Photographic postcards have been a popular form of communication for nearly a century, and the images Peter Grant has collected provide a fascinating social history of life on Vancouver Island from 1904 to 1918.

The book contains real-photo postcards, most never before published. These pictures were created by artistic photographers, sometimes amate …

Coast Salish street cop Silas Seaweed has his hands full. An elderly Jewish immigrant has disappeared. An old blind woman has been murdered. Valuable art stolen from German Jews during the Second World War has begun to show up for sale in Victoria's auction houses, and the word on the street is that collectors are planning to loot a priceless Coast …

Walter B. Cheadle’s diary tells his incredible story of travelling with Lord Milton, as they journeyed along the uncharted Yellowhead route in 1862–63. A miraculously successful expedition, the men traversed the continent, making their way from Quebec, through Saskatchewan, Alberta, up the Athabasca River, risking their lives opening the trails …

A murder, a tryst, a mysterious child. A Victoria aristocrat who obsesses over her Churchill relatives. A repressive Welsh mother with a royalty fixation. A once-carefree Hesquiat girl from Nootka Sound. A dashing Icelandic philanderer. And quiet, steady Julia Godolphin, trying to rise above it all. The lost novel of Norma Macmillan, the Vancouver …

When former TV star Lulu Malone finds her evil union representative stabbed to death, her first instinct is to run. Unfortunately, the exit is crowded, as she has four actor friends with her. Without much choice, Lulu becomes enmeshed in the real-life detective hunt, one that she has only experienced as an actor on TV. With her life in danger, and …

With sharp, witty reviews of the best spots in town to slake your thirst, Drinking Vancouver: 100+ Great Bars in the City and Beyond is the pocket-sized booze bible for locals and visitors craving a night out on the town. Divided into 11 neighbourhoods, each one with a handy map, visit many of the new, revamped and unique establishments from the he …

In this award-winning cookbook by acclaimed chef Angelo Prosperi-Porta, find over 200 inspiring recipes for food that tastes every bit as delicious as it looks. With easy-to-follow instructions, create breakfasts worth jumping out of bed for, elegant hors d’oeuvres, mouth-watering entrées and delightfully decadent desserts. Lavishly photographed …

It was the summer of ’43 on a Cariboo ranch. He was 12 and had to become a man. If you were a man, you could become a cowboy. Join the author on this nostalgic look back on the joys, frustrations and observations of growing up and discovering where he belongs.

Excerpt from Eldon Lee's foreword: “This book by Alan Fry is probably the best book e …

Silas Seaweed is back on the beat as the street-smart Coast Salish cop. A gardener is found dead and the prime suspects are two young local party girls. Silas is handed the case that soon takes a bloodier turn when a policeman’s wife is killed. Silas begins to suspect that these murders and other events are related to the recent tide of gang-rela …

In a follow-up to his bestselling Fire Hall Cooking with Jeff the Chef, Jeff Derraugh, a 20-year veteran firefighter, offers over 150 delectable, affordable and easy-to-make recipes straight from the fire hall kitchens. Written in a relaxed, conversational style, this eclectic collection of recipes for any time of day and any kind of food craving m …

Victoria’s Chinatown is Canada’s oldest Chinese neighbourhood and has a lineage unbroken since 1858. With large-format colour photos and photocollages, Robert Amos and Kileasa Wong take you behind the doors of the 29 private clubs that make up the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association, where you’ll see the gilded altars, antique art and …

Bill Gallaher’s bestselling novel The Journey follows a group of three adventurous Overlanders—two young men and one remarkable woman—as they travel west in 1862, from the Manitoba prairies to the goldfields of the Cariboo.

With his gift for storytelling, Gallaher brings this intriguing era to the page as he vividly recounts the overland trek …

David Finch’s highly regarded biography of R.M. Patterson is now available in paperback. The escapades of this great Canadian are brought to life in a story that combines the lure of gold, the thrill of wilderness exploration and comic tales about life on a southern Alberta ranch. With access to Patterson’s diaries, letters and photographs, as …

Adrift on the Ark is a collection of personal essays by Margaret Thompson that offers a straightforward study of the complex relationship between human beings and the natural world. The essays look at a wide range of beings—from spiders to peacocks—and cover issues such as our irrational phobias, our fascination with zoos, and the myths and sto …

For well over a century, the bright seas of the Sunshine Coast have been attracting visitors to the waterfront resorts, fishing lodges and beaches that rest between Howe Sound and the spectacular Princess Louisa Inlet. These coastal hotspots and communities were settled by a few courageous and daring pioneers whose names are still familiar today: …

Featuring more than 500 public art installations, this is the essential guide for anyone interested in Vancouver, its people and its artists.

