Books published by Goose Lane Editions

JOANNE SOPER-COOK is such a spellbinding storyteller that she can lead her willing captives anywhere. In her new story collection "The Opium Lady, she draws her readers into the far corners of human yearning. "The Opium Lady resembles an old family snapshot album. A photograph heads each story, and each freezes a defining moment in a different person's life. The teller of the tales is the person guiding the reader through the album. Who is this guide? How down he or she know the secrets of so many people? Some live in Maryland, some live in the Newfoundland outport of Guernsey, and some lives in other places. They're a mixed lot--rich and poor, men, women, and children, the scandalizers and the scandalized, housewives and farmers, tradesmen, charlatans, and ne'er-do-wells. The Opium Lady herself is an "actress" in vaudeville, a fan-dancer, really, horrified to discover that her escort has taken her to a snake-handling church. Various members of this motley cast pop up in the stories of others. They all seem to be connected, but how? It's clear that the pieces will fit together, but Soper-Cook hands over the missing link only at the very end. Newfoundland author JOANNE SOPER-COOK was born in Hant's Harbour and now lives in St. John's. She is the author of three novels, most recently the highly acclaimed "Waterborne.

Germain Laski, trained in herbal medicine by his Mi'kmaw family, found adventure in the American medicine shows of the 1880s. He performed as Doctor Lonecloud in Healey and Bigelow's Kickapoo Indian Medicine Company. Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, and his own Kiowa Medicine Show, for which he made the medicines. After he returned to Nova Scotia, Lonecloud worked as a guide and sold his herbal remedies. During his twenty-year friendship with Harry Piers, curator of the Nova Scotia Provincial Museum, he collected artefacts and specimens for the museum and shared his knowledge of Mi'kmaw culture. Between 1923 and 1929, he gave interviews to journalist Clara Dennis. In the 1990s, these interviews, recorded in Dennis's notebooks, came to the attention of Ruth Holmes Whitehead. Tracking Doctor Lonecloud includes Lonecloud's life story in his own words -- the earliest known Mi'kmaw autobiography. This memoir, painstakingly transcribed by Whitehead and augmented by her research, reveals both the showman and the carrier of Mi'kmaw legends.

Thirteen provocative stories offer lots of sex, a bit of violence, and a wickedly clever exploration of human nature. Backed into emotional corners, Darryl Whetter's men are creatures of feckless energy and intermittent idealism. Their fragile relationships break up easily, and men who don't retreat into pot-fuelled lethargy revert to ambitious self-destruction. From the classroom to the Laundromat, from Paris to the mosquito-infested Ontario bush, Whetter dissects a portion of human experience that has never been so deftly explored.

In A Good Enough Life, twelve terminally ill people speak about life in the face of impending death. Susan Gabori interviewed men and women, ranging in age from thirty-three to seventy-eight, who were suffering from cancer, ALS, or AIDS. They willingly confided in Gabori, knowing that talking would cleanse them and clarify their thoughts. All answered questions they had never been asked before, and many revealed things they had never told anyone else for fear of not being understood. Each self-portrait in A Good Enough Life is filled with honesty and the joy of discovery in the midst of struggles and hardship. Together, they offer a priceless gift that will be different for everyone: the opportunity to learn what we need to learn and find clues to help us on our own journey.

Canadian journalist and political insider Dalton Camp left behind a powerful legacy, ranging from books to essays, from radio broadcasts to newspaper columns. To celebrate his career and continue his passionate interest in politics, public engagement, and the practice of journalism, the Dalton Camp Lecture is held each year at St. Thomas University and broadcast on Ideas on CBC Radio. Here, for the first time, gathered together in one remarkable compilation, are the Dalton Camp lectures in journalism. Beginning with journalist and social activist June Callwood's inaugural address, "The Best Game in Town," and ending with New York Times business, media, and culture critic David Carr's "The Next Big Thing Has Finally Arrived," the book centres on the journalist's dilemma: how to find the stories that need to be told and the words that can best be used to tell them. Featuring the lectures of Callwood and Carr as well as contributions by Nahlah Ayed, Sue Gardner, Chantal Hébert, Naomi Klein, Roy MacGregor, Stephanie Nolen, Neil Reynolds, Joe Schlesinger, and Ken Whyte, The Next Big Thing forecasts the future of journalism and its relationship to democracy and the free expression of ideas.

