About BC Books Online
BC Books Online was created for anyone interested in BC-published books, and with librarians especially in mind. We'd like to make it easy for library staff to learn about books from BC publishers - both new releases and backlist titles - so you can inform your patrons and keep your collections up to date.
Our site features print books and ebooks - both new releases and backlist titles - all of which are available to order through regular trade channels. Browse our subject categories to find books of interest or create and export lists by category to cross-reference with your library's current collection.
A quick tip: When reviewing the "Browse by Category" listings, please note that these are based on standardized BISAC Subject Codes supplied by the books' publishers. You will find additional selections, grouped by theme or region, in our "BC Reading Lists."
Description
A finalist for the 1995 Governor General's Literary Award for English-language non-fiction
Winner of the Mountain Environment and Culture Award at the 1995 Banff Mountain Book Festival
Leaning on the Wind is a love song of the west, sung to the tune of the wild chinook wind. Sid Marty skilfully weaves together the prehistory of Alberta with the experiences of First Nations, miners, early homesteaders and his own family. At the centre of his tale is the Marty homestead, located in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. Sid looks back through generations of his family and celebrates the feats of wild creatures and wild westerners.
The past comes alive in these pages, but so does the present, where you will meet cowboy poets, bull riders, sailplane pilots, desperate chicken farmers, curmudgeonly broncos, a homicidal cow elk, some dubious politicians and several fierce defenders of the earth. Humour and sardonic wit abound, along with abundant affection for the western earth and the people who depend on its bounties and experience its extremes of wind, frost and drought.
A western classic, Leaning on the Wind is as evocative today as when it was first published in 1995.
Editorial Reviews
“Surely one of the best books about Alberta ever written.” —Kevin Connolly, Equinox magazine
Marty’s thorough research and eloquent storytelling, coupled with his personal connections to this land and most certainly his strong opinions, make the history and culture of southern Alberta, especially the nuances of the pioneer and ranching set, come alive . . . Through it all, Marty reminds us [that] the land of the chinook is a remarkable place, as unique and powerful as the great deserts of the American Southwest, the jungles of the Amazon Basin or the plains of Africa. —Rocky Mountain Outlook
“These essays are so vital, so vibrant, so full of life, you just want to jump up and down for joy. —Edmonton Journal
“[F]ine writing and absorbing narrative” —Maggie Siggins, the Globe and Mail
