sleep at the beach in the early for Long Beach Wild (Greystone $24.95), none more essential to Shakespeare’s “Once more unto the breach, days of their arrival, but once the cabin dear friends” from Henry V, was porten- was ready, complete with a tiny tin stove, the spirit of the area than pioneers Peg and Dick Whittington, tous. Henry V opens just before the Battle they moved in. who first arrived together on a beautiful sunny day in August, 1936. In of Agincourt begins during the Hundred During the first year and a half, the Years’ War. Not two months after Edith Whittingtons chipped their home and liveli- this excerpt, Mason has recalled what happened Nelson waved goodbye to the Whittingtons hood out of the forest fronting Long Beach. after they bumped their way to Long Beach in a and headed home, Canada declared war on They cleared an area large enough for a new BC Germany. truck, off-loaded their crates and never left their BOOKWORLD house, dug a well, and put in a garden. Nei- Even on the remote western edge of ther had homesteading experience, yet both sixty-four-acre lot northwest of Green Point. STAFF PICK Canada, things were about to change. were apparently well suited to it. They built ✍ IF THE LEADING EDGE OF THE CLOUD THAT their first house completely of wood they On February 1st, Heritage House Publishing announced it had acquired all the salvaged off the beach, mostly sawed lum- was about to sweep over Long Beach dur- assets of the former D&M Publishers’ imprint Greystone Books, managed by ber lost off the decks of passing ships. For ing World War II was signalled by a trun- the foundation they used rocks and creo- Rob Sanders, who will be taking most of his authors and titles — such as Long cated honeymoon, perhaps it was fate that soted posts, and for the roof, hand-cut Beach Wild — to Heritage House. Previously, Heritage House was chiefly com- saw the need to mark the cloud’s departure shakes. prised of Heritage House Publishers, Touchwood Editions, Brindle & Glass and with another casualty of the heart. As with the Lovekins’ place, the activ- In March 1946, a large mine floated onto Rocky Mountain Books. Overseen by Rodger and Pat Touchie, The Heritage ity at the Whittingtons’ property became a the beach near Dick and Peg Whittington’s Group received the Jim Douglas Publisher of the Year Award in 2008. topic of curiosity and conversation. Any Singing Sands resort. They reported it to visitors to the beach made sure to stop by continued on next page
16 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 HISTORY TOLKIEN & DAY continued from previous page continued from page 15 founder of both Bantam and Ballantine George Redhead, the provin- Auk, Samuel de Champlain to the Books, I thought this was rather presump- cial policeman stationed in Passenger Pigeon, Vitus Bering to the tuous, but I was assured he was very ap- Ucluelet, who in turn sent Stellar’s Sea Cow, Daniel Boone to the proachable; and as the publisher of the recent word to the Canadian navy. Black Bison, Charles Darwin to the best-sellers Gnomes and Faeries, would be Although Redhead advised Antarctic Wolf. interested in meeting me. them to land at Ucluelet, from As a tribute to a multitude of strange “With nothing much to lose I made the where he would drive the deto- and astonishing species which have liter- call while in New York. To my astonish- nation crew out to the beach ally ‘gone the way of the Dodo,’ the book ment, he arranged a meeting that same day site, the navy insisted on pro- begins with the historic first encounters with at Bantam Books. To my further aston- ceeding by sea straight out to the Dodo’s extinction in 1680. Day sug- ishment, he stated he knew who I was and Green Point and sending the gests the Dodo’s demise marks the begin- then sat by amused as he played me a tape men ashore in a small boat. ning of ‘Globalization’ and the monetization in which his designer David Larkin was Redhead and the Whittingtons of species that rapidly resulted in many having a conversation with the illustrator knew this was a foolish deci- extinctions at the hand of man. Alan Lee. sion—launching and rowing Dick Whittington (left) with George Hillier and an Day says the highlight of his literary “Two minutes into the tape, Lee stated through the surf was risky at unexploded mine on Long Beach. The navy expedition promotion was a reading at the Old Fire the illustrations were going fine, but the the best of times and even sent to detonate the mine ended in death. House in Duncan, in the Cowichan Val- concept of the book and its text was a more so in the late winter’s ley, where his logging camp journals were major problem for him. Ideally he would high seas—but they had little say in the Sands to warm up. written. like to have someone like that author of A matter. Dick, meanwhile, had, with great diffi- ✍ Tolkien Bestiary, a Canadian writer named Offshore, a skiff with five men was low- culty, made it onto the rocks of Green Point CASTLES (MCGRAW-HILL, 1984) WAS THE FIRST David Day work with him on the ered, and they headed in. They made it safely to help the stranded sailor still in trouble of five collaborations with artist Alan Lee, project! to the beach and set about exploding the there. Whether Dick was swept into the followed by Lost Animals (1984), Gothic “A few months later, Ballantine had mine. The plan went awry, however, when water by the wave surge or pulled in by the (1986), Tolkien’s Ring (1994) and Quest For flown Alan Lee and me to New York, and the men tried to return to the base ship. As man he was trying to save is not clear, but King Arthur (1995). then taken us to his upstate New York home they strained at the oars to propel the small Dick disappeared. Only later was his body Day’s first encounter with Alan Lee was in the village of Bearsville in Woodstock. boat through the breakers, they were flipped found down the beach toward Sandhill the result of a set of coincidences. There we sat around a table with the de- over into the churning surf. Dick and Red- Creek. One of the naval men also drowned “In 1981,” he says, “I was in Toronto, a signer David Larkin and brainstormed the head raced in to help while Peg ran to the in the incident. couple of years after the publication of A project that eventually became the book house for rope. When she got back, she could Dick was posthumously awarded a Tolkien Bestiary and was on my way to Castles. That was the beginning of a friend- see three of the navy men struggling in the medal for his part in the rescue. Peg chose New York to promote my Doomsday ship and series of collaborations with Alan surf as another clung to the overturned skiff not to go to the ceremony; instead his Book of Animals. Someone I had met Lee that has lasted for over thirty and the fifth was trying to gain purchase on mother accepted the medal. through Earle Birney suggested I get years” the rocks off the beach. “Everybody thought I should leave the in touch with Ian Ballantine while I For additionall information on David Eventually, three of them were rescued beach after that,” Peg Whittington said years was in New York. Day and his books, visit abcbookworld.com and brought to shore, and Peg and a later, “and I thought I shouldn’t.” “As Ian Ballantine was the legendary Nevermore 978-1-926802-68-8 neighbour drove the shaken men to Singing 978-1-55365-344-8
17 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 18 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 A quarterly forum for and about writers; as well as a series about the origins # of B.C. publishing houses 49 3516 W. 13th Ave., Vancouver, BC V6R 2S3 • [email protected] Scott McIntyre, in 1997, receives LOOKOUTLOOKOUT another prize, with Corky McIntyre in All things the background. must pass
WHEN TWO CULTURAL FLAGSHIPS, D&M Publishers Inc. and The Playhouse in Vancouver, ran aground last year, there was much handwringing.
