Saskatchewan Books

This was the first of the Russell Quant mysteriea I read, and it was while I was on a Mediterranean cruise. I really got into the main character and all the rest of his friends. Everyone sweemed so real and the mystery held me. It was a page turner. The PI is gay, so if you are gay you will like it even more. I left the book with the cruise ship library so some one else could enjoy it.

There are some implausible plot twists, maybe one too many coincidences, and one major mystery element left quite unresolved, but with a sexy and personable detective (I am a sucker for a man who loves his mother), a large cast of well drawn supporting characters, sparkling wit, and prose as crisp as the winter weather in his Saskatoon setting, Anthony Bidulka keeps you turning the pages at a brisk clip, right up to the very last one. This is the sort of satisfying read perfect for curling up in front of the fire with a warm brandy--or a flight of cold aquavit. Victor J. Banis, author of Spine Intact, Some Creases

This book is about returning detective Russell Quant (2nd in the series) hired by a local businessman being blackmailed by a blackmailer who at once is both enticing and dangerous. Quant ends up for a spell in New York for a short but exciting time and then its back home for the exciting conclusion of another top notch detective story with humour and pathos and further development of some very unique and endearing and curious characters. The author has created a world that is very welcoming to the reader and you will easily (and happily) be taken in.

This book was one of the best reading experiences I've had in a long while, bar none! Anthony Bidulka has quickly become one of my top 5 authors and once you've read "Flight of Aquavit" you'll know why. First of all, I absolutely LOVE (!!) the lead character, Russell Quant. This character is so well-developed I feel as though I actually know this man, from his little quirks to his dry sense of humor, and even to his sense (or lack thereof) of style and likes/dislikes. The cast of characters (especially his mother and his fabulous, larger-than-life friend, Sereena) is quite memorable and provide the reader with a more "3-D" view of Russell's life. Bidulka has a way of drawing you into the story and making you care about the characters and understand what makes them "tick." I found myself having to pace myself as I read the book or else I might have spent all night and part of the morning finishing the story in order to find out how it ends. If you're looking for a great story with a top-notch private eye who happens to be gay (rather than his gayness being the primary characteristic that defines him), look no further than this book. You WON'T be disappointed!

In Flight of Aquavit we see even more of the story behind the story of who the hero of this series, Russell Quant, really is as he trails an captivating blackmailer to New York City and deals with his mother coming to stay for the Christmas holidays. A fun thriller as well as a very human story.

After I read this book I had a burning desire to visit the Canadian Shield and paddle a wood and canvas canoe on the Churchill River. I only wish I could have done it in 1960, when this book was written. It is a much different place today. This is an excellent book about a canoe trip of 500 miles by six friends. I only hope I will be as lucky to do such a trip someday.

It's a great book. I haven't paddled the Churchhill River yet, but rivers closeby, and you still find the wilderness and the loneliness that Sig Olson describes. After reading this book and others by Sig Olson I just want to go out paddling and enjoy the wilderness.

I first obtained this book in my youth through the old Outdoor Life Book Club (which also introduced me to other classics such as John J. Rowlands' Cache Lake Country). I'm not sure I read The Lonely Land all the way through at that first encounter, but I recently rediscovered it when cleaning out a family home. I picked it up out of nostalgia, but I soon found that I couldn't put it down.

Apart from the inherent interest of its subject matter -- the majestic wilderness of central Canada's Churchill River drainage -- I was quickly taken by the immediacy of Olson's account. The wind, the waves, the thunder of approaching rapids all spill off the page in vivid detail, as do the detailed descriptions of each night's camp and its routines. As compelling is the exuberance of Olson and his five companions as they explore pristine lakes, shoot the Churchill's wild water, and find refuge time and again on the solid, reassuring outcrops of the Canadian Shield.