The indispensable companion for a Dieppe, Moncton, or Riverview walkabout, Trails of Greater Moncton provides trail descriptions, maps, photographs, and fascinating details about plants, animals, historic sites, and other landmarks. Most of the 25 trails are suitable for anyone, but a few will challenge the adventurous. Well-groomed multi-use trails invite cyclists as well as people pushing strollers or using wheelchairs, while forest paths beckon wanderers on foot. The Trans Canada Trail winds along the Petitcodiac River. In the parks, groomed trails, woods roads, and rugged footpaths lead hikers instantly from city streets into wild nature.

Amazing Medical Stories explores medicine's strange borderlands with twenty true tales of healers and frauds, inventors and quacks, heroism and desperation. An American millionaire implants goat testicles in his patients to restore flagging manhood. An identity thief becomes a famous Royal Canadian Navy surgeon. A courageous black doctor performs the first successful heart operation. A clergyman stops a diphtheria epidemic, and Alexander Graham Bell develops life-saving inventions at his home in Cape Breton. From the brain tumour of Fortress Louisbourg's would-be saviour to the valour of the medical examiner who managed the horrific aftermath of the Swissair Flight 111 crash, these tales are guaranteed to shock, amuse, and inspire. In Amazing Medical Stories, George Burden and Dorothy Grant prove, once again, that truth is stranger than fiction.

Like a genuine Down-East Christmas, An Orange from Portugal is tangy and delicious. Novelty spices tradition, shadows make joy more precious, and laughter is everywhere. Here are stories to savour. Hugh MacLennan's waif hopes Santa will bring him a real orange from Portugal, Alden Nowlan and Harry Bruce give very different versions of the magical transformations in the barn on Christmas Eve, and Rhoda Graser recalls Jewish children hanging up their stockings. Wilfred Grenfell, Bernice Morgan, and Wayne Johnston host a century of parties. Offerings by Alistair MacLeod and David Adams Richards, Joan Clark, and Lisa Moore, Milton Acorn and Lynn Davies make An Orange from Portugal a rare Christmas feast.

Douglas Lochhead's poetry overflows with energy. Sharp observation of detail anchors his passionate sense of place, subtle irony and masterful form barely contain his uncompromising honesty, and his command of the poet's craft guides his attacks on the boundaries of meaning. In Weathers, more than ever before, he transmutes suffering and loss into a celebration of life and love. Douglas Lochhead is one of Canada's most distinguished men of letters, and Weathers presents choice selections from his work since 1985. In shaping this volume, he collaborated with David Creelman, who teaches Atlantic literature at the University of New Brunswick, Saint John. This collection shows the poet at the apex of his fifty-year writing career.

In "Tent of Blue," Rachael Preston alternates between the dying days of English music hall and Vancouver in 1952 to tell the stories of Yvonne and her son Anton. Both are imprisoned, Yvonne by emotional ties to her abusive mother and, later, to a brutal impresario, and Anton by his disability and his mother's misery."Tent of Blue" is a story of captivity and escape, of discovering the strength to fight back against the world and seize freedom.

The Atlantic Coast is one of the world's most exciting new destinations for sea kayakers. In Paddling in Paradise, Alison Hughes shares her passion for a sport that, in these waters, offers both serenity and the thrill of a lifetime. Off the shores of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland, she carries readers along on glorious multi-day trips. Some are beautiful nature paddles that beginners will dream about for the rest of their lives, while others will test experienced sea kayakers and their guides. With photos, maps, and travel information, Paddling in Paradise is pure enchantment for adventurers and dreamers alike.

Conservation et restauration de la maisonette de l'artiste populaire la plus aimée du Canada. Maud Lewis a peint l'intérieur de sa minuscule maison d'une seule pièce -- pas seulement les murs, mais aussi l'intérieur et l'extérieur des portes, les cadres de fenêtres, les boîtes à pain, le petit escalier menant au grenier, le poêle à bois, bref tout ce qu'elle avait sous la main. Sa demeure était un plaisir à regarder. Quatorze an après la mort de Maud, l'Art Gallery of Nova Scotia a fait l'acquisition de sa maison peinte, alors bien connue mais en très mauvais état. La stabilisation et la restauration de ce préceiux artefact ont posé un défi de taille aux conservateurs. En 1998, la maison a été installée intacte, avec son mobilier, son matérial de peinture et tout ce que l'artiste y avait accumulé, dans la salle Scotiabank Maud Lewis, spécialement aménagée pour elle.