Since then, the removal of The Playhouse has enabled more light to shine on smaller companies previously in the shadow of that behemoth. Stage offerings around town are more varied than ever. Ditto for publishing. New players continue to appear while the D&M umbrella has been split into three smaller umbrellas, all hoisted by owners who will more diligently toe the bottom line. ✍ 1. New Society Publishers was bought back from D&M by their original owners, a deal approved on January 25. [See story P. 11] 2. Publisher Rob Sanders and editor Nancy Flight had their Greystone imprint bought from D&M by Rodger Touchie’s ever-expanding Heritage House consortium, a deal also approved on January 25. 3. That left room for Howard White of Harbour Publishing to spend about ten days dickering with his Japanese woman. ‘That is not bad.’ I thought, ‘She is 50% by a petroglyph on a boulder near their house showing a former business rival Scott McIntyre, inking a deal to correct.’” female mouse, with one arm outstretched, welcoming peo- acquire approximately 500 D&M titles, 397 of which are The fortune teller became 100% correct when David ple to the sacred site that includes burial caves. in print, in a deal announced on February 6. (D&M Pub- Young met Michiko Kimura, a senior in college, at an Eng- As a “grandmother” spirit, Mouse Woman tradition- lishers Inc. and Greystone had creditor protection in place lish speaking retreat in Japan. After Michiko obtained her ally protects young people and rectifies injustices done to until February 18; New Society did not.) degree, she joined him in Hawaii where he was completing them. The Youngs have observed people with problems ✍ a master’s degree in Asian Studies. such as rheumatoid arthritis who have leaned against the AUTHORS ARE AMONG THE BIG LOSERS, UNABLE TO COLLECT The couple began to seriously research Japanese aes- rock to receive a burst of energy that cures or alleviates royalties from the original D&M parent company. Owed thetics. “The thing that puzzled us most,” he says, “was their problems. Their book explores possible explanations more than $2 million, Bank of Montreal, as the preferred the great difference between the quiet, austere aesthetics of spontaneous healing, with an emphasis upon the role of creditor, gets first dibs on any fire sale proceeds. associated with art forms such as the tea ceremony and religious symbols, mind-body interactions, and the pla- Meanwhile B.C. publishing is expanding with more the gaudy lights and noise of the recreational areas of Japa- cebo effect in healing. small players—the latest being newbie publishers David nese cities. It took us some time to realize that rather than The Youngs launched their imprint at the Commons on and Michiko Young who have formed Coastal Tides being competing traditions, the Restrained and Exuberant Gabriola in March, with books available through Page’s Press to specialize in books on Japanese culture, health traditions are actually two ends of a continuum upon which Resort & Marina Bookstore, 250-247-8931. and healing, and the traditional knowledge of the First Japanese move back and forth in the course of their every- It’s a far cry from the Frankfurt Book Fair, lobbying in Nations. day lives –in accordance with rules that depend upon the Ottawa or hobnobbing at the Giller Prize, but they are ✍ circumstances.” unlikely to leave their printer in the lurch for $1.4 million THE YOUNGS’ STORY BEGINS AT YALE After receiving his Ph.D. in anthro- and place all their employees on the street. University. It was there David Young pology from Stanford University, David ✍ stumbled upon a black ink painting, Win- taught anthropology at University of Al- SMALL IS BEAUTIFUL. SO IS MEDIUM-SIZED AND LOCAL. ter Landscape, by the great Zen artist, berta, specializing in Japanese culture, D&M Publishers Inc. lost their Canada Council and BPIDP Sesshu. He had what the Japanese call health and healing, and the traditional government funding by accumulating $6.3 million in debts a satori experience. He decided then and knowledge of Canada’s First Nations. His to 143 creditors. there that he would have to visit Japan to seven books prior to Coastal Tides include Nobody knows the whole story except D&M board see what kind of culture could produce Cry of the Eagle: Encounters with a Cree chairman Scott McIntyre, who declined interview requests such a work of art. Healer and The Art of the Japanese Gar- from B.C. BookWorld. In 1962, having lined up a job teaching Michiko and den, written with Michiko. We do know D&M lost their lucrative association with English in a high school in Kyoto, Young David Young Now on Gabriola Island, the Youngs Farrar, Straus & Giroux; efforts to sell the company to an and a Yale friend bicycled across Europe, are emulating many B.C. publishers (such American distributor distracted energies; and new owner meeting up with another Yale friend in Munich, who hap- as Howard White, Harbour; Bob Tyrrell, Orca; Mark Scott invested rashly in an internet book marketing pened to be the minister of finance for Afghanistan. The Stephen Osborne, Pulp; Julian Ross, Polestar; scheme called BookRiff—all problems Coastal Tides Press trio drove a Volkswagen bus across the deserts of Turkey Ron Smith, Oolichan, Brian Kaufman, Anvil, etc.) won’t be having. and Iran to Kabul. by starting off as writers. “People still love to read books, that’s the bottom Young’s ultimate destination was Japan. Leaving his Fifty years of shared research on Japanese aesthetics line,” says Orca Books’ publisher Andrew friends in Afghanistan, Young flew to India, visited holy has resulted in Spontaneity in Japanese Art and Cul- Wooldridge, “and if things keep going the way they places, and then something spooky happened. “In New ture ($46.40), their third co-written book and the first are, the B.C. publishing industry could surpass the Cana- Delhi, I did something I have only done once in my life,” title from their new Coastal Tides imprint. dian-owned sector of the Ontario publishing industry. says Young, “I visited a fortune teller, who informed me It has been followed by The Mouse Woman of Collectively, our glass is half full, not half empty.” that I was on my way to Japan where I would marry a Gabriola ($32.95), written by David, who was inspired Mouse: 978-0-9881110-2-8; Spontaneity: 978-0-9881110-0-4
19 BC BOOKWORLD • LOOKOUT • SPRING • 2013 FEATURE REVIEW
Juan de Fuca’s Strait: Voyages in the Waterway of Forgotten Barry Gough (left) with Vangelis Dreams by Barry Gough (Harbour $32.95) Catevatis, president of the Kefalonian Cultural Society of B.C. A statue of HE FIRST EUROPEAN MARINER TO Juan de Fuca has recently been erected in Kefalonia, Greece, but the explorer have reached B.C. waters, accord- remains little-known in Canada. ing to written eyewitness ac- counts, was the Spaniard Juan Peréz in 1774, some four years Frances Barkley’s diary of her husband’s 1787 before Captain James Cook fa- voyage recorded the following perceptions: “The mouslyT set foot at Nootka Sound in 1778, accompa- entrance appeared to be about four leagues in width, nied by British crewman that included George and remained about that width as far as the eye can Vancouver and William Bligh. see. Capt. Barkley at once recognized it as the long But, as Barry Gough now makes clear, there is lost strait of Juan de Fuca, which Captain Cook had ample evidence to assert that the first “European so emphatically stated did not exist.” discoverer” of B.C. was actually a Greek explorer ✫ named Apostolos Valerianos, sailing for Spain un- IN 1847, AMERICAN