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George Orwell’s Friend
Editor: Ron CaplanPublisher: Breton Books$14.95Born in British Columbia, Paul Potts (1911-1990) lived most of his life based in London’s Soho district, a friend and confidant of many ultimately famous writers. His circle included Dylan Thomas and T. S. Eliot, Elizabeth Smart and Sean O’Casey–and of course George Orwell, a constant friend. George Orwell’s Friend includes autobiography and poetry, an intimate portrait of George Orwell, and the classic anguished memoir of love and vulnerability?elements that rarely find words, and even more rarely find the words of a man. Along with Potts’ intimate essay about George Orwell, ‘Don Quixote on a Bicycle,’ editor Ronald Caplan reclaims the thoughtful work of a passionate, unusual Canadian.
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Great Nova Scotia Cookbook
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$29.95The definitive cookbook of Nova Scotia combining traditional foods with trends in today’s cooking, and the best techniques. This is a must have cookbook for all who value good cooking.
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A Portrait of Lunenburg County Photographs and Stories from a Vanished Way of Life
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$19.95The legendary schooner fishing days are gone forever from the coast of Nova Scotia, but the spirit of those days, and the hard and heroic men who endured them, lives on in the stories and photographs of A Portrait of Lunenburg County.
Stripped of romantic myths, told without editorial comment in the stark and simple words of fishermen themselves, here are tales of harsh conditions and sometimes cruel captains, of body-breaking work for low wages, and of tragedy and daring adventure faced amid the awesome forces of the elements. Here, too, are plain, straightforward expressions of human values nurtured in tightly knit communities: close family ties, honesty, kindness, respect, and willingness to share. The stories are accompanied by 48 photographs, black and white portraits of the colourful people and the hard lives that they led.
First published in 1978, A Portrait of Lunenburg County is a moving tribute to the warmth, humour, and vitality of a people whose lives have formed a rich and vital chapter in Canada’s past. This new edition includes a new preface from the author and an updated design.
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Historic South End Halifax
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$21.95The South End of Halifax is well known as the wealthy part of the peninsula. While it does hold private schools, country clubs, and some million-dollar houses, the area is much more diverse than its reputation. The history of the district- from its humble beginnings in 1749 as the “South Suburb” to its present popularity and illustrious image- is extensive. For instance, did you know that the South End was once known as Irishtown? Or that the famous author Oscar Wilde visited the South End?
Historic South End Halifax will undoubtedly expand your knowledge about this historically significant part of Halifax. It is divided into sections that highlight the many transformations of this district. The various incarnations of the industrial and military sectors of the South End are explored, demonstrating the importance of the port status of the city to the area’s development. Also, the roles of hospitals and universities in the South End’s story are detailed. Peter McGuigan also recounts the history of Point Pleasant and Francklyn parks and live theatre. Historic South End Halifax contains everything that you’ve ever wanted to know about the South End. -
Me & Mr. Bell
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$11.95It’s 1908, and ten-year-old Eddie MacDonald shares Alexander Graham Bell’s passion for solving problems and for taking long walks in the fields above Bras d’Or Lake.
But whereas Bell is renowned by many for being the smartest man in the world, Eddie is just a local farm boy who struggles to learn to read and write. After a few chance encounters, the elderly Bell befriends the young boy, and takes an interest in his struggle—encouraging Eddie to celebrate his successes and never give up.
When Bell’s long ambition for manned flight culminates in the Silver Dart soaring over Bras d’Or Lake, Eddie is inspired to find solutions to his own challenges.
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Somebody’s Daughter
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$21.95First released in 1996, Somebody’s Daughter takes us inside the lives of real players in Canada’s prostitution game. This book is about what we don’t know about prostitution and perhaps what we don’t want to know; what goes on inside that violent underworld know as The Game, and who the girls in the tight skirts really are. Author and reporter Phonse Jessome traces the short careers of several young girls actively recruited by pimps and describes the anti-pimping efforts of law enforcers who work to get teenage girls out the The Games and off the streets.
