New Release Books by Farley Mowat

The popular sequel to his award-winning Lost in the Barrens, this is Farley Mowat’s suspense-filled story of how Awasin, Jamie and Peetryuk, three adventure-prone boys, stumble upon a cache of Viking relics in an ancient tomb somewhere in the north of Canada. Packed with excitement and with little-known information about the customs of Viking explorers, this story of survival portrays the bond of youthful friendship and the wonders of a virtually unexplored land.

"First published by The Curtis Publishing Company in 1957"--Title page verso.

The story of an astonishing band of Canadian soldiers and their part in the Allied victory in Italy. The Hastings and Prince Edward Regiment (the Hasty Ps) was Canada’s most decorated regiment in the Second World War, winning thirty-one battle honours. Famed for their role in the Allied invasion of Sicily and the conquest of Italy, for six years the members of the regiment suffered brutal conditions, fighting bravely in the face of fierce opposition from the enemy, and ultimately triumphing. In The Regiment (originally published in 1955), Farley Mowat, famed Canadian fiction writer and regiment member, tells the story of the Hasty Ps, from their recruitment in September 1939 until the end of the war. Mowat was a second lieutenant and platoon leader with the regiment, and writes movingly of the great suffering his fellow soldiers endured, their bravery in battle, and the lasting friendships he forged as a member of the group.

"First published in Canada in 1969 by McClelland and Stewart Limited, Toronto/Montreal"--Copyright pages.

The follow-up to And No Birds Sang, Farley Mowat’s memoir My Father’s Son charts the course of a family relationship in the midst of extreme trial. Taking place during Mowat’s years in the Italian Campaign, the memoir is mostly told through original letters between Mowat and his mother, Helen, and his father, Angus, a World War I veteran and librarian. Written between 1943 and 1945, the correspondence depicts the coming of age of a young writer in the midst of war, and presents a sensitive and thoughtful reflection of the chaos and occasional comedy of wartime. First published in 1992, Douglas & McIntyre is pleased to add My Father’s Son to the Farley Mowat Library series, which includes the other recently re-released titles Sea of Slaughter, People of the Deer, A Whale for the Killing, And No Birds Sang, Born Naked and The Snow Walker.

This international bestseller that changed the way we look at wolves “opens new horizons in understanding animal nature and intelligence” (Newsday). In 1948, Farley Mowat landed in the far north of Manitoba, Canada, a young biologist sent to investigate the region’s dwindling population of caribou. Many people thought that the caribous’ conspicuous decline had been caused by the tundra’s most notorious predator: the wolf. Alone among the howling canine packs, Mowat expected to find the bloodthirsty beasts of popular conception. Instead, over the course of a summer spent observing the powerful animals, Mowat discovered an animal species with a remarkable capacity for loyalty, virtue, and playfulness. Praised for its humor and engrossing narrative, Never Cry Wolf describes a group of wolves whose interactions and behaviors seem strikingly similar to our own. Mowat humanizes these animals that have long been demonized, turning the widespread narrative of the “savage wolf” on its head and inspiring many governments to enact protective legislation for the North’s most mysterious creature.

Farley Mowat''s outrageous memoir begins with his unlikely conception in a canoe and continues to his boyhood fascination with creatures of the natural world and on to his youthful rambles and adventures. To his immense pleasure and his parents'' dismay, he adopted various beasts (whom he affectionately calls "The Others") as roommates. In this boyhood memoir, he recounts the exploits of this second family, who have been the subjects of many of his beloved books for young readers. This is the tale of a mischievous, immensely gifted young naturalist, recounted with the wisdom, humor and grown-up perspective of a very talented writer.