Finally, at each stage of the journey, Olson quotes from the journals of those who came before him, the "bourgeois" who led the brigades of voyageurs into the heart of the Lonely Land in search of furs. Men like Alexander MacKenzie, George Simpson, and David Thompson, who worked for the Hudson's bay Company or its competitors: the record of their observations informs Olson's account with vivid descriptions of the land as well as a sense both of how much and how little had changed over the one hundred and fifty years since they had last paddled, poled, and lined their way up the same great river system.

I know that Olson has many well-regarded books to his credit, but a new reader could do worse than enter this world of woods and water by way of The Lonely Land.

I read this book while in Antarctica, and I spent several storm days lost in Olson's vivid tale of an epic journey through the vast Canadian wilderness. His insight into the socio-historical condition of the indigenous peoples and French-Canadian missionaries and traders is unique. Also, I found the illustrations by Frances Lee Jacques to be immaculate line drawings worthy of admiration in their own right. "The Lonely Land" fueled the wanderlust and naturalist in me as much as any Ed Abbey or John Muir book.

I was looking on information on old canoe routes of the voyageurs and I came upon this book. It tells the experiences of Olson, a famous naturalist of the 50's and 60's, and 5 of his friends, as they paddle three wood and canvas canoes down 500 miles of the Churchhill River in Saskatchewan in 1960. Olson describes the setting and experience so completely, including diary entries of famous fur trappers who traveled the same route, that I have thought of nothing else but going to see the country he describes, the Canadian Shield of Northern Saskatchewan. It is a different place now than it was 40 years ago, less lonely I imagine, but still something I must do. I would recommend this book to anyone who longs to experience this land, North America, before it became overpopulated.

'Bad Beekeeping' isn't really a beekeeping book, at least not in the sense of how to keep bees. Rather it is more of a memoir of the author's life during the time he was a commercial beekeeper.

It is very well written and Ron Miksha has a wry sense of humor. 'Bad Beekeeping' is a fun and interesting book with interesting insights.

Instead of "Bad Beekeeping," Ron Miksha's book could have been called "Portait of the Beekeeper as a Young Man," since it is all about his growing up as a commercial beekeeper in the 1970's and 1980's. Working the canola bloom, his summer beekeeping operation in Saskatchewan, and working citrus, his winter beekeeping operation in Florida, Ron had a unique run as a beekeeper that is simply not possible today. Regulations, rules and differing concerns on opposite sides of the U.S./Canadian border made his operation a one-of-a-kind, as well as one-of-an-era.

His story is a roller-coaster ride of great successes matched with spectacular failures. His calcuations and plans meet with the unexpected and that is the fun of his tale. Although no longer a commercial beekeeper; instead now, a geophysicist and entrepreneur, he remains a hobbyist beekeeper in Alberta. As beekeepers, we have not lost one of our own.

Nothing bad about this book, Ron has given the beekeeping world another cracking good read. There is every thing here, history fun information and entertainment. Also a very good read for those people who do not have the insanity to employ millions of buzzing workers, with potentially very hot tails! An excellent book.

Bad Beekeeping is not a bad book at all! It is hilariously funny and packed fun of really neat things everyone would like to know. It's all about bees and beekeeping, but all about lots of other things, too. This is such a great book, I started on Friday evening and read all weekend long. Couldn't put it down. Best book I've read!

The author's account of his career as a beekeeper will appeal to a wide variety of readers. It is a delightful blend of both humorous and sobering personal anecdotes and exhaustively-researched facts about honey. You can't help getting drawn into Ron's life and the diverse personalities he encountered across North America. His engaging writing style makes this book one you'll want all your friends to read.

Life is hard - and there's always someone out to make it harder. "From the Dust" follows Eva Edwards as she tries to run her farm and raise her adopted child. Tate Prescott Brown has come to her farm to claim what he believes is rightfully his - the farm that Eva Edwards calls hers. A legal conflict ensues, as both try to do what they believe is the correct thing. "From the Dust" is a charming historical romance novel, highly recommended to fans and community library romance collections.