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Spring Wildflowers
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$12.95Spring Wildflower is a handy field guide that will help you identify most flowers that bloom in the spring. It is well organized, easy to follow and features fine pen and ink drawings of almost 250 flowering plants.
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Historic Sydney
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$21.95Dominion Steel and Coal Company. The Dominion Steel and Coal Company steel plant built at Whitney Pier brought in many of the people who make up the region’s rich cultural diversity Today, Sydney is Nova Scotia’s third largest city and is a major industrial centre. Cape Breton native Rannie Gillis has selected from a wide range of historical photographs to provide glimpses of the city’s rich heritage. Industrial scenes, streetscapes, urban life, the historic waterfront, and domestic work all combine to offer a fascinating portrait of historic Sydney.
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Historic North Sydney
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$21.95North Sydney has an exciting history. Once the fourth-busiest seaport in North America, the little town was also known as “Canada’s Gateway to the (European) World” when an underwater telegraph cable between North America and Europe was successfully laid, with the end of the cable in North Sydney. Because of its transport and communications advantages, the town played a vital role through both world wars.
Historic North Sydney is divided into chapters by topic. Rainnie Gillis uses historical images and extensive research to explain transportation, business, the Newfoundland Ferry Service, and public service in North Sydney, among other subjects.
Historic North Sydney is a much-anticipated addition to the Images of Our Past Series. -
Our Maud The Life, Art and Legacy of Maud Lewis
Publisher: Art Gallery of Nova Scotia$29.99Our Maud: The Life, Art and Legacy of Maud Lewis tells the story of Maud’s life, and traces her impact on Nova Scotia, her fame, the saving of her painted house, and the Nova Scotia folk art renaissance sparked by her example. The book looks at how Maud Lewis has become a role model for children with juvenile arthritis, her posthumous role in the creation of Atlantic Canada’s largest art museum, and how her story has become known around the world, culminating in the hit feature film Maudie starring Sally Hawkins and Ethan Hawke.
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Nova Scotia Folk Art An Illustrated Guide
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$24.95There may be many folk artists in Canada, but there is only one integrated folk art scene: the one in Nova Scotia.
Classic folk art is the work of artists who did not think of themselves as artists, who made art that they never considered to be art at all. There were no festivals, no galleries, and no touring exhibitions when they started—just a sign by the side of the road, a painted house, or colourful sculptures in the yard to attract the attention of passers-by. Today in Nova Scotia, contemporary folk art has become a distinct style, one which stresses individual creativity over collective utility. The maker, and their stories, is central to the appeal.
Written by former Art Gallery of Nova Scotia curator Ray Cronin, Nova Scotia Folk Art features profiles of fifty artists—some obscure and some well known—from the first, second, and third waves of folk art. The list includes Barry Colpitts, Laura Kenney, Ralph Boutilier, Craig Naugler, Joseph Norris, and Maud Lewis. With more than 150 colour images, this illustrated guide explores the exhibitions, collections, and festivals that allowed a group of Nova Scotia artists to move their creations from the roadside to the museum, and in so doing to create its own genre: Nova Scotia Folk Art.
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Hope for Wildlife
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$29.95One day, a couple who had run over a skunk with their car brought it to the Dartmouth Veterinary Hospital. When the veterinarians couldn’t look after it, Hope Swinimer decided to take the helpless animal into her care, and that was the start of it all. Now, through her rehabilitation centre called Hope for Wildlife, Hope’s name is synonymous with wildlife rescue in Nova Scotia.Since 1997, hundreds of animals have been saved through the tireless efforts of the staff and volunteers at Hope for Wildlife. Some animals’ stories were so unique that they even garnered national attention-such as Hope’s battle with the department of natural resources over Gretel, a member of the endangered pine marten species. Each creature comes with its own challenges, either through a particularly difficult injury or a quirky personality-like Lucifer the inexplicably bald and ornery raccoon-but each patient leaves an indelible mark on the lives of those around them.Hope for Wildlife tells the stories of fourteen different wild animals from Nova Scotia that have passed through the centre. Colour photographs of the animals and the centre’s efforts supplement the text, and info boxes offer further information on the province’s wildlife. The stories in Hope for Wildlife are educational, heartwarming, and sometimes heartbreaking-but always filled with hope.