Here is a Siberia unheard of in the West. Once the most remote place of exile in all of Russia, Mowat describes it as a burgeoning land of opportunity and growth. Granted extraordinary freedom to visit places rarely seen by any westerner since 1917, Farley Mowat and his wife, Claire, travelled more than 29,000 miles over mountains, steppes, taiga and tundra to meet the people who have chosen to make Siberia their home and livelihood. With his classic exuberance and wit, Mowat brings to life a place and a people who share the top of the world with us – their hopes and aspirations, their humour, and their dedication to the dramatic awakening of Sibir, the Sleeping land.

Turned away from the Royal Canadian Air Force for his apparent youth and frailty, Farley Mowat joined the infantry in 1940. The young second lieutenant soon earned the trust of the soldiers under his command, and was known to bend army rules to secure a stout drink, or find warm - if non-regulation - clothing. But when Mowat and his regiment engaged with elite German forces in the mountains of Sicily, the optimism of their early days as soldiers was replaced by despair. With a naturalist''s eyes and ears, Mowat takes in the full dark depths of war - and his moving account of military service, and the friends he left behind, is also a plea for peace. It is one of the most searing and unforgettable World War II memoirs from any Canadian.

A compelling true story of the author''s desperate attempts to save an eighty-ton fin whale trapped in a Newfoundland lagoon. As he tries to persuade wildlife authorities and the Canadian press to help him in his quest, he must fend off curious and uncaring locals, who want to harvest the helpless whale for sport. As it tells one of Mowat''s most personal and moving stories, this book becomes an impassioned plea to save a species that seems doomed to extinction. A classic nature book now back in print. In the 1960s, Farley Mowat was living in the tiny fishing community of Burgeo on the southwest coast of Newfoundland. When an 80-ton fin whale became trapped in a nearby saltwater lagoon, Mowat rejoiced: here was the first chance to study at close range one of the most magnificent animals in creation. Some local villagers thought otherwise, blasting the whale with rifle fire and hacking open her back with a motorboat propeller. Mowat appealed desperately to the authorities, but it was too late-ravaged by an infection resulting from her massive wounds, the whale died. A plea for the end of commercial hunting of the whale, this moving account blends all the tension of the life-and-death struggle for one animal''s survival with the drama of man''s wanton destruction of life-bearing creatures and the environment itself.

The northeastern seaboard of Canada and the United States, extending from Labrador to Cape Cod, was the first region of North America to suffer from human exploitation. Farley Mowat informs extensive historical and biological research with his direct experience living in and observing this region. When it was first published more than 20 years ago, Sea of Slaughter served as a catalyst for environment reform, raising awareness of the decline and destruction of marine and coastal species. Today, it remains a prescient environmental classic, serving, now as ever, as a haunting reminder of the impact of human interest on the natural world.

Following Farley Mowat’s bestselling memoir, Otherwise, the literary lion returns with an unexpected triumph. Eastern Passage is a new and captivating piece of the puzzle of Farley Mowat’s life: the years from his return from the north in the late 1940s to his discovery of Newfoundland and his love affair with the sea in the 1950s. This was a time in which he wrote his first books and weathered his first storms of controversy, a time when he was discovering himself through experiences that, as he writes, "go to the heart of who and what I was" during his formative years as a writer and activist. In the 1950s, with his career taking off but his first marriage troubled, Farley Mowat buys a piece of land northwest of Toronto and attempts to settle down. His accounts of building his home are by turns hilarious and affecting, while the insights into his early work and his relationship with his publishers offer a rare glimpse into the inner workings of a writer’s career. But in the end, his restless soul could not be pinned to one place, and when his father offered him a chance to sail down the St. Lawrence, he jumped at it, not realizing that his journey would bring him face to face with one of Canada’s more shocking secrets – one most of us still don’t know today. This horrific incident, recalling as it did the lingering aftermath of war, and from which it took the area decades to recover, would forge the final tempering of Mowat as the activist we know today. Eastern Passage is a funny, astute, and moving book that reveals that there is more yet to this fascinating and beloved figure than we think we know.