The setting of From the Dust set this book apart from every historical romance I have ever read. The story is set on the Canadian prairies during the depression and although the grit and desperation of the time and place make for an out-of-the-ordinary love story background, Kennie's passion for the landscape and her characters make this book unforgettable.

Eve and Tate's love story is gentle and sweet against the harshness of farming in the dustbowl. I especially liked the great cast of secondary characters (little Maggie, Hans Anderson, Hilda and Sam Sloat) that Kennie populated her small, dusty town with.

Overall, this prairie love story is well, well worth reading.

I loved both Tate and Eva. Secondary characters were interesting and added depth to the story. The unique setting and developing romance sucked me right in. I thoroughly enjoyed reading "From The Dust" and will be looking for more from this author.

It is perhaps unlikely that a publisher specializing in romance novels would be based in a small Eastern Oregon town. But unlikely or not, that is exactly where Black Lyon Publishing is located. Evidently it is a particularly fitting place to be, because virtually all their books are superior examples of their genre.<
Their latest is "From the Dust," a work of depth and genuine sentiment from a Canadian author.<
The opening paragraph of the novel is not what one would normally expect from a romance. It reads: "He died with liquor on his breath and poison in his soul. Doc MacPherson claimed that between the alcohol and the arsenic there were enough chemicals in his body to keep him picked to the second coming."<
The time is 1935 and the setting is remote Saskatchewan. The central character is a woman of achievement who has left all that behind, an intelligent woman who has been reduced to the essentials, and is ready to fight to keep what little she has.<
Rich in period detail and full of nicely-drawn characters, "From the Dust" is a solid romance that also has a good deal to offer to those who don't normally read romances.<
Romance lovers would also do well to seek out other Black Lyon titles...including one by its Publisher, Kerry A. Jones. "Orion in the Winter Sky" is just as fulfilling and intriguing as its title would suggest, as is Jones' "Cast in Stone."

A perfect blend of history and romance, I found Ryshia Kennie's From the Dust to be a double treasure.
The story unfolds as recently widowed Eva Edwards struggles to coax a crop out of the dusty land. She must succeed in running her farm if she is to provide security for herself and her young step daughter, Maggie. Strong, stubborn and beautiful, Eva is determined to succeed. But she soon discovers a bigger threat in Tate Prescott Brown, the wealthy Toronto veterinarian who stakes a claim to her land. As the unlikely romance unfolds gently and tenderly between them, the reader cannot help but cheer for the vulnerable and headstrong Eva and kind, oh-so-sexy Tate to overcome the obstacles that would keep them apart.
Truly an artist with words, Ms. Kennie's descriptions of the Saskatchewan prairie are so powerful I could almost feel the gentle prairie winds, almost taste the grit of dust on my tongue. Kennie has succeeded in creating a tender love story that touches the very heart, and an endearing cast of characters that will long live on in my memory.
Highly recommended!

Over the last two summers I have paddled the Fur Trade Route from Pinehouse Lake to Pelican Narrows. This book was the perfect guide with accurate information on rapids, rock paintings, campsites and navigation. This was very important this year with the high water on the Churchill.

Beyond the guide book aspects, this book explains the history, culture, geology and botany of the region. This book is a must own if you're canoeing the route and a great read even if you never dip a paddle.

It is hard to imagine that anyone could ever write a better reference manual to canoeing the historically significant section of the Canadian fur trade route which runs through Saskatchewan. In the summer of 2003 I paddled the entire Churchill and Sturgeon Weir river systems, from the Clearwater River to Cumberland House. This book was an invaluable resource, describing clearly every rapid, portage, and most of the campsites along the river.

Besides its use as a canoeing reference, it is a most comprehensive study of the history of the region, from the fur trade era, to more modern times.

Anyone planning to canoe any Saskatchewan portion of the voyageur's highway should read this book.

