In Bittersweet Sands, Rick Ranson recounts a twenty-four-day shift at an oilsands operation undergoing a shutdown, giving us a glimpse at a world most of us only know from the evening news. Along the way, he encounters a group of engaging roughnecks, including a husband-and-wife welding crew, a petty fascist safety inspector, and the tough-as-nails secretary that keeps them all in line.

The stories that became Paddling South, Winnipeg to New Orleans by Canoe stem from a voyage a high school friend and I took in the fall of 1969. Although there was a forty year wait between voyage and publication, the book retains its accuracy because both John Van Landeghem and I kept separate journals.While I was writing the book John lent me his diary so I was able to refer to both accounts. After forty years it was a revelation to see what John actually thought of the trip and ...

Thousands of years ago an inland ocean covering Manitoba, Saskatchewan, North Dakota and Montana smashed through a mile high wall of ice and with a roar of constant thunder that could be heard for 200 miles the water exploded into the Arctic Ocean. Some scientist say that this was Noah's flood.That was then. This will happen.Freed of the crushing weight of the Everest of ice, the land is rising and slowly blocking all the rivers draining into Hudson Bay.Those lakes are...

Lucienne Dora Eugene was living the ultimate charmed and rich life. A Paris trained couturier and a governess to the royal court living in Windsor Castle England her life was almost a fairy tale. Then a Canadian Sergeant of the Guards at Windsor Castle swept Lucienne off her feet and promised a life of romance and ease if she would come to Canada and marry him.Lucienne followed her intended lover, Lorne Ranson, to Winnipeg, Canada. Where she quickly found out that she had just marr...