HISTORIAN ROBERT GREENHOW der the name of Juan de Fuca. published a history of Oregon and California in which In Juan de Fuca’s Strait, Gough carefully relates he supplied a summary of Juan de Fuca’s life based how Juan de Fuca was an old man when he met an upon the English and Spanish translations of the cor- English dealer in fine fabrics, Michael Lok, in Venice, respondence between de Fuca and Lok. In 1854, an- in 1596. Lok, who also spoke French, Spanish, Italian other American historian named Alexander S. Taylor and Latin, was acutely aware that major seafaring na- took up the narrative by asking the American consul tions were hoping to discover a “northwest passage” in the Ionian Islands, A.S. York, to gather any and all to the riches of the Orient. material concerning Juan de Fuca and his family. Lok was therefore fascinated by Juan de Fuca’s York provided information gleaned from The Lives account of a voyage made “up the backside” of North of Glorious Men of Cephalonia written and published America, in 1592. The transplanted Greek, from the in Venice in October 1843 by Rev. Anthimos island of Kefalonia—the largest of the Ionian Islands One hundred years after a little Mazarakis, a Kefalonian. The book had been trans- along the Adriatic Coast, a place “held in fee” by the known mariner from Genoa lated into Italian by Tomazeo. Taylor published two city state of Venice, acquired in 1500—provided Lok articles in the September and October 1859 issues of with a detailed verbal summary of a voyage as far named Cristoforo Columbus Hutchings’ California Magazine that recounted north as the 48th parallel, at which point he entered a reputedly discovered the New what he had gleaned about Juan de Fuca’s life. waterway (that now bears his name) that he called According to Taylor’s research, the ancestors of the Strait of Nova Spain. World, a Greek explorer reached John Phokas (Fucas) fled Constantinople in 1453 Lok, as an English consul, excitedly sent this news British Columbia while sailing and found refuge in the Ionian Islands. One brother to England. The Greek/Spanish mariner was offering named Andronikos Phokas remained as the head of his services to the Queen of England for 100 pounds under a Spanish flag in 1592. Phokas family. Another brother Emmanuel Phokas to help England discover the Northwest Passage. was born in Constantinople in 1435 and departed in Specifically, Juan de Fuca agreed to serve as a pilot if 1470 for Kefalonia. Juan de Fuca was one of four England provided a ship of forty tons. A pilot in a sons born to Emmanuel Phokas, also known as Spanish vessel, as Gough explains, corresponded to a with a broad Inlet of Sea, between 47 and 48 degrees Phokas Valerianos to distinguish him from the first mate on English and American ships, second in of Latitude, he entered there into, sayling therein more Phokas family in Argostoli. Emmanuel Phokas set- command. than twentie days, and found that land trending still tled in a valley in southwestern Kefalonia, at Elios. In But Juan de Fuca also wanted the English to pro- sometime North-West and North, and also East and that valley lies the village of Valeriano, where a statue vide compensation for goods stolen from him by Cap- THE ANCIENT MARINER, South-Westward, and very much broader sea than of Juan de Fuca has been recently erected. tain Cavendish in 1587 when, on a return voyage was at the said entrance, and that he passed by divers ✫ from the Philippines and China on the 700-ton Manila Illands in that Sayling. And that at the entrance of JUAN DE FUCA’S STRAIT: VOYAGES IN THE WATERWAY galleon Santa Anna, Juan de Fuca was overtaken by this said Strait, there is on the North-West coast of Forgotten Dreams represents a synthesis of forty Cavendish who stole his cargo valued at some 60,000 thereof, a great Hedland or Iland, with an exceedingly years of research by Barry Gough into maritime ex- ducats, near Cabo San Lucas, where Juan de Fuca was high Pinacle, or spired Rocke, like a piller thereupon. ploration of the West Coast. put ashore with food and handguns. Also he said, that he went on the land in divers places, After capably recounting this tale of the ancient Unfortunately for the English, Juan de Fuca’s re- and that he saw some people of Land, clad in Beasts’ mariner, Gough proceeds to illuminate the voyages quest for restitution could not be resolved quickly. skins; and that the Land is very fruitful and rich of of mariners in his wake, such as James Cook, Manuel Juan de Fuca returned to Kefalonia but continued to Gold, Silver, Pearle, and other things, like Nova Spania. Quimper, José María Narváez, George Vancou- communicate with Lok, using his native Greek. When And also he said, that being entered thus farre into ver, Juan Francisco de la Bodega y Quadra and Lok wrote to Juan de Fuca in Kefalonia in 1602 and the said Strait, and being come into the North Sea Dionisio Alcalá Galiano. 978-1-55017-573-8-6 no reply was received, the Englishman presumed, FOR REAL already, and finding the Sea wide enough everywhere perhaps correctly, that Juan de Fuca must have died. kd lang’s overwrought version of Leonard Cohen’s and to be about thirtie or fortie leagues wide in the ✫ mouth of the Straits, where he entered he thought he THE WRITTEN EVIDENCE THAT JUAN DE FUCA WAS THE had now well discharged his office and done the things first European to discover the strait between Van- Hallelujah was all very well. And it was great to have he was sent to do.” couver Island and Washington State that bears his It is important to note that Juan de Fuca claimed name is provided in a remarkable compilation of travel the entranceway to the great inlet between 47º and literature called Hakluytus Posthumus or Purchas His local, spoken word poet Shane Koyczan recite his 48º was marked by “an exceedingly high pinnacle or Pilgrimes Contayning a History of the World in Sea spired rock, like a pillar, thereupon.” Voyages and Lande Travells by Englishmen and oth- The coastal historian Captain John T. Walbran ers in 1625. paean to how nice we are as Canadians at the opening later corroborated this report in his British Columbia Maritime historian Samuel Purchas based his Coast Names. He wrote, “This is substantially cor- entry about Juan de Fuca on letters written by ceremonies for the 2010 Winter Olympics. rect; the island is Tatooche, and the spired rock, now Michael Lok, who had written to the Lord Treasurer, known as De Fuca’s pillar, 150 feet high, stands in to Sir Walter Raleigh and to Master Richard But imagine the bewilderment of the world—as well as 99.9% of British Columbians—if Olympic organizers had solitary grandeur, a little off shore, about two miles Hakluyt, asking them to send 100 pounds to bring commissioned the province’s foremost maritime historian, Barry Gough, to conceive the opening ceremonies and tell southwards of Tatooche Island.” Juan de Fuca to England. The first English mariner to recognize Juan de As recorded by Samuel Purchas, the Viceroy of the story of how modern British Columbian society began. A public address system narrator would begin with, “Once Fuca’s strait was Captain Charles Barkley on the Mexico had sent Juan de Fuca “with a small Caravela upon a time, in a café in Venice, in April, in 1596….” There and then, in a place not yet called Italy, the English Imperial Eagle in 1787—almost two centuries after and a Pinnace, armed with Mariners only” along the correspondence of merchant Michael Lok references the earliest visit to the shores of what we now call B.C. by a Juan de Fuca’s voyage. He consequently named Juan coast of New Spain and California in 1592. He sailed de Fuca Strait because it lay above the 47th parallel, European mariner, as Barry Gough has neatly outlined in the opening chapter for his 15th book, Juan de Fuca’s Strait: “until he came to the Latitude of 47 degrees and there where Lok’s report of Juan de Fuca’s exploration had James Cook: first mariner known to have stepped finding that the land trended North and North-East, Voyages in the Waterway of Forgotten Dreams (Harbour $32.95). That ancient mariner was Juan de Fuca. designated it to be. ashore on land now part of British Columbia