In this bestseller, Farley Mowat challenges the conventional notion that the Vikings were the first Europeans to reach North America, offering an unforgettable portrait of the Albans, a race originating from the island now known as Britain. Battered by repeated invasions from their aggressive neighbors—Celt, Roman, and Norse—the Albans fled west. Their search for safety, and for the massive walrus herds on which their survival depended, eventually took them to the land now known as Newfoundland and Labrador. Skillfully weaving together clues gathered from forty years of research, Mowat presents a fascinating account of a forgotten history.

A Canadian icon gives us his final book, a memoir of the events that shaped this beloved writer and activist. Farley Mowat has been beguiling readers for fifty years now, creating a body of writing that has thrilled two generations, selling literally millions of copies in the process. In looking back over his accomplishments, we are reminded of his groundbreaking work: He single-handedly began the rehabilitation of the wolf with Never Cry Wolf. He was the first to bring advocacy activism on behalf of the Inuit and their northern lands with People of the Deer and The Desperate People. And his was the first populist voice raised in defense of the environment and of the creatures with whom we share our world, the ones he has always called The Others. Otherwise is a memoir of the years between 1937 and the autumn of 1948 that tells the story of the events that forged the writer and activist. His was an innocent childhood, spent free of normal strictures, and largely in the company of an assortment of dogs, owls, squirrels, snakes, rabbits, and other wildlife. From this, he was catapulted into wartime service, as anxious as any other young man of his generation to get to Europe and the fighting. The carnage of the Italian campaign shattered his faith in humanity forever, and he returned home unable and unwilling to fit into post-war Canadian life. Desperate, he accepted a stint on a scientific collecting expedition to the Barrengrounds. There in the bleak but beautiful landscape he finds his purpose — first with the wolves and then with the indomitable but desperately starving Ihalmiut. Out of these experiences come his first pitched battles with an ignorant and uncaring federal bureaucracy as he tries to get aid for the famine-stricken Inuit. And out of these experiences, too, come his first books. Otherwise goes to the heart of who and what Farley Mowat is, a wondrous final achievement from a true titan.

Mowat writes passionately of the bonds between a traditional people and the harsh world they inhabit, compiling a collection of stories that gives voice to a vanishing existence lived in the vast Arctic wilderness. The mythic Snow Walker traverses a place foreign to modern man -- a landscape where survival is simultaneously brutal and beautiful; a way of life embodied by fate, superstition and tribal connection; and a world where the ancestors wield an inexplicable magic. A story from this collection titled "Walk Well, My Brother" was adapted in 2003 for the acclaimed Canadian film titled The Snow Walker. First published in 1975, Douglas & McIntyre is pleased to add The Snow Walker to the Farley Mowat Library series, which includes the other recently re-released titles Sea of Slaughter, People of the Deer, A Whale For the Killing, And No Birds Sang and Born Naked.

Ideal for fans of Master a Million and Blue Latitudes Chronicles Mowat’s hazardous 1966 journey across northern Canada A must-have for wilderness lovers Farley Mowat is a world-renowned author. More than 17 million of his books have sold, and the New York Times calls him a “master storyteller.” In High Latitudes, Farley Mowat hoped to write a book that would let northern people speak for themselves and would expose the false view of the North as “a bloody great wasteland” with no people in it. That perspective led to resource developers abusing the land however they chose. For several reasons that Mowat explains, he did not write that book when he originally wanted to. At long last, here it is. Within its pages are the original conversations that Mowat recorded during his journey. Mowat is a natural and a master storyteller, which old fans will remember and new fans will quickly learn. In old-fashioned Mowat style, the legendary writer shares a glorious narrative filled with breathtaking nature writing, larger-than-life characters, suspenseful storytelling, pitiless rage, ferocious humor, compassionate concern, and iconoclastic insights. In her foreword, Margaret Atwood writes, “High Latitudes gives us, with passion and insight, a vertical section of time past—the time that preceded our present. The choices that were made then affect our now, just as the choices we make now will determine the future…”

Originally titled Virunga, this is the story of Dian Fossey, the mountain gorillas’ greatest champion and martyr. Based on Fossey’s personal papers and on interviews with her colleagues, friends, and enemies, Gorillas in the Mist reveals one woman’s passion for life — and the creatures who share it with us.

