You are invited to the book launch party of
Seven Ravens: Two summers in a life by the sea
by Lesley Choyce
November 6, 2009 at 6 - 8pm. The Company House, 2202 Gottingen St., Halifax.
If Eat, Pray, Love had been written by a 50-year-old male surfer from Nova Scotia, it would be Lesley Choyce's Seven Ravens: Two summers in a life by the sea. While Choyce doesn't journey to Italy, India and Bali in search of emotional healing and spiritual growth (though he would probably be happy to do so), his book is also a journey of self-discovery. But instead of leaving everything behind and visiting exotic locales, Choyce takes his pen, his writer's ability to observe and some unexpected literary companions into the wilderness that surrounds his Lawrencetown Beach home to find healing.
Seven Ravens is filled with luminous descriptions of the natural beauties of Nova Scotia, humorous stories of saving orphaned animals with his daughter and moving accounts of Choyce's struggle with depression. There is no self-pity in this book, only honesty, love of nature and a willingness to work through problems in the most human way possible.
Seven Ravens: Two summers in a life by the sea is a book that readers will enjoy, and turn to again and again whenever they are bewildered by life
LESLEY CHOYCE is the author of 70 books for adults, teens and children. He has taught at Dalhousie University for the past 25 years and is the publisher of Pottersfield Press. Lesley surfs year-round in the North Atlantic and is considered the father of transcendental wood-splitting. He lives in a 200-year-old farmhouse at Lawrencetown Beach overlooking the ocean. He also hosts a nationally syndicated TV talk show on BookTelevision. His novel The Republic of Nothing is currently being developed as a feature-length movie.
"Choyce's writing reveals an engagement with both the physical world and the literary one. It is a privilege to be invited on a journey with such an inquisitive and sensitive mind." -Candace Fertile, Quill and Quire
WOLSAK AND WYNN PUBLISHERS LTD. Contact: Noelle Allen noelle.allen@wolsakandwynn.ca Tel: 905-972-9885
Media inquiries: Peggy Walt, pwalt@eastlink.ca, (902) 422-5403
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Friday, September 18, 2009
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Nova Scotia: Visions of the Future
Edited by Lesley Choyce
Nonfiction: Nova Scotia, Energy, Politics, the Future
192 pages, $19.95, 6" x 9" Paperback
ISBN-13: 978-1-897426-07-4
Available in May 2009
Pottersfield Press || Chapters || Amazon
In the spring of 2009, Pottersfield will launch this most insightful book that may set in motion some serious action that can help Nova Scotia live up to its full future potential. The writing is personal, reflective, proactive and thoroughly captivating by more than 30 contributors from many diverse fields of expertise.
In the summer of 2008, Pottersfield publisher Lesley Choyce sent a letter to a select and varied list of Nova Scotians asking them to contribute to a book about this province's future. He invited some of the best minds (and hearts) around the province to present their vision of this possible province of the future. Absolutely anything goes.
Two things prompted this grandiose plan. First, Choyce became a grandfather in May. His daughter Pamela had a boy - Aidan, whose arrival made Choyce think about the world he will inherit and what he will see and experience in his lifetime. Second, while Choyce was away in Yellowknife in June, a forest fire nearly took his house. The flames were not exactly licking the door, but it was headed its way with a strong north wind and a lot of fuel in the form of forests ravaged by Hurricane Juan and clear-cutting. When he got home, he went hiking up into the charred land several times. Once the sadness wore off, he started thinking about renewal... and about the future.
That's when he decided to pull this book together. He invited many Nova Scotians to write anything they wanted to, hoping contriutors would cover environment, technology, immigration, social aspects, urban life, rural life, energy, politics, government, family, economics, forests, the ocean and much more. The bolder the vision, the better. Stories and personal aspects were okay. Controversial ideas were fine. Which future? Anything beyond ten years and up to a thousand.
Some of the contributing writers include Marq deVilliers, Peggy Hope-Simpson, Richard Zurawski, Premier Rodney MacDonald, Budge Wilson, Alan Wilson, Dr. Richard Goldbloom, Carol Bruneau, Tom Gallant, Geoff Regan, Sunyata Choyce, Neal Livingston, Barb Stegemann, Bill Carr, Bob Howse, Ralph Martin, and Stephen Clare among others.