20 BC BOOKWORLD • LOOKOUT • SPRING • 2013 21 BC BOOKWORLD • LOOKOUT • SPRING • 2013 22 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 reviews FIRST NATIONS THE CRUSADING MATRIARCH OF ALERT BAY Married at 18, Jane Cook gave birth to 16 children and assumed the role of caregiver for Alert Bay and the surrounding communi-
ties, delivering babies, nursing the sick and tending the dying. Jane Cook: the lone female among the Allied Indian Tribes council
Standing Up with Ga’axsta’las: It was the political ac- Indians becoming Christians.” non-potlatching Christians who felt will marry his daughter to anyone Jane Constance Cook and the tivity that distorted her The ban not only pitted First Politics of Memory, Church, like “outcasts.” who will give him a ‘copper.’ A and Custom by Leslie A. legacy, and in particular Nations against the authorities, but A rumour circulated that her op- stranger coming into the tribe can- Robertson with the Kwagu’l Gixsam Clan (UBC Press $125 her involvement in the in- caused divisions within native vil- position to the potlatch surpassed not buy a ‘copper,’ no matter how hc, $39.95 pb, pub. date: July 2013) famous potlatch trials of lages and clans. As a result of the “even that of the Indian agent.” rich he is, until he has given feasts 1921. The potlatch trials, ceremonial Another had it that she deliberately and one potlatch after another and S THE 1914 PHOTO Joan custom, a com- property was mistranslated, that when a magis- even then he may still be regarded at far right GIVNER plex economic confiscated, trate asked the accused, “Do you as an outsider.” A shows, Jane system of forty-five plead guilty or not guilty?” she mis- One of the criticisms directed Cook was a singular female pres- property exchange people were translated the question to “He against Jane Cook in the aborigi- ence in the struggle to retain, or re- (she described it as a arrested, wants to know were you there?” nal community was that she mar- gain, First Nations civil and form of government twenty-two An affirmative response was trans- ried only once. As the eldest property rights in B.C. or constitution) was were given lated as, “He’s guilty. Yeah.” daughter of a noble line she would Leslie A. Robertson with the banned because the suspended Her expertise in both the have been expected to have a se- Kwagu’l Gixsam Clan’s new biog- colonial authorities sentences, and Kwakwala language and English ries of marriages, and earn money raphy of Jane Cook, aka considered it “the most twenty held in was called into question. Boas by marrying so that her family Ga’axsta’las is a testament to the formidable of all obsta- Oakalla Prison wrote to a correspondent that peo- could be glorified by holding legacy of this remarkable First Na- cles in the way of near Vancouver. ple said she talked like a child. This potlatch. tions woman as well as a history of In the late thir- unlikely claim could have several Her marriage was considered il- her descendants. ties, Jane Cook de- explanations, among them the fact legal because she chose not to have ✫ scribed herself and that the language had changed by a First Nations ceremony, and no JANE CONSTANCE COOK WAS BORN her family as the time she was sixty. What was bride price was given. As a conse- in 1870 to Gwayulalas (Emily), a construed as childish may well have quence, her children were considered Kwakwaka’wakw woman from been earlier usages. illegitimate and stigmatized. At the Fort Rupert and Captain One of the criticisms At a 1936 church meeting, Jane same time, she was a strong advo- William Gilbert, an English Cook said “we were children of the cate for recognition of the Indian/ trader. directed against potlatch system,” and her husband First Nations marriage tradition. As the first-born child of a said the custom was “in my blood.” ✫ first-born mother, Cook’s high Jane Cook in the Nevertheless, when they entered THIS IS AN ACADEMIC BOOK WITH rank derived from primogeni- into a Christian marriage, they the research documented in detailed ture. She was educated by Al- stepped out of the system. footnotes and an extensive bibliog- fred Hall, an English aboriginal community Jane Cook opposed the potlatch raphy. As such, it constitutes a valu- missionary, and became a de- because of the financial burden it able resource for other scholars vout Christian, serving for was that she married placed on families, and especially working to uncover the traces of many years as president of the on women and children. Yet she later any culture suppressed by racism, Anglican Women’s Auxiliary. only once. worked to obtain compensation for conversion, and assimilation. Descendants remember her property confiscated during the Standing Up with Ga’axsta’las as Granny Cook, the strong- potlatch arrests. also has a strong popular appeal as willed matriarch who presided In a 1932 interview with a jour- the rich collection of personal an- over the Cook big house, an im- nalist for the Christian Science ecdotes, and the fifty-six photo- posing structure completed by Monitor, she struggled to make the graphs provide graphic evidence of her husband in 1907. custom understandable to an out- Jane Cook and her times. This house had two storeys, nine sider by comparing it to a Christ- UBC Professor of Anthropol- bedrooms, a veranda, and a large gar- mas gift-giving exchange. ogy, Leslie A. Robertson, has den that yielded food for the “It keeps the property in cir- worked cooperatively with the multigenerational occupants who culation,” she said, “for sup- Kwagu’l Gixsam Clan to do justice sometimes numbered thirty-five, pose a man gives a phonograph to Jane Cook’s complicated char- with two sittings for every meal. set away, in the course of a acter and to the diverse opinions of Straddling both the reserve and few years, he is likely to re- her. Robertson draws on oral his- land bought from the church, the ceive it back.” tory, memory and archival mate- house coincidentally symbolized She goes on to describe the rial—letters, recorded interviews, its owner’s duality. crucial importance of the newspaper articles—and enters ✫ shield-shaped piece of cop- into a dialogue with various mem- DOMESTIC LIFE AND COMMUNITY per to the potlatch giver. bers of the Kwagu’l Gixsam, allow- service was only a part of Jane “The more ‘copper’ a ing their voices to interrogate the Cook’s activities. chief owns, the more source material. In the political arena, she advo- powerful he is Thus a valuable portrait of Jane cated strongly for women’s rights, among other Cook emerges cumulatively urging support for destitute women tribes... A man throughout the book. 9780774823845 and children. She represented her people in their demand for land Joan Givner writes claims, fishing rights and health serv- regularly on biographies ices, and acted as interpreter for the BC and autobiographies. anthropologists and ethnologists, BOOKWORLD She lives in Mill Bay. such as Franz Boas and the pho- STAFF PICK tographer Edward Curtis.