This past summer, I put together a three week canoe trip on the churchill river. I found this book in Ric Dreideger's canoe outfitter's store in Missinipe, and immediately bought it. (luckily) Our trip started from Pinehouse lake, and two of us paddled past stanley mission, then backtracked to missinipe, eventually covering some 140 miles. This book covers the whole of the churchill river in detail, while giving brief historical backgrounds about the voyageurs who used to make a living on the waterway. I followed our route in the book, and it was of particular importance when it came to rapids and portages, which were numerous on our route. It was always right on as to the degree of difficulty of the rapids, so we made few mistakes. Once I got confused in a series of rapids as to which was which and ended up running a dangerous one where we were swamped and I injured my knee. However, this can be avoided using *prudent* scouting of all rapids (we were over-zealous), and by paying attention to warnings in the book.

The book also contained information on rock paintings, side trips, and outfitters along the way where we could get supplies.
It's content is cut up into smaller trips with ways to get in and out of the river, which is extremely advantageous.

As a guide book, I think you can't go wrong by purchasing this book for your trip. As I knew basically nothing of this river, (being from kentucky), and since I was only 20 years old, I was lucky in acquiring this book. I owe much to its exactness for keeping myself and the three other people safe.

The histoy of Saskatchewan is riddled with mysterious, disturbing and spooky tales. From the busy streets of the busy streets of the cities to the wide-open prairies in the south and the pristine forests in the forests in the north, legend and folklore have sprung up around phenomena that cannot be explained.

I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in ghost stories. It is wonderful to read, and includes stories from all over Saskatchewan that are well researched, well written, and bound to send a chill down your spine!

I took last summer off to float some rivers in Canada. This book is excellent both for deciding which of the rivers of Northern Saskatchewan to float and for use during your trip. It is exceptionally well organized and detailed. Ms. Archer will not steer you wrong and the book is full of helpful advice that comes from a person who has obviously done a multitude of river trips and who has an exceptional level of wilderness wisdom and skill.

If you plan on going canoeing in N. Sask. this is the book you need. Almost every major river in this area is profiled with history, character of river, detailed map with UTM coordinates of important sites. Also includes info. on the type of fish in each river - important for the anglers. I have used it on several occasions when paddling in this beautiful area of N. Sask. The appendix includes important outfitter contacts and websites to check water levels.

Saskatchewan: Uncommon Views is a stunning, full-color photographic gallery of Saskatchewan's countryside. Only the barest minimum of commentary supplements this collection of stunning images of grasses, open parklands, crop fields, prairie, snowfields, hills and more. A truly beautiful collection that instills a great appreciation for the wide open spaces of nature in the reader. Award-winning photographer John Conway proves his exquisite gift in this superb compilation particularly for those who appreciate the majesty of landscape photography.

...And now, the University of Alberta Press has published John Conway's amazing collection of photographs, Saskatchewan: Uncommon Views. The fruit of 12 years of photographing the province's changing countryside, the collection is an unlikely centennial gift that grapples with the tensions between the province's collective imagination and the testament of the land. Conway's photographs are driven by questions: there is beauty here, yes, but it is not a pretty postcard end in itself; rather, the beauty is a crowbar used to pry open our habitual ways of seeing-the way we edit and ignore much of what we see around us. The result is a book that is soul-searching, ironic, invigourating, depressing, demystifying, and yet, in the end, that celebrates the enduring power of place and the transformative potential of dreams.

The first photograph depicts a Yellowhead highway billboard that read "Future Home of Something." It's a poignant beginning for the exploration of a province that in its settlement phase was figured as a blank canvas awaiting European narratives. After establishing the familiar pastoral genre (bison spread on bald, snowy prairie) Conway shifts to the unexpected, to Saskatchewan's recreation as an industrial/scientific landscape. Many of these photographs centre around a manmade object that dialogues with or "interprets" its landscape context: signs next to plots of experimental crops; a row of piebald, rusting oil tanks in crop of barley; a tousled, Edward Burtnysky-esque grain tarp on a desolate field. In another, a pile of rocks and glacial erratics, plucked by a rock-picker from a stony field, becomes a sort of modern drumlin left behind by modern farming ideologies. Elsewhere, an abandoned farmstead (covered with decades of high-school grad graffiti) becomes a stage for different rites of passage, while a landscape and animal mural in Duck Lake conveniently ignores the 1885 battle that put it on the map.