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That Bloody Cape Breton Coal
Publisher: Breton Books$17.95Rennie MacKenzie is the author of ‘In the Pit: A Cape Breton Coal Miner’.
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Riptides New Island Fiction
Publisher: Acorn Press$21.95A call was sent out asking writers to submit unpublished short stories for a fiction anthology featuring newer writers with a significant P.E.I. connection. There were no boundaries for setting or genre, only a limit of 5,000 words. PEI is strong on tradition, which includes out-migration and immigration. Thus, its culture and demographics are changing, and these PEI writers both are Island-born and hail from away – Australia and Calgary, Newfoundland and Ukraine. The result is twenty-three stories, which take the reader from a ritual gathering of PEI widows to Chernobyl in the nuclear disaster’s aftermath, from a menacing marital game of hide-and-seek through the Maritime landscape to gender clashes on an outback sheep ranch, from a religious commune in Alberta to the Enlightenment Tour bus into Quebec. Whether the characters are struggling for dear life in breaking surf, gasping for emotional air at a ladies’ candle party or fearing the Tall Tailor’s scissors, the authors demonstrate a rich variety of fictional talent and imagination emerging from what Island poet Milton Acorn called the “red tongue…In the ranged jaws of the Gulf,” and revising our perception of “the land of Anne.”
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Discovering Cape Breton Folklore
Publisher: Cape Breton University Press$24.95For more than two decades, Richard MacKinnon—Canada Research Chair in Intangible Cultural Heritage, Cape Breton University—has researched Cape Breton’s rich cultural heritage: from protest songs to company houses, from co-operative housing to nicknames, from log buildings to cockfighting.In Discovering Cape Breton Folklore, professor MacKinnon revists some of his research and exposes us to some new.
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Richard Zurawski’s Book of Maritime Weather
Publisher: Pottersfield Press$18.95Richard Zurawski’s Book of Maritime Weather is a compendium of fascinating weather facts, myths, climatological oddities, weather science, folklore and observations of the diverse and oftentimes frustrating topic of Canadian Maritime weather. Whether you just like to watch the clouds go by or if you are a serious student of meteorology, there is plenty to entertain you in this volume.
There’s virtually everything here you’d like to know about the how and why of our regional weather. What makes our weather the way it is? What drives this ceaseless cycle of hot and cold, dry and wet? Zurawski brings the reader up to date on the modern science of forecasting but also includes historical perspectives about the weather before people made the study of weather into a science. Folklore, myths and anecdotes from days past are included with the modern facts and records of our climate. Weather sayings are not only presented, but scrutinized for their basis and value. Before the days of the super-computer and Environment Canada, the sea-bound skipper was the forecaster of his era and his innate and intimate knowledge of Maritime weather shifts could mean the difference between life and death.
Even with the aid of computers, satellites and ultra modern communications, the weather is still as much an art as it is a science. Zurawski’s Book of Maritime Weather taps the wisdom of the past and the present to give a holistic view of the fascinating and sometimes bizarre world of Maritime weather. -
Radio Talk
Publisher: Pottersfield Press$19.95Rick Howe has been a reporter, a newscaster, a news director, a commentator and a talk show host. For several years he also wrote a column for the Halifax Daily News, and he has made numerous appearances on CTV and CBC television as a political analyst. With family roots in New Brunswick, Howe has worked in radio in Campbellton, Newcastle, Saint John and over thirty years in Halifax. Currently living in Fall River, Nova Scotia, Howe is married to former ATV/ ASN television journalist Yvonne Colbert.