The character of a city is revealed by its public art—what it collectively places on its streets and walls and in its public spaces. As a city known internationally for its breathtaking cityscapes and mounta …

Celebrate the unique flavours, terroir and grape varieties that can be found only on the wine islands off the west coast. A collaborative effort from the writers of EAT Magazine, Island Wineries of British Columbia is your guide to a growing wine culture and the food movement that accompanies it. Starting with the history behind the region’s win …

In this new mystery series set on the islands off the coast of British Columbia and Washington State, Noel Franklin and Kyra Rachel team up to form Islands Investigations International. Quickly they come to realize that some crimes respect no boundaries.

Their first job takes Noel and Kyra to Gabriola Island and the unsolved murder of an art gallery …

It is January 1961 and Margaret Spencer and Nat Southby are relaxing on a ski holiday when their vacation takes a bone-chilling turn. While cross-country skiing the couple comes across the frozen body of Maurice Dubois, a man who went missing from a fishing resort the month before. When Maurice’s wife is also found murdered, the two Vancouver det …

It was 1862 and the Cariboo Gold Rush was in full swing. Sophia Cameron, the Beauty of Barkerville, lay dying of typhoid when her husband, John Cariboo Cameron, made one last promise to his fading young wife. The Promise is a compelling story of a great love and an epic struggle to honour a dying wife's final request: to take her body home to easte …

Frances Barkley was just eighteen when she became the first European woman to set foot on the west coast of North America. After a sheltered upbringing in England, Frances found herself boarding the Imperial Eagle in 1786 to set sail on an adventurous, round-the-world voyage with her husband, Captain Charles William Barkley.

With great wisdom and w …

In a sequel to the celebrated collection of stories Nobody's Mother comes an honest and poignant collection of essays from men who have forgone fatherhood.

Statistics Canada data show that seven per cent of women and eight per cent of men intend to remain childless. Nobody's Father gives readers fresh, honest insights into that male eight per cent. …

In the spring of 1884, Jack, an adventurous young man, packs his bags in Victoria, BC, and heads for the prairies, looking for a new life and hoping to get involved in an Indian war. Instead, he lucks into an exciting job in the fur trade and meets and befriends many of the great chiefs of the Cree nation, such as Poundmaker and Big Bear, and ends …

In this fourth mystery of the Seaweed series, Victoria neighbourhood cop Silas Seaweed is as always sensitive to his Coast Salish culture, but when he's confronted by a ten-foot-tall bear on a marsh on the city's outskirts, he suspects that this is no creature from the unknown world but someone out to con him. And Silas is right, but his attempts t …

The frantic pace of our world leaves little time for reflection, and even less time to nurture our spirits. In Havens in a Hectic World, Star Weiss explores the spiritual geography of the West Coast with individuals from a wide variety of faiths and cultural traditions. In visiting their sacred places, and hearing them share their stories, Weiss ra …

This first-hand account of a Canadian pioneer — the next title in TouchWood’s Classics West series — tells the story of a hard-won wilderness home and of the self-sufficient father and brothers who built it. Their tale of wanderlust begins in 1839 in Bytown, Ontario (later called Ottawa), with father Archie MacDonald, who reached his peak as …

Once available and appreciated only by researchers, these stories remained buried in the British Columbia Archives until 2007. Finally, readers are given a new glimpse into Emily Carr's life with this collection.. Carr began to write these stories in the last two years of her life. She wrote of the project: ... they are too small each to be taken s …

After many years of eating backpackers' standard meals, Laurie Ann March set out to replicate her home kitchen favourites in the outdoors. With more than 200 trail-tested recipes, March will transform your expectations for backcountry cooking possibilities. Don't just crave a gourmet adventure-create one!

Recipes Include:

• Cinnamon Walnut Buns
• Gi …

Once available and appreciated only by researchers, these stories remained buried in the British Columbia Archives until 2007. Finally, readers are given a new glimpse into Emily Carr's life with this collection. Carr began to write these stories in the last two years of her life. She wrote of the project: ". . . they are too small each to be taken …

Widely recognized as a classic of northern-exploration literature, A Journey to the Northern Ocean is Samuel Hearne's story of his three-year trek to seek a trade route across the Barrens in the Northwest Territories. Hearne was a superb reporter, from his anguished description of the massacre of helpless Eskimos by his Indian companions to his met …

Artist Robert Amos gives readers a fascinating insider’s tour of studios on Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands where some of Canada’s best-known artists create works.