Throughout, Conway records the land's exquisite, subtle range of texture, as well as the centrality of the sky where the drama of light and clouds plays out. He captures, as few others have, the gorgeous clarity of winter light on the prairies-the pinkish-white light at the horizon dissipating to powdery cobalt-a light that moves me in ways that exceed mountains or seascapes. Though Conway occasionally places short texts alongside the photographs, the reader for the most part is left to identify their own thematic progression.

In the 1970s, writers asserted that Western Canada needs to be "written into being." This makes sense. But the visual representations of a place are of similar importance. Saskatchewan's image continues to be swaying fields of grain, hip-roofed barns and grain elevators, a land still knit together in a gloriously productive quarter-section patchwork. Fact is, family farms have dwindled and agribusiness now exploits the land on a mass scale-filling sloughs, bulldozing copses and shelterbelts...

This disjuncture, between imagination and what one finds in the field, is what Conway records in his brilliant collection of photographs. Art historian Helen Marzolf's introductory essay theorizes Conway's "post-pastoral" photographs, seeing them as visual anecdotes that correct "the distorting lens of nostalgia" and act as unflinching "witness to inexorable change." I would add that Conway picks up where people like poet Andy Suknaski or photographer Sandra Semchuk left off in their explorations of ancestral legacies and prairie landscape. By comparison, Conway's vision is in a sense depersonalized, though no less valuable. Untouched by layers of family memory, he examines the land through the lens of public history and the collective imagination.

Alberta thirsts for this kind of "revisionist" book. The lunar devastation of the tar sands, the boreal forests slashed by seismic lines, the blighting of rural landscapes with dumps and power projects that benefit urban dwellers: all these cry out for a skilled photographer's eye. But Alberta just may be too jittery with its own adrenaline these days to be so thoughtful. Saskatchewan has won and lost at Lady Fortune's wheel and in doing so has developed a lovely, quiet grace. Uncommon Views beautifully captures these provincial qualities in rich tableaux that captivates, surprises and challenges. By framing typical, "forgettable" views, Conway reveals, as Sharon Butala writes, "what strangers have failed to see, and what it would not occur to us to explain to others."

it gives the inside story what a person goes through to become a mountie

Hard to believe how the mounties were made would like to read more modern comparison with it. More people should learn how our Canadian Police force is made. The hardships that were apparent. I could see clearly how the men and women were strengthened throughout their training. The writers description of the Training Acdemy was so detailed that I could almost imagine being their myself. I now understand that if they could make it through that training then they are clearly ready for any situation that they will encounter on the job.

This is a great story! I loved the vivid characters and the message the story portrays. The great thing about this author's books is that you don't have to read them in order to understand them...but all her books are excellent and I highly recommend them!

This is the second installment in the Saskatchewan Saga series...I was ready to hear more about my favorite characters from the first book, A Place Called Bliss, but the majority of the book dealt with new characters and it dawned on me, the common thread in these books was the town of Bliss...eventually the story touched on some of the prior characters...

Kerry was a precosious child orphaned by her father's death. She had a penchant for spouting Biblical quotes when she could not verbally express her feelings. Her Aunt Charlotte comes and takes her in and brings her to a whole new world of elegance and sophistication...Kerry (Keren, with TWO e's!) becomes fast friends with Franny, her cousin, who being sickly, is sheltered by the rest of the family...As the two girls grow up, they become inseparable until tragedy strikes Franny. In her grief, Kerry plans to pay back what she considered an unforgiveable deed, by going out west and finding the man who broke Franny's heart and spirit...along the way Kerry will find herself challenged to really understand the Bible in ways she never did before.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and will look forward to reading more about the town of Bliss!