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Peggy's Cove: The Amazing History of a Coastal Village
Nonfiction: Nova Scotia History, The Maritimes
146 pages, $15.95, 6"x9" Paperback (Includes photographs)
ISBN-13: 978-1-897426-00-5
ISBN-10: 1-897426-00-3
Available in July 2008
Here is the complete history of the famous cove and the unique village that hosts thousands of visitors each year. The story begins with the formation of the rocks along these shores and the impact of the glaciers. The Mi'kmaq were the first to live here in the summers, harvesting the
riches of the sea. A land grant in 1811 brought the first hardy settlers, who built homes and wharves and discovered that the sea could provide bounty but was also a source of great danger.
The story includes the origin of the name, Peggy's Cove, and details about the everyday life of nineteenth-century families living here. A history of the famous lighthouse is included and there are excerpts from many of the famous and not-so-famous visitors who have written
about the Cove through two centuries.
The author explores the most damaging storms, the shipwrecks, the reports of sea monsters and other strange phenomena. Fishing was always a source of income, but it changed over the years. At times the fish prices were so low it was not worth the effort and, in recent years, dramatic changes to the ocean have seen the collapse of several important species of fish.
In the twentieth century, Peggy's Cove attracted artists, writers and ultimately thousands of tourists. Sculptor William de Garthe made his home here and created his monument to the coastal fishermen out of the sheer granite outcropping in his backyard. In 1998, Swissair Flight
111 crashed off the shores of Peggy's Cove and the community opened its doors to the world in an effort to provide support for the rescue workers and the families of the victims. From the earliest days to the present, the story of Peggy's Cove has been a tale of natural wonder and
human endurance.
Lesley Choyce lives at Lawrencetown Beach and is the author of 65 books including
Nova Scotia: Shaped By The Sea and The Coasts of Canada, a history of the country's shorelines. He has also edited Nova Scotia: A Traveller's Companion.
The Book of Michael
Red Deer Press
Juvenile Fiction/Social Issues/Self-Esteem & Self-Reliance
Ages 16+ • 224 pages • 5 1/4 x 7 1/4"
ISBN 0–88995–417–8 paper • CDN 12.95 • USA 12.95
Michael Grove was sixteen years old when he was convicted for the murder of Lisa Conroy, the girlfriend he loved very much. The circumstances surrounding her final hours attract considerable media attention, especially because Michael and Lisa had sex just prior to her death. A public outcry against light penalties for young offenders ensures Michael is tried as an adult; he receives a harsh and severe penalty. Six months into his imprisonment, the true murderer confesses. Michael is released but quickly finds that the stigma of imprisonment and the (wrongful) rap for murder is not an easy thing to escape out on the streets.
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
White Pine Award Nomination for The End Of The World As We Know It
Lesley's Young Adult novel "The End of the World As We Know It" has been nominated for a 2008 White Pine Award.
Click here for more information about this prestigious award.
"Author Lesley Choyce has filled his latest book with quirky yet complex characters, and his adept portrayal of one teen's inner struggles - struggles that are not fuelled by extreme poverty, abuse, or neglect or any other external provocations - is at once profound and utterly realistic. Carson's story of subtle growth and quiet transformation will resonate with a wide range off readers. It is a beautifully honest book tinged with sadness, but ultimately filled with optimism and hope."
-- Atlantic Books Today (Halifax)
Book Description
"I hate the world and everything in it. And that includes me."
Asked to write something for English class that expresses who he really is, 16-year-old Carson takes pleasure in blistering the page with hate for everything in his life. Stuck in a private school for kids who have repeatedly flunked out elsewhere, Carson knows he's got nowhere lower to sink to. "Flunk Out Academy" is the last resort for Carson and his classmates, in a small town where its deeply troubled students are decidedly unwelcome.
Then Carson meets someone who is even less optimistic than he. Christine struggles to get by, living in a trailer by herself, abandoned by her mother and father, so desperate that she has become almost immune to the pain and loneliness.
Confronted by her deep sadness, Carson starts to care for her and she for him. Once focused on someone other than himself, he begins to notice the world around him and realize that there is beauty as well as hopelessness, love as well as hate. Together the two teenagers struggle to work out how they are going to live in an imperfect world. There are no easy happy endings, but somehow the journey eventually makes the pain worthwhile.- Reading level: Ages 9-12
- Paperback: 224 pages
- Publisher: Red Deer Press; 1 edition (May 31, 2007)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0889953791
- ISBN-13: 978-0889953796
If you like, you can order your copy from many online and bricks & mortar book sellers. Here are a few links for your convenience:
Chapters.ca || Amazon.com
Friday, November 16, 2007
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
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