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For the Children
Artist: Burland MurphyPublisher: Breton Books$19.95Born in 1932, in Whycocomagh, RITA JOE lived a hardscrabble existence, from foster home to foster home, experiences that helped her decide to admit herself to Shubenacadie Indian Residential School, a place most Mi’kmaq people had come to dread. It was a rare example of the child choosing Shubie, “to better myself,” to get an education. That same determination compelled her to write about her personal combination of traditional Mi’kmaw spiritualism and Catholic faith, carrying forward her ‘gentle war’. Her last poem, unfinished, was found in her typewriter when she died in March 2007.
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Saint John
$29.95One of New Brunswick’s best known photographers , Rob Roy lives and works in the historic Trinity Royal area of Saint John. Roy’s photography is at once practical and artistic, bringing together everyday scenes of Saint John and almost missed moments of beauty.
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Saint John
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$29.95At the mouth of the St. John River sits New Brunswick’s largest city. Once a summer gathering place for the native Wolastoqiyik (Maliseet), this beautiful spot on the Bay of Fundy was first settled by Europeans in the seventeenth century, and today people from all corners of the globe are drawn to the city of Saint John.
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Shipwrecks of New Brunswick
Publisher: Pottersfield Press$19.95In the past 20 years, Robert Parsons has become one of Atlantic Canada’s most popular and prolific writers, specializing in the stories of shipwreck, rescue and survival. He devotes much of his time to researching, writing and promoting the sea-going history of Canada’s eastern provinces, their ships and the people who sailed them. His books include Ocean of Storms, Sea of Disaster, In Peril on the Sea and The Edge of Yesterday: Sea Disasters of Nova Scotia.
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Shipwrecks and Sailors of Prince Edward Island
Publisher: Pottersfield Press$21.95It has been estimated that between fifteen to twenty thousand ships have meet their end along Canada’s eastern seaboard. Many of these wrecks happened between the 1800s to the mid-1900s when the season of bark, brig, brigantine and schooner came and went. This era left behind literally a vast volume – both recorded in print and preserved in local tales – of heroism and tragedy of mariners young and old.Prince Edward Island’s legacy of tales from the era of all-sail is great: from the wreck of the immigrant-laden Elizabeth at Cascumpec where the castaways were saved by a native; to the unique tale of PEI’s Jessy thrown onto St. Paul’s Island; to the strange tale of Rival caught in the “Yankee Gale” and the SS Quebec’s demise in the death-dealing tides of East Point, Shipwrecks and Sailors of Prince Edward Island, Volume I will fascinate and educate.Then again, island ships were involved with mystery, mayhem and wreck in practically all parts of the North Atlantic: gripped in sandbars of Sable Island, plundered on the rugged coasts of Newfoundland, drifting with no crew off Ireland, wrecked on Nova Scotia’s shores, stranded on the Magdalenes, and “Lost with Crew” in the vast Atlantic.Anything that could happen to a ship has happened to a Prince Edward Island hull and scores of tales within Shipwrecks and Sailors of Prince Edward Island present those weird and wonderful epics. Arranged chronologically, the stories are full of names of our seafaring ancestors, plus descriptions of the local ports that sheltered the ships.For over a hundred years the wooden sailing ship was an important and vital transportation link along the shores of Prince Edward Island. Its maritime records are full of stories in which local ships and their crews played an essential role. Self-sacrifice, daring, skill, wreck and rescue are all part of a fabric which makes up the history of the ships and the heritage of the villages that knew them. Shipwrecks and Sailors of Prince Edward Island has all this and more!
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Rise Again
Publisher: Breton Books$21.95The first full-scale history of Cape Breton Island in nearly 150 years!
RISE AGAIN! Is the story of Cape Breton Island told by beloved historian, archivist, and teacher Robert Morgan. From the geological roots to Mi’kmaw life before discovery, the planting of French Louisbourg, and the island’s first economic boom, this is a rich and accessible new book.