23 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 reviews NON-FICTION
Father August Brabant, Saviour or Hesquiaht, at the north I am neither a white man (Messenger of the Sacred Heart people who he considered his “chil- Scourge? by Jim McDowell (Ronsdale Press $24.95) end of Clayoquot Sound, nor an Indian,” he wrote. Press, 1900) which formed the ba- dren.” Meanwhile the Hesquiaht about a four-hour boat “I am the Chigha, the sis of a 1920 biography by Rever- knew they were a proud culture ENTION JIM MCDOWELL trip from Tofino, from devil.” end Van Der Heyden . that could trace its heritage back in the milieu of writers 1875 to 1908. Nevertheless, Brabant ✫ thousands of years. Mfestivals, grants and Not long after his ar- stubbornly persisted. “BECAUSE SIX VERSIONS OF FATHER Packed with deception, hero- Facebook-fostered book launches rival in 1875, Brabant’s Cherie Brabant’s memoir of his August Joseph Brabant’s life were ism, murder, white-knuckle adven- and you’ll likely draw a blank. fingers in his right hand THIESSEN missionary work first ap- written between 1900 and 1983,” ture on the seas, pestilences, battles But his illuminating investiga- were deformed after he peared in serialized form McDowell notes in his preface, “the and shipwrecks, this examination tion of alleged cannibalism on the was attacked by Hesquiaht Chief in The Messenger of the Sacred reader may justifiably ask: Why do of Brabant’s character simultane- West Coast, Hamatsa: The Enigma Matlahaw who, fearful he had con- Heart. His serialized reports were we need a seventh? What is new or ously documents the changing of Cannibalism on the Pacific tracted smallpox from Brabant, republished collectively as Vancou- different about this one?” times for aboriginals, their increas- Northwest Coast (Ronsdale 1997) shot Brabant twice using Brabant’s ver Islands and its If words such as ‘well-bal- ing contact with Europeans, their easily ranks as one of the great, own gun. First Matlahaw shot Missions, anced’ and ‘meticulous’ don’t efforts to resist acculturation, and under-acknowledged works of B.C. Brabant in the right hand. While the 1874- stir you to pick up this the slow swing to commercial seal- historical literature. priest was cleaning his injury in a 1900 book, how about ‘sur- ing and a cash economy. In that book, McDowell pains- creek, Matlahaw sprayed the mis- prisingly gripping In his sidebars, footnotes, size- takingly reveals how the practice sionary with buckshot in his back reading’ and ‘intriguing able appendix and endnotes, of ritual (symbolic) cannibalism on and shoulder. characters’? McDowell describes many of the the West Coast has been misinter- Brabant was rescued by a Brit- Father August beliefs, practices and lore of the preted, largely due to untrustwor- ish man-of-war, H.M.S. Rocket, and Brabant: Saviour or aboriginal population. For example, thy and ignorant accounts of early recovered in Victoria. His return to Scourge? is not only Transformers are supernatural be- mariners, which were recycled by Hesquiaht greatly enhanced his a biography, it is a ings whose power pervades the the settlers and colonists who fol- reputation as a formidable force. classic tale of con- world and whose spiritual energy lowed. Speaking Chinook (an intermediate flicting ideologies can be accessed by unique human “Cannibalism did not represent pidgin language) and using a local embodied by two beings such as shaman, powerful the type of gastronomic custom translator, he held Mass and taught men. chiefs, and other avatars. that may have existed among cer- the Lord’s Prayer, stubbornly op- Brabant was de- The historic photos are well- tain aboriginal societies in Africa or posing Nuu-chah-nulth shamans. termined to save chosen, although most readers may the South Sea Islands,” he con- “They blame me for the absence and civilize in- yearn for more to break up the cludes. “On the contrary, the eat- of food. They laugh at the doctrine digenous sometimes daunting text. ing of human flesh was abhorrent which I teach. I can do Today, we can condemn this to all Northwest Coast Indians. It nothing by making the arrogant priest for living and preach- was precisely this loathing that sign of the Cross. ing among the Hesquiaht for so made the gruesome rite all the more long without bothering to powerful.” master their language, Following his acclaimed bio- yet made sweeping as- graphical study, José Narvaez: The sumptions about be- Forgotten Explorer. Including his ing understood and narrative of a voyage on the North- MISSIONARY winning converts. west Coast in 1788 (Spokane: Arthur continued on H. Clark Company, 1998), page 26 McDowell has generated an- other definitive work, this time focusing on one of the most fascinating and controversial mission- IMPOSSIBLE aries of the West Coast, August Joseph Brabant. Deception, heroism, murder, Not surprisingly, Father August white-knuckle adventure, Brabant, Saviour or Scourge? is another battles and shipwrecks are all thoroughly documented, even-handed account that re- in this gripping life story of veals Brabant’s life and thoughts through his substantial writings, as well as the author’s meticulous re- Father August Brabant search and observations. ✫ AS AN IDEALISTIC, 24-YEAR-OLD missionary, Brabant left Belgium for Victoria in 1869 and underwent a long apprenticeship in Victoria be- fore he was sent to live and work amongst the Hesquiahts in a remote coastal village, 275-km northwest of Victoria. Having first visited the West Coast of Vancouver Island with Right Reverend Charles Seghers in 1874, and having just returned from Sitka, Alaska, Brabant arrived BC at Clayoquot Sound on Vancouver BOOKWORLD Island as a 29-year-old Catholic STAFF PICK priest, aboard the twenty-eight-ton Father August schooner Surprise, and he pro- Brabant, circa 1865 ceeded to stubbornly operate “the poorest church in Christendom” at
