Reconnecting with a special friend and unique story in Brandon MB

As an author and book publisher, I am often asked, "Where do you get your stories from?"

Sometimes, I find the stories or book subjects by researching and asking questions, the way I did when I was a freelance journalist writing for various Canadian newspapers and magazines.

Sometimes, the stories walk into my line of vision or hearing, as was the case when my daughter Lisa told me about the indomitable Dionne Warner, the seven-time cancer survivor who was about to speak at a Relay for Life rally in Regina in July 2011 (which made me think Dionne's story was worthy of a great book, which I would go on to write and publish - Never Leave Your Wingman).

Sometimes, as in the case of the book I wrote about former Royal Canadian Navy man John Hanlon of Brandon, Manitoba, the story comes to me through a friend of a friend.

In about 2011, a dear friend of mine, Dexter van Dyke, suggested that he knew of a story that his friend, Elaine Rounds of Brandon, had told him about an elderly man who did something wonderful during the Second World War. 

In November 1944, John Hanlon was a wireless operator on the HMCS Royalmount, which was docked in St. John's, Newfoundland at the time. John knew their convoy would be at sea on Christmas Day, so he and a couple crewmates walked up a hill in St. John's Harbour and cut down some evergreens. John hid those trees in the belly of his ship and pulled them out weeks later, on Christmas morning, in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean - surprising his crewmates as well as some English children who were on another ship in that convoy, coming to a safe home in Canada. John's forward-thinking made that wartime Christmas a very memorable day for many people for decades to come.

John had been telling this Christmas 1944 story to his children, grandchildren, his United Church community, and Royal Canadian Legion members at Christmastime for decades after the Second World War ended.

Elaine had told Dexter about the story. Then Dexter told me. We all knew it would make a great book. So I asked Dexter to connect me with Elaine and, thus, John Hanlon.

I met Elaine Rounds in Brandon in May 2012, based only on an introduction via Dexter. Elaine became an instant friend and we have spoken and seen each other several times in the years since then. That first day, she took me and my husband Al to the care home in which John Hanlon was a resident. John's wife Audrey told me the story while John, unable to speak at times at age 90, nuzzled in beside me and bumped my leg when the story got interesting.

Before I left John's room that day, I promised him and Audrey that I would write his special Christmas trees story before that Christmas and I would donate some money from each book to the Royal Canadian Legion (Dominion Command Poppy Trust Fund, which helps veterans and their families). John Hanlon passed away a few days after our meeting.

I fulfilled my promise and wrote The Sailor and the Christmas Trees book a couple months later in a style as though John was telling his Christmas trees story to the reader. When I phoned Audrey to read her what I had written, to make sure I had the details correct, she said, "I can hear John's voice." This brought tears to her eyes and to mine. A nonfiction writer cannot receive a bigger compliment.

I added a biography of John to the back of the book and invited artist Catherine Folnovic to illustrate the first half of the book, with family photos completing the biography. In a spur-of-the-moment decision that first day in Brandon, I had asked Al to take a photo of me with John, Audrey, and Elaine in John's small room. That photo has been a precious memory ever since.

This past weekend, I was storm-stayed in Brandon after a successful weekend at the Brandon's Big One Arts & Crafts Sale. Deciding to not take a chance on driving back to Regina in bad weather, I opted for a hotel room and I also made a phone call to Elaine Rounds to see if we could connect again. We met for supper and spent three glorious hours bringing each other up to date on our lives, relishing in our friendship, and celebrating the wonderful people who brought us together.

Thank you to Dexter, John, and Audrey. But thank you, especially, to Elaine, who knows a very good story when she sees one.

Elaine Rounds and Deana Driver
in Brandon, MB - Oct. 24, 2022

A Funny Thing Happened at a Craft Show

I miss craft shows. Actually, I miss seeing real people with their faces visible, but that's another story.

I miss the busy craft show atmosphere of talking