In 1886, the Ihalmiut of northern Canada numbered 7,000 souls; by 1946, when 25-year-old Farley Mowat travelled to the Arctic, their population had dwindled to only 40. Living among them, he observed the millennia-old migration of the caribou and endured the bleak winters, food shortages and continual, devastating intrusions of interlopers bent on exploiting the Arctic. In this seminal book, Mowat details a genocide wrought by misunderstanding and neglect. Debated long after its publication, this powerful story of the Ihalmiut continues to haunt the Canadian conscience.

In 1957, Farley Mowat shipped out aboard one of Newfoundland’s famous coastal steamers, tramping from outport to outport along the southwest coast. The indomitable spirit of the people and the bleak beauty of the landscape would lure him back again and again over the years. In the process of falling in love with a people and a place, Mowat also met the woman who would be the great love of his life. A stunningly beautiful and talented young artist, Claire Wheeler insouciantly climbed aboard Farley’s beloved but jinxed schooner as it lay on the St. Pierre docks, once again in a cradle for repairs, and changed both their lives forever. This is the story of that love affair, of summers spent sailing the Newfoundland coast, and of their decision to start their life together in Burgeo, one of the province’s last remaining outports. It is also an unforgettable portrait of the last of the outport people and a way of life that had survived for centuries but was now passing forever. Affectionate, unsentimental, this is a burnished gem from an undiminished talent. I was inside my vessel painting the cabin when I heard the sounds of a scuffle nearby. I poked my head out the companionway in time to see a lithesome young woman swarming up the ladder which leaned against Happy Adventure’s flank. Whining expectantly, the shipyard dog was endeavouring to follow this attractive stranger. I could see why. As slim and graceful as a ballet dancer (which, I would later learn, was one of her avocations), she appeared to be wearing a gleaming golden helmet (her own smoothly bobbed head of hair) and was as radiantly lovely as any Saxon goddess. I invited her aboard, while pushing the dog down the ladder. “That’s only Blanche,” I reassured my visitor. “He won’t bite. He’s just, uh . . . being friendly.” “That’s nice to know,” she said sweetly. Then she smiled . . . and I was lost. –From Bay of Spirits

Awasin, a Cree Indian boy, and Jamie, a Canadian orphan living with his uncle, the trapper Angus Macnair, are enchanted by the magic of the great Arctic wastes. They set out on an adventure that proves longer and more dangerous than they could have imagined. Drawing on his knowledge of the ways of the wilderness and the implacable northern elements, Farley Mowat has created a memorable tale of daring and adventure. When first published in 1956, Lost in the Barrens won the Governor-General’s Award for Juvenile Literature, the Book-of-the-Year Medal of the Canadian Association of Children’s Librarians and the Boys’ Club of America Junior Book Award.

The Black Joke is a rousing sea story in the tradition of the great classic pirate tales. The time is the 1930s. The loot is bootleg liquor, not pirate gold. And the ship is the Black Joke, the speediest, nimblest craft on the Newfoundland coast—Jonathon Spence, owner and master. An unwelcome passenger enmeshes the boat and her crew (young Peter and Kye) in danger and near destruction . . . until the fiercely independent people of the island of Miquelon are caught up in the fate of the Black Joke and the cargo aboard her.

Every child needs to have a pet. No one could argue with that. But what happens when your pet is an owl, and your owl is terrorizing the neighbourhood? In Farley Mowat’s exciting children’s story, a young boy’s pet menagerie – which includes crows, magpies, gophers and a dog – grows out of control with the addition of two cantankerous pet owls. The story of how Wol and Weeps turn the whole town upside down is warm, funny, and bursting with adventure and suspense.