Spanning more than 15 years of interviews and photographs, Amos has created panoramic collages of these artists' creative spaces, and even more revealing images with his words. …

I knew that if I dived deep enough, the bullets would lose their killing velocity. I heard, or sensed, another explosive blast. My left arm was useless. I kept diving, down and out into deeper, blacker water . . .

Coast Salish investigator Silas Seaweed is back in another suspenseful page-turner. What begins as a missing-person investigation takes …

Containing inviting descriptions of fifty-four of Alberta's best tea houses, their specialties, special teas, foods, ambience and giftware, Tea Time in Alberta: 55 Places to Discover Your Favourite Tea is an indispensable companion for locals and tourists, city-dwellers and inveterate travellers alike. Besides detailed descriptions, the book contai …

As entertaining as it is practical, Fire Hall Cooking with Jeff the Chef features tried-and-true recipes from some of the country's greatest unheralded chefs: firefighters.

This eclectic collection grew from veteran firefighter Jeff Derraugh's experience cooking for ravenous fire crews, who demand that each meal be amply portioned, deliciously dec …

Down-to-earth, easy-to-prepare, inexpensive recipes for home cooking are at the heart of this cookbook inspired by foods from the garden. Ingredients can be purchased locally through farmers' markets (or grocery stores), but if you want to grow your own, this book tells you how.

Written by the same people who brought you Gardening Under the Arch, Co …

Jane Priddle, a proper young Englishwoman, has lived a sheltered, genteel life. In 1897, she is offered a life-changing opportunity: she will travel to Canada's northwest frontier to search for young Billie Thomm.

Surviving in the gutters of London, England, Billie had acquired the cunning of someone twice his 15 years, but a moment of desperation a …

In May 1936, George Dalziel flew far up the Nahanni River to check on Bill Eppler and Joe Mulholland, who were working one of his traplines. He found their cabin burned to the ground and no sign of them anywhere. What had happened to the healthy young men? Had there been an accident, or was a killer on the loose?

Dalziel, known as The Flying Trapper …

Reliving the adventures of past explorers.

Trail to the Interior is R. M. Patterson's rich account of exploration and personal adventure in the Cassiar district of British Columbia. The trail is the historic track from Wrangell, Alaska, along the Stikine and Dease rivers and across the height of the land into the valleys of the Liard and the Macken …

Timeless tales about wilderness living.

Eric Collier's riveting recollections about the 26 years that he, his wife Lillian and son Veasy spent homesteading in the isolated Chilcotin wilderness made for an international bestseller and one of the most famous books ever written about British Columbia.

In the early 1930s, Collier and his family moved t …

In her best-selling first book, Home: Tales of a Heritage Farm (2005), Anny Scoones introduced readers to historic Glamorgan Farm. In Home and Away, Anny presents more stories about the joys and sorrows, excitements and mishaps and also takes readers farther afield, sharing with them her travels to other parts of Canada, to New York and to such pla …

Around One More Point is a journal sketchbook of writings, photographs and drawings that capture the adventures of B.C. artist and paddler Mary Gazetas, who has journeyed with family and friends on the west coast of Vancouver Island, the Inside Passage and Haida Gwaii for almost 25 years.

This work, with its powerful visual imagery, includes storie …

Finalist for the 2007 BC Book Prizes' Bill Duthie Booksellers' Choice Award

Statistics say that one in 10 women has no intention of taking the plunge into motherhood. Nobody's Mother is a collection of stories by women who have already made this choice.

From introspective to humorous to rabble-rousing, these are personal stories that are well and ho …

On September 23, 1994, an unusual rescue operation took place in the chilly waters off Telegraph Cove, a tiny, picturesque village perched on Vancouver Island’s north coast. It was not stranded hikers or fishermen who needed help, but a large humpback whale, which had become hopelessly entangled in a rope that had fallen off a fishing boat.

The r …

Keeping the peace in turn-of-the-century B.C.

Murderers, thieves and drunks tested the will of Superintendent Fred Hussey, the B.C. Provincial Police officer appointed to keep the peace in rough-and-tumble, turn-of-the-century B.C. But in his action-packed and often risky career, he always relied on the power of reason rather than force to set thin …

Adventures on wild waters

In Finlay's River, R. M. Patterson, whose style was described by noted author Bruce Hutchison as a a mixture between Thoreau and Jack London, tells the story of his 1949 trip up this wild river in remote northern British Columbia. Patterson uses his own journey as a framework to recount the adventures of explorers who went …

The first real look at the Canadian West

Harmon's Journal—the first published English-language journal written in B.C.-is a lively, engaging story that, unlike other early journals, captures the rough-and-tumble life of a fur trader and explorer in the western Canada of 200 years ago. Harmon's descriptions of the cultures and customs of the peopl …