Dundurn Press

Paddles Up! provides an in-depth look at dragon boating from its beginnings in ancient China to the modern-day prominence of Canadian teams on the international scene, as told in the words of top coaches of men's and women's teams, experts and enthusiasts, and sports health professionals across Canada. Contributing writers include Mike Haslam, executive president International Dragon Boat Federation; Matthew Smith, president Dragon Boat Canada; Kamini Jain, Vancouver; Albert MacDonald, Halifax; Jamie Hollins, Pickering; Matt Robert, Montreal; and Jim Farintosh, Toronto. Through legends, history, and traditions, to paddling tips and mental readiness, and from choosing gear to exceptional achievements, a battery of Canadian dragon-boat notables share their considerable knowledge in one authoritative volume.

In the early 20th century the Canadian North was a mystery, but the Canadian military stepped in, and this book explores its historic activities in Canada’s Arctic.

Is the Canadian North a state of mind or simply the lands and waters above the 60th parallel? In searching for the ill-fated Franklin Expedition in the 19th century, Britain’s Royal Navy mapped and charted most of the Arctic Archipelago. In 1874 Canadian Prime Minister Alexander Mackenzie agreed to take up sovereignty of all the Arctic, if only to keep the United States and Tsarist Russia out. But as the dominion expanded east and west, the North was forgotten. Besides a few industries, its potential was unknown. It was as one Canadian said for later.

There wasn’t much need to send police or military expeditions to the North. Not only was there little tribal warfare between the Inuit or First Nations, but there were few white settlers to protect and the forts were mainly trading posts. Thus, in the early 20th century, Canada’s Arctic was less known than Sudan or South Africa.

From Far and Wide recounts exclusively the historic activities of the Canadian military in Canada’s North.

By every principle of war, every shred of military logic, logistics support to Canada's Task Force Orion in Afghanistan should have collapsed in July 2006. There are few countries that offer a greater challenge to logistics than Afghanistan, and yet Canadian soldiers lived through an enormous test on this deadly international stage - a monumental accomplishment. Canadian combat operations were widespread across southern Afghanistan in 2006, and logistics soldiers worked in quiet desperation to keep the battle group moving. Only now is it appreciated how precarious the logistics operations of Task Force Orion in Kandahar really were.

What the Thunder Said is an honest, raw recollection of incidents and impressions of Canadian warfighting from a logistics perspective. It offers solid insight into the history of military logistics in Canada and explores in some detail the dramatic erosion of a once-proud corner of the army from the perspective of a battalion commander.

Folktale, memoir, fiction, literary hoax, The Yellow Briar is all of these. Ostensibly the charming remembrance of an Irish orphan who escapes the Great Famine of 1840s Ireland and comes to the New World to seek a fresh start on the streets of Toronto and in the pioneer hinterland of Canada West (Ontario), the book was actually a fictional humbug perpetrated by John Mitchell, a Toronto lawyer, who first published the tale in 1933.

Patrick Slater, the protagonist of the "memoir," is said to have died in 1924 but not before setting his saga down on paper. And what an account it is! The Globe and Mail felt that the book "gives a picture of Ontario to be found in no other work of fiction we know and has won for itself a permanent place in Canadian literature." If nothing else, Slater/Mitchell captures perfectly the lilt of the Irish and the wry wisdom of an old soul to paint an affecting portrait of trials and tribulations in a long-ago time.

What’s in a name? Personal misfortune, or so it would appear if your name happens to be "Flam Grub." This touching contemporary novel shows how our lives are entwined with our names and how our destinies are never certain.

Full of humour and sadness, quirky wit, and quiet moments of beauty, Flam Grub tells the tale of a young man’s misadventures and his retreat to the security of reading books, work in a bookstore, and a career as an undertaker until fame unexpectedly comes his way.

Both an endearing tale and a shrewd send-up of contemporary life, Flam Grub is the second book from the rich imagination and skillful pen of new Canadian author Dan Dowhal.

In an age when "survival" shows permeate the media, noted northern traveller Hap Wilson shares accounts of his lifelong involvement with wilderness living within the Canadian Shield. Wilson knows better than most how to live in the woods. As park ranger, canoe guide, outfitter, trail builder, and environmental activist, he learned from firsthand experience that nature can neither be beaten or tamed.

Trails and Tribulations takes the reader on a journey with the author through natural settings ranging from austere to mysterious and breathtaking. Contents include animal attacks, bush fires, the threat of hypothermia, and vision-quest sites, to name but a few.