NOVEL SCOTIA

Available on Amazon as a trade paperback (CAN $20) and Kindle e-book (CAN $5).  419 pages including 14 pages of notes.

 

The following photos are intended to illustrate some of the locations visited by the characters. In the book only three gray-scale illustrations are present, one in each Tier.

 

 

THE VALLEY

 

 

The river had subsided by several feet and was now flowing in the opposite direction. How could it be so indifferent to the laws of nature?

The road dropped down to a tiny cove where a few fishing boats huddled.

Aside from a fantastic section carved away by the elements, the beach was smooth and level.

 They looked like knobby heaps separated by winding channels of gravel, some wide as a sidewalk, others narrow and twisty.

“They’re hard to paddle because they’re not streamlined. Whipple’s trying to grow one that’s a little easier to manage, one with a keel.”

Each 18-bushel bin contained about 2250 apples. The man with the sweet smile averaged seven or eight bins a day, more when the picking was good, thus earning him the nickname Mr. Pickquick.

Nina fell back with a gasp as it sailed over the fence and landed on the asphalt in a clatter of steel-shod hooves and a spray of sparks. It cantered a short way down the road, then stopped and looked around uncertainly.

Each pair was linked by a carved wooden yoke and moved into position at a stately pace like royalty, accompanied by the solemn jingle of bells attached to neck straps.

  

THE CITY

 

 

 The skeletal orange beasts of a container terminal, gantry cranes with their booms raised as though saluting or trumpeting.  

 

 

 

Flashing lights and jaunty tunes filled the air as people strolled about holding glasses of colourful liquids or sat on stools before flashy vending machines with names like Julius Cashier, Eel of Fortune, and You Bet Your Ass. 

 

 

He gazed up at its underbelly reticulated with girders, at the two green towers that shouldered the load of the deck, and at the graceful orange cables that swooped down and plunged into  concrete abutments, as though they were not holding up the bridge but keeping it from floating away.

He set off on a tour called Hanging Out in Halifax. It took him to the Grand Parade, the Wanderers Grounds, the Public Gardens, and a few other places where in times gone by people had danced the hempen jig.

 

 

...another battery appeared, but in much better repair. The gun emplacements were intact, and three men staggered around drunkenly on a raised proscenium, cursing and quarrelling in loud voices. Seated before them on folding chairs was a respectful audience. 

    “Thou deboshed fish.”

    “Bite him to death, I prithee.”

    “Knock a nail into his head.”

    “I will supplant some of your teeth.”

“Shakespeare-by-the-Sea,” Maps said as he and Avon backed away.

 

Trailer Park Boys was no longer being shot in HRM, but tourists were so interested in seeing the locations that Maps had developed a sheet on the subject. It included the sites of several noteworthy scenes, such as the bank that the boys tried to stick up, and where one of the characters, Mr. Lahey, somehow ended up on the roof in his underpants.

...a triumphal arch inscribed with the word Sebastopol in honour of two Nova Scotians who died in the Crimean War. Atop it was a stone lion. “That was once a well-hung cat,” Maps said, and addressed it with a ditty of his own composition.

O King of Beasts upon a throne

What happened to thy balls of stone?

Didst thou roar when nipped so cruelly

To reflect the times more truly?

To Avon, he added that it had been neutered to avoid disturbing Victorian sensibilities.

There was a dank smell in the air, and their footsteps echoed with a hollow sound accompanied by the faint rumble of traffic overhead. Soon they were wading through several inches of water and ducking to avoid pipes that hung from metal strapping. Presently a light appeared in the passage ahead and voices became audible.

FURTHER READING:

OTHER NOVELS SET IN NOVA SCOTIA

Bruce, Charles. 1954. The Channel Shore

Ibid. 1959. The Township of Time

Buckler, Ernest. 1952. The Mountain and the Valley

Choyce, Leslie. 1994. Republic of Nothing

Clarke, George Elliott. 1990. Whylah Falls

Day, Frank Parker. 1928. Rockbound

Holmes, Jeffrey. 1974. Farewell to Nova Scotia

MacLennan, Hugh. 1941. Barometer Rising

Norman, Howard. 1998. The Museum Guard

Raddall, Thomas. 1992. Hangman's Beach