24 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 25 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 reviews NON-FICTION continued from page 24 stubbornly toward his goal. Jean-Charles Pandosy In his ignorance, Father Brabant He viewed Protestant mission- AFTER THE made many fundamental errors that aries who arrived after him as dev- are still being made by zealous mis- ils who were ‘perverting’ his APOLOGY sionaries: pushing to convert with- children. They were moving in and Marjorie Too Afraid To Cry: A Home-Child out first understanding or building churches nearby, giving the Experience by Patricia Skidmore (Dundurn $30) respecting, and focusing on salva- Catholic church another perceived tion without taking service into ac- challenge. Brabant’s response was rowing up in Coquitlam, G Patricia Skidmore couldn’t count. to open the first “Indian” residen- understand why her mother was so re- However, we can also appreci- tial school on Vancouver Island. luctant to discuss her own childhood. ate the hardships that these early Christie School opened in 1900 In particular, her mother avoided talk- ing about five years at the Prince of Christian crusaders bore. Many on Meares Island, linking the Wales Fairbridge Farm School, lo- times Brabant slept on the bare priest’s name forever with a shame- cated south of Duncan, on Vancouver ground when travelling, went with- ful history. Island, or why she had been sent there. out meals, and risked his life in dug- McDowell is critical of In the late 1990s, Skidmore be- gan the research that has resulted in out canoes on long open-sea Brabant’s attitudes and actions as PANDOSY: Established first white Marjorie Too Afraid To Cry: A Home- journeys. a missionary, including his role in Child Experience, a rare study of child Known for building several log launching a notorious residential settlement in the Okanagan Valley migration to Canada. churches, Brabant recruited indig- school. Nevertheless, his criticism At age ten, Marjorie Arnison, her mother, had been one of thou- enous labour, transported building is balanced with historical, social, sands of children (over 100,000 be- materials by canoe, felled timber and political explanations that help tween 1869 and the late 1930s) who and cut lumber by hand, acted as the reader understand Brabant’s were removed from their families, architect and supervisor, and behaviour. McDowell also credits communities and country and placed in a British colony or Commonwealth thrived on the exhausting work. the priest for his invaluable writ- country to provide “white stock” and Father Pandosy: Pioneer of Faith in the Northwest (Midtown Press/Sandhill $19.95) He watched the Hesquiahts suf- ings and records. cheap labour. fer through famines when the sea Marjorie Too Afraid To Cry contains Prior to turning his hand to Pa- NYONE WHO HAS LIVED IN THE OKANAGAN VALLEY RECOGNIZES THE NAME was too rough for the men to fish; cific Rim historical subjects, Jim 65 b&w illustrations and a foreword APandosy; others will not. But the Oblate priest Jean-Charles from former British Prime Minister he survived more than one at- McDowell served as the first di- Pandosy ought to be better known. In 1859-1860, Pandosy established Gordon Brown, who, in 2010, as tempted murder and numerous rector of the Carnegie Centre in his chapel and farm as the first white settlement in the Okanagan Valley. prime minister, gave a formal apol- ogy to all British child migrants sent threats to his authority; he serv- Vancouver, forging the inner-city His Okanagan Mission evolved into the city of Kelowna. Trained in iced the sick-albeit ineffectually — community centre that today re- from Britain between 1619 and the Marseilles, he worked with indigenous societies as far south as Walla mid 1970s. Patricia Skidmore’s mother 24/7, and yet he endured.” mains a remarkable gathering place Walla and as far north as Prince George, and also lived in Victoria, Hope Marjorie attended the apology. Shored up as he was by his faith for the under-privileged. and Kamloops. Louis Anctil, a publisher’s sales rep in B.C. since 1987, Finally, in adulthood, Skidmore has been able to unravel the story and and the inviolability of his mission, 978-1-55380-189-4 has opted to publish the first English translation of a French biography Brabant weathered repeated set- confront the issues inherent in forced of Pandosy by Edmond Rivère, Father Pandosy: Pioneer of Faith in child migration. She is editor of the backs and disappointments, more Cherie Thiessen writes from the Northwest, translated by Dr. Lorin Card. 978-0-9881101-0-6 Fairbridge Gazette and lives in Port than a few depressions, and moved Pender Island. Moody. 978-1459703407
26 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 featureview NON-FICTION BC BOOKWORLD STAFF PICK
Imperial Canada Inc.: Legal Haven of Choice Protesters hold placards during an anti- for the World’s Mining Companies by Alain mining rally in front of the Canadian Deneault & William Sacher (Talon $29.95) embassy in Manila ahead of Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper's arrival last November for a two-day visit. The NCE UPON A TIME, WHEN protesters accused Canadian mining companies operating in the country of Tommy Douglas was harming the environment. Ofighting for Medicare and Lester Pearson won the Nobel Canada Inc. is not just a searing Peace Prize, Americans who trav- indictment of the Toronto Stock Ex- elled abroad sewed Canadian flags change and the lax guidelines of onto their backpacks. Quebec’s mining code that con- Nowadays Canadians might be dones exploitation. Deneault and better off in some developing coun- Sacher claim the concentration of tries showing off the Stars and foreign-owned mining companies in Stripes. Canada is having a severe impact That’s because Canada, on the management of our domes- unbeknowst to most Canadians, is tic resources. home to more than 70% of the As more giants of the Canadian world’s mining companies. mining industry such as Inco, Subtitled Legal Haven of Falconbridge and Noranda have been Choice for the World’s Mining Com- sold to foreign interests, foreign-con- panies, Imperial Canada Inc. by trolled mining assets jumped from Alain Deneault and William $10 billion in 2005 to $54 billion in Sacher examines the foreign prac- THE TRUE NORTH: 2006. “Canada,” they allege, “has tices of Canadian-registered mining abandoned its sovereignty… and companies as well as the Ontario/ transformed itself into a paradise for Quebec society that condones and the extractive sector.” protects them, focussing on Que- ✫ bec’s and Ontario’s mining codes; IT HAS BEEN MORE THAN FIFTY the history of the Toronto Stock years since Lester Pearson won the Exchange; Canada’s involvement Nobel Peace Prize in 1957 for his with Caribbean tax havens; and key role in resolving the 1956 Suez Canada’s role of promoting itself Crisis, creating the UN’s first des- to international institutions govern- ignated peacekeeping mission. ing the world’s mining sector. STRONG Now we keep the profit, not Temporarily suppressed by the the peace. threat of a SLAPP (“Strategic Law- Deneault and Sacher want Ca- suits Against Public Participation”) nadians to wake up and smell the lawsuit by Barrick Gold, this copper. And the gold. And the sil- exposé concludes with the allega- ver. With