Brennen Siding, a hamlet on a tributary of the famous Miramichi River, is home to an unforgettable crew -- teenagers Shadrack Nash and Dryfly Ramsey and their families, friends, and neighbours. Hilda Porter, Shad's elderly employer, treasures the story of Trucanini, the last Tasmanian, while the invasion of TV, Elvis, and rich American salmon fishermen influences everything, including Shad and Dry's escapades. Are they, like Hilda and Trucanini, the last of their kind? The Last Tasmanian is the second volume in the humorous yet poignant Brennen Siding Trilogy.

Mary Pratt, famous for her luminous paintings, is also a lifelong writer. From childhood, she has kept journals and written short reflections on any topic that crossed her mind. Since the 1980s, she has given addresses and published essays in periodicals as diverse as The Globe and Mail and Glass Gazette. Mary Pratt: A Personal Calligraphy features ten speeches and published articles, along with thirty-five essays and reflections that, until now, remained hidden in her journals. Some of the journal entries are on topical matters such as Joey Smallwood's funeral and the fiftieth anniversary of Newfoundland's Confederation with Canada. Others tell more personal stories of growing up in Fredericton, of juggling painting and motherhood in Salmonier, Newfoundland, of a winter's sojourn in Vancouver, of the natural rhythms of her home and garden in St. John's. and, of course, Pratt reflects on the images that interest her and influence her art and on the process of painting. Like her painting, her writing is accessible yet profound. Even at its most meditative, it is incisive and original, the work of a powerful artist who both celebrates and sharply examines the stuff of daily life. Exhibitions from St. John's to Vancouver have brought Mary Pratt's paintings to the attention of a wide audience. With more than thirty colour reproductions of works from the 1990s, A Personal Calligraphy is a glimpse into Mary Pratt's creative mind.

16 Categories of Desire maps the human heart in all its passion, valour, ineptitude, and vulnerability. These eleven stories are populated by scientists and eccentrics, writers and wastrels, all looking fervently for love in its many guises. Some long for the unattainable; others struggle with the compulsion to destroy love before it�s taken from them. Occasionally scabrous, horrifically funny, intermittently appalling, and wildly erotic, the stories in 16 Categories of Desire bring to life a world in which a screen of irony may be the only defence against fear and loneliness.

Tess Corrigan seems to be living the good life. She is a popular politician, the first female Member of the Newfoundland House of Assembly. Originally from a tiny coastal village, she now lives in St. John's with her husband and their son, a hockey-mad twelve-year-old. Growing up in a religious community, Tess has suffered the shame of being the child of a bigamous marriage. She decides to track down her father, an American charmer who wed her mother without revealing that he already had a wife. Preoccupied with this quest and her work, Tess has no inkling of trouble until a revelation by an acquaintance sets into motion a series of betrayals, recriminations and admissions that shake her life to its foundations.

A ship sinks, a plane crashes, a child wanders deep into the forest -- and the world's best search-and-rescue personnel are on the spot, risking their own lives to snatch the victims from death. Among the terrifying events in Deadly Frontiers are the death of nine-year-old Andy Warburton in the woods near Halifax, the sinking of the MV Flare and the Ocean Ranger, the wreck of a Labrador search-and-rescue helicopter, an the crash of Swissair Flight 111. Veteran newsman Dean Beeby covered many of these disasters, sometimes form his reporter's desk and sometimes from the midst of the action. He reveals the heroism of rescuers determined to cheat dense forest and the raging Atlantic of their human prey. He also exposes the political heel-dragging that hinders the work of these brave men and women.

A cross-dressing writer, a beautiful young man with one blue eye and one brown, a mother crouched on the beach in her nightdress . . . JoAnne Soper-Cook's tale transcends the bounds of nature. Waterborne tells the stories of Stella Maris Goulding: the ones she broods upon, the ones she has forgotten, and the ones she will never know. Only as her mother is dying does she recognize the strange heritage passed down from her Scottish great-grandmother.

Hendrick Nellis is a Tory guerrilla at the Niagara frontier at the end of the American Revolution; he is also a redeemer of whites abducted by Indians. He kidnaps his own son, Oskar, for King George's army, and it is Oskar, haunted by dreams, who tells this ambivalent tale of war and redemption. The violent, erotic, and partly true story of The Life and Times of Captain N. trespasses into the psychic no-man's-land where the delirium of combat drives human nature into a primal frenzy.