Morgan takes us from the battle for control of the island and Britain’s deliberate schemes to withhold opportunities for significant growth, through the opening of Cape Breton to provide a new home for the Loyalists, the forced marriage of the Colony of Cape Breton to the Colony of Nova Scotia and with it the birth of the never-ending Separatist movement. Book One takes the reader through the 19th century and sees Cape Breton as a new home for the Acadians, the Irish, and the Scottish, preparing the ground for the second economic boom as world markets were found for Cape Breton’s coal and then steel. A marvellous book, built to last. -
Rise Again Book Two
Publisher: Breton Books$23.95Robert J. Morgan has been Senior Historian at the Fortress of Louisbourg and Professor of History at Cape Breton University.
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Historic Sackville
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$21.95In 1749 Sackville was founded and it has since been Halifax’s gateway to the interior of Nova Scotia. The community has been a growth centre since. These vintage photos bring that story of development to life.
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Birds and Their Ways
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$13.95True life anecdotes, shedding light on the behavior of Eastern Canadian birds form the basis of this local classic by the renowned writer and naturalist, Robie W. Tufts. Sound answers are given to unusual queries, ranging from the sleeping habits of hummingbirds to a speculation on harmfulness of crows. Topics of interest include: birds of prey, bird intelligence, nesting and feeding habits, identification of birds, and protective legislation for rare species. The text is accompanied by illustrations by John H. Dick.
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Birds of Nova Scotia
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$35.00Birds of Nova Scotia has been a highly cherished publication since it first came into print in 1961. To preserve the originality of the earlier editions, this posthumous revision by the Nova Scotia Bird Society and the Nova Scotia Museum has been a long and careful labour. New information on sightings of rare birds and changes of status bring the text in line with current data, without modifying the special qualities of Robie Tuft’s personal style.
Colour illustrations by two distinguished nature artists, Roger Tory Peterson, author of Field Guide to the Birds (Houghton Mifflin) and John Crosby and line drawings by Jjohn Henry Dick will ensure accurate identification of species.
This book has a place beside the binoculars, near every winter feeding station, in the summer cottage, aboard ship and also in school libraries and classrooms.
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Beartan Briste
Publisher: Cape Breton University Press$14.95Born in Dublin, Ireland, Rody Gorman is Writer-in-Residence at Sabhal Mòr Ostaig, Isle of Skye. He has worked as writing fellow at the University College Cork and the University of Manitoba and is editor of the annual Irish and Scottish Gaelic poetry anthology An Guth. He has published a wide range of poetry collections and his selected poems in Irish and Scottish Gaelic, Chernilo, were published by Coiscéim in 2006.
Beartan Briste is the latest collection from this prolific Gaelic poet. His highly original English “intertongueings” are wonderfully entertaining in their own right – providing insight not only to the nature of his poetry, but the nature of Gaelic interpretation.
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Blood on the Coal
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$10.95Over 400 people have died mining for coal under the town of Springhill. This is the stirring account of two explosions, a “bump” and two major fires. Pieced together from interviews, diaries and newspaper files.
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Historic Cumberland County South
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing$22.95Southern Cumberland County, with Chignecto Bay on one side and Minas Basin on the other, has been identified by its geography: great cliffs, eroded Appalachian mountains, lush inland valleys, and the sea. Over a century ago, the area was a veritable “land of plenty” busy with the activity of settlement and work. Extensive coal fields fed a successful coal mining industry, while the fertile valleys sustained farms and lumber mills, and the Parrsborough Shore supported a busy shipbuilding industry.
Historic Cumberland County South revisits the various communities that have grown out of theis rich past tapping into an equally rich photographic heritage. Cumberland County comes alive through stories of its communities and the events, activities, and industries that shaped their development. Although many of the industries have gone into decline, the spectacular beauty of the region and its rich fossil deposits continue to make it “a land of promise.”