a chapter entitled ‘The tion that Canadians, by customiz- Comedy of Self-Regulation,’ they ing our financial environment to suit clearly have little faith in the abil- GREED ity of the current federal govern- the needs of the world’s “extrac- Temporarily suppressed by the threat of a lawsuit, Imperial tive sector,” are repeating the sins & ment or the Quebec and Ontario of our forefathers, in essence, rep- governments to regulate and ad- licating the imperialistic practices Canada Inc. is an exposé that concludes with the allega- monish foreign-controlled mining of the Hudson’s Bay Company and companies registered in Canada, so Great Britain. tion that Canadians are replicating the imperialistic prac- they have opted to demand a mor- Deneault and Sacher remind us alistic reckoning among its that two years after the constuct tices of the Hudson’s Bay Company and Great Britain. citizenry, or, rather, the few thou- of Canada was created by the Brit- sand people from sea to sea to sea ish North America Act in 1867, who might have the stomach for Canada perpetuated the imperial Imperial Canada Inc. ambitions of its mother country by The Quebec court concluded the • When El Salvador refused to corporation, was sued in Canada “What price do people in the claiming possession of all of the case had to be heard in Guyana, sanction exploitation of gold in the for $12 million by Angelica Choc, South have to pay in order for a land draining into Hudson Bay— whereupon the Guyanese court de- country’s northern region, the Ca- the wife of Guatemalan activist share price to rise on the Toronto so-called Rupert’s Land—as well clared a mistrial and the citizens’ nadian company, Pacific Rim, Adolfo Ich Caman, over the death exchange, bringing large profits to as the North West Territories, group was compelled to pay the through its Panamanian subsidiary of her husband in September of major shareholders and modest re- thereby grabbing three million company’s court costs. Pac Rim Cayman LLC, filed a com- 2009, arising from local opposition turns to small investors? Must dic- square miles of resources and ex- • Canadian capital, including plaint with the World Bank de- to a nickel mine. tators be strengthened, civil tending its Dominion, by executive public funds, is supporting the manding $77 million in damages • In Ghana, Canadian mining servants corrupted, ecosystems fiat, “from sea to sea.” Moanda Leasehold project in from the Salvadoran government. firms hold half of all mining con- destroyed, workers suppressed, It’s a big idea to swallow—we Congo-Kinshasa that will allocate The lawsuit was filed under the cessions. peasants expropriated, arable land are replicating the rapaciousness of a huge area for resource extraction provisions of a U.S.-made free trade • Before the adoption of a new flooded, community leaders assas- our colonial forefathers—but piece and power plants for a century, agreement. Peruvian Mining Code in 1995, Ca- sinated, warlords financed, con- by piece, example by example, the harkening back to 19th-century • When two prominent Roma- nadian resource extraction invest- tracts deposited in Caribbean tax reader can digest their claim. European colonialism. nian politicians, including the envi- ment in Peru was virtually nil. havens, taxes evaded, and Africa • Three years after a tailings • In 2010, Canada remained the ronment minister, tried to halt the Today, in keeping with a new free- looted, for the sole purpose of sup- pond collapsed at the Omai mine world’s fifth largest asbestos pro- extinction of a two-thousand-year- trade agreement, 40 % of all mining porting extractive industries regis- in Guyana, contaminating much of ducer, supplying 100,000 metric old Romanian village named Rosia investment in Peru is Canadian. tered in Canada?” that South American country’s wa- tons, mainly used for making as- Montana, threatened by the prox- “For the first time in history,” The next book by Deneault and ter supply with cyanide, an alli- bestos cement for construction in imity of an open-pit mine described write Deneault and Sacher, “we are Sacher promises to analyze the con- ance of 23,000 Guyanese citizens countries such as India, Indonesia as Europe’s largest, the Canadian feeling the pressure of world opin- nections between Canada’s extrac- filed suit against the offending min- and Thailand. Indisputably, the mining firm Gabriel Resources re- ion. We have discovered that we, tive industry and Canada’s ing company, Quebec-based Canadian and Quebec governments sponded by filing suit against them too, can play the villain’s role.” contribution to the creation of tax Cambior, in Quebec Supreme have supported the extraction and for 100,000 Euros. As translated by Fred A. Reed havens in the Caribbean. Court, in 1998, seeking reparations. sale of a known carcinogen. • Hudbay Minerals, a Canadian and Robin Philpot, Imperial 9780889226357
27 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 Strange Possession at Viner Sound A novel by Robin Percival Smith The Unplugging by Yvette Nolan This is a story of spiritual possession and reincarnation that uses the traditional cul- The Cave Painter & ture of the Kwakiutl aboriginals on the Brit- ish Columbia west coast. The spirit of Jojo, The Woodcutter a young Kwakiutl boy, possesses Matti, a by Don Hannah single handing sailor on board his sailing vessel, Windsong, to tell of his captivity at a secret Japanese radio base on the west coast during WWII. In a post-apocalyptic world, Two impactful one-person The Cave Painter Bern and Elena are exiled plays. Available this spring CONTACT: [email protected] from their village. Their was the winner of the 2012 in print and as www.robinpercivalsmith.wordpress.com crime? The two women are Carol Bolt Award. www.createspace.com/3648661 for story no longer of child-bearing ebooks. synopsis and author biography. age. ISBN 10: 1478320745 • ISBN 13: 9781478320746 The book may be downloaded from Kindle bookstore. playwrightscanada.com
✦ ✦ WWW.LIBROSLIBERTAD.CA ✦ ✦ WWW.LIBROSLIBERTAD.CA ✦ ROYAL BC MUSEUM HANDBOOK STANDING AT AN ANGLE TO MY AGE GEORGE SEFERIS – POEMS short stories poems by by P.W. Bridgman George Seferis translated by Manolis HOOFED MAMMALS This fictional writing explores ... everyone is in need of OF BRITISH COLUMBIA ✦ universal all the others. We must David Shackleton themes of forgiveness look for man wherever we WWW.LIBROSLIBERTAD.CA and redemption, can find him. When on his $25.95 WWW.LIBROSLIBERTAD.CA of love and loss, of hope way to Thebes Oedipus