Certifiable pushes collective ideas of the human condition -- white/black, sane/mad, Canadian/Jamaican -- into a matrix of unstereotyped experience where we manoeuvre only by dead reckoning and by the light of the word. In language guided by the creole soundscape, Mordecai's poems explore the truths hidden beneath the ideal of love, the fullness of sisterhood, and the intimate knowledge of little and big madnesses.

Penelope-Marie Lancet yearns for a child. A baby would mend her life, a baby would heal her maimed relationship with the world. A false pregnancy ignites her conviction that her child has been taken away. She tells of Penelope's obsession, her tragic history, her theft of a baby, and the fragmentation of her personality. In letters to her sister Jasmine, at least six personalities write in their different voices, at first in turn and then interrupting one another. As Jasmine arrives from Trinidad and knocks at the door of Penelope's Calgary apartment, the inner dialogues become cacophony.

Lenore Rutland is a savvy but unsophisticated singing waitress in a zany Montreal theme restaurant. Her neighbour, Reine Ducharme, an expert gardener and maman to a pair of spoiled lap dogs, has gone to jail for poisoning six fellow jury members. Lenore finds herself playing foster-maman to the unruly dogs. When she takes them to obedience school, Brioche and Montcalm are "discovered," and soon they're starring in a Titanic movie-of-the-week. Lenore achieves her own comic fame, first winning instant notoriety by accidentally embarrassing the host on the hot TV chat show Fiona!, and then shooting to stardom in an amateur musical comedy on the stage of the Centaur Theatre. In her frenetic story, romance advances and recedes, and there are laughs aplenty and plot complications galore. Overnight Sensation is the richly entertaining sequel to Colleen Curran's hilarious first novel Something Drastic and, like it, contains more than a kernel of psychological truth in its humorous core.

Glowing pyramids of succulent fruit make shopping for produce like taking a walk through the Garden of Eden. In "The Greengrocer's Kitchen: Fruit and Nuts," Pete Luckett offers 150 casual gourmet recipes based on these heavenly temptations, plus tips on almost every page for selection, storage, and preparation. Fruit eaten raw is sublime. Cooked, it's ambrosial.Pete Luckett tells how to make the most of fruit, dried fruit, and nuts, and how best to enjoy nature's treats out of hand while imagining the results of his unusual recipes. "The Greengrocer's Kitchen: Fruit and Nuts" contains recipes for savoury dishes, desserts, drinks, and snacks. Some are elegantly simple and others will challenge experienced cooks to sensuous creativity.

Letters, photographs, a program from a concert by Madame Albani, a buckskin jacket, clippings about the Bill Miner gang -- mementos found by a museum curator organizing a display about central British Columbia a century ago. Infused with the spirit clinging to these personal treasures, Anna reconstructs the life of their owner, Margaret Stuart. On the cusp of womanhood, Margaret is drawn by opposites: the Nicola Valley ranchland, the horses, and her native grandmother's traditions on one side, the luxuries sent by her American relatives an the new art of photography on the other. Anna's and Margaret's lives entwine, the past reverberates through the present, and their shared rituals and turning points create a universal pattern of beauty.

A wanderer arrives by chance on Inishbream, a rocky dot in the sea just off the west coast of Ireland. A lover of boats and a strong worker, she soon marries Sean, the young owner of her stone cottage. For a time, she does her woman's work, fishes with her husband, and walks along the shore, imagining Saint Brendan and the invisible world so real to the islanders. Through the winter, she repays Inishbream storytellers with tales of coastal British Columbia, not so very different, after all, from their own. Inishbream conjures relationships between the newcomer and her husband, between the island people, the sea, and the land, and between the coastal landscapes of reality and imagination. In the uneasy peace of partial acceptance, a young woman starts to envision her own place in the world.

A self-made woman's dramatic sweep through the turmoils of mid-century America and Europe. Jean has no plan; self-contained, imaginative, and resilient, she acts first and rationalizes later. Her specialty is moving on, choosing adventure all the way. At 17, she is ready to slip into the secret life of adults. To save a smuggler on Lake Ontario, she rows hard and keeps her mouth shut. Posing for art classes and "art" photographs in New York leads to a silent movie career in California and Paris, which in turn leads to marriage into an aristocratic family. After riots and strikes, after World War II and compromises with Vichy, after losing her family and her money, she uses a friend's leavings to remake herself as an art dealer. Old age finds Jean in a Montreal apartment, still earning her living by letting people look at her, still propelled by uncontrollable bravery. The Time of Her Life follows a strong and beautiful woman through a life permeated with drama and intrigue.