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Crows shape-shift their way through the paradoxes of language, personal Emilia Poems from Planet Earth mythologyDaniela and poetic Elza ecology, through Leanne McIntosh Nielsen with Jack Sproule edited by Yvonne Blomer and landscapes and histories that, like the crows themselves,milk refuse to be tamed. Cynthia Woodman Kerkham tooth A round-up of poems from readers at bane Dark Surge internationally renowned Planet Earth bone Matter Narrows Poetry in Victoria BC — “launching pad for the energies of writers and poets established and not.” “These crows are mischievous ...” “If we could taste it, this book They shape-shift their way through “The chronicle of a unique would be salmonberry. It would April 2013 208 pp $20.00 the paradoxes of language, personal journey of friendship between be salt. To read these poems mythology and poetic ecology, through two unlikely people.” is to stand under a waterfall, landscapes and histories that, like the letting the words rush like cold, crows themselves, refuse to be tamed. clean water over the skin. A powerful debut." with an introduction by with an introduction by UNEARTHEDAislinn Hunter Jock McKeen Anne Simpson Janet Marie Rogers “... a spiritualApril 2013 descendant 104 pp $16.95 April 2013 104 pp $16.95 April 2013 80 pp $16.95 of the Mohawk poet Pauline
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28 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 reviews MEMOIR
After Richmond P. Hobson, country ten years when she Jr. dissolved his Frontier Cat- came to the realization she tle Company partnership was no longer a dude. “De- spite the many tears and ex- with Pan Phillips and writ- citing and sometimes ten two, non-fiction, ranch- horrendous experiences,” she ing classics, Grass Beyond writes, “I had accomplished the Mountains (1951) and the feat of becoming a ranch- Nothing Too Good for a er’s wife.” Cowboy (1955), Hobson, Jr. That job included turn- wrote a third, lesser-known ing herself into a good hunter and an excellent shot. Doris volume called The Rancher tells of shooting two caribou Takes A Wife (1961), to de- at their sheep camp. “We scribe his ranching days in the field dressed these caribou, Vanderhoof area with his wife, then skinned and hung the Gloria. Hobson’s accounts of meat back at camp,” she life in the B.C. Interior served writes. “Neither John nor I enjoyed killing them. I had as a basis for a CBC televi- lived with them all summer sion series Nothing Too Good and it felt like killing a friend. for a Cowboy, filmed in Brit- We vowed never to shoot ish Columbia, just as another caribou and we Chilcotin-based stories by didn’t. Paul St. Pierre had led to “I was also a rugged indi- vidual who could strap on a the breakthrough, made-in-B.C. se- Doris Lee with her son and the grizzly she shot in her sheep camp in the hills of Yank’s Peak. backpack and compete with the ries, Cariboo Country. best. Guiding was something I All of which sets the stage for could do well. I cooked, took out Doris Lee. extra hunters, skinned and cared for their meat, wrangled BY SAGE BIRCHWATER THE RANCHER TAKES horses and did whatever else Ever-Changing Sky: From needed to be done.” Schoolteacher to Cariboo Rancher by Doris Lee (Caitlin $24.95) ✫ A WIFE — TAKE 2 EVER-CHANGING SKY WAS PUBLISHED T 86, DORIS LEE IS PRETTY after Doris Lee attended a book pumped about getting her Doris Lee guided hunters, skinned animals, wrangled horses, launch last year for The Legendary Astory out. In February of cooked, and did whatever else needed to be done. Betty Frank, a memoir by and about 1951, married for less than two the trailblazing hunting guide Betty years, she moved from northern Changing Sky: From School- stance, while exploring with Frank. California with her husband, John, teacher to Cariboo Rancher takes her kids at Yank’s Peak, they Lee and Frank had a mutual ac- to Big Lake in the heart of the the reader on an intriguing journey came upon a five-foot quaintance, Roy Cessna, who had Cariboo. It was an odd time of year through the eyes of a newcomer wooden grave marker in- doctored Doris’ sheep. As Betty to start ranching in central B.C. who learns the wiles of ranching, scribed: “Sacred to the Frank’s memoir mentions, he was John, several years older, had the challenges of making do with- memory of William Luce – known for, among other things, bit- grown up on a ranch; whereas Doris out modern conveniences and the Native of Maine, USA, Died ing the balls of the sheep he was was a city girl from Redding. She warm friendliness of country neigh- 28 May, 1881, Aged 60 castrating. was a young school teacher with bours. years.” At the book launch, Doris Lee different dreams and ambitions Over several decades Doris Lee Thirty years later she met Betty Frank’s publisher, Vici than John, but in those days it was persevered, pulling (birthing) took historian Dave Fal- Johnstone, of Caitlin Press, and expected that a wife should go calves, working in the hay fields, coner to the site and they handed her the manuscript that has where her husband could support trapping, hunting, herding flocks of found the grave marker still enabled her to become an octoge- his family. sheep into the alpine of Yank’s Peak undisturbed except for a narian author . John was a kind and gentle man, north of Likely, and raising two lengthwise crack. They took No sheep were harmed in the but it took Doris several years to sons, Michael and Gary. the headboard to the Cedar making of this book. 978-1894759892 stop being homesick and to learn Her links with Cariboo history Creek Museum in Likely and the skills of backwoods living. Sixty go well beyond her stint as a school left a replica in its place. Sage Birchwater writes years later, her memoir Ever- teacher. In August of 1963, for in- Doris Lee had been in the The Rancher Takes A Wife (1960) from Williams Lake.
29 BC BOOKWORLD SPRING 2013 community-minded but globally connected
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WISDOM of COMPASSION Talk & Signing withVictor Chan Tuesday, March 19 7:00pm VPL, Central Library FREE . Seating is limited. O pen year-round with over 25,000 titles plus a great selection The Wisdom of Compassion, co-authored by the of Canadian authors, used books, art supplies, and gifts. Dalai Lama and Victor Chan, offers rare insight into the life & teachings of the Dalai Lama. Victor Chan is the V founder of the Dalai Lama Center for Peace, and has previously isit us at www.galianoislandbooks.com co-authored The Wisdom of Forgiveness with the Dalai Lama. 250.539.3340 [email protected] 76 Madrona Drive Galiano Island BC V0N 1P0 3608 West 4th Ave. Vancouver, BC 604-732-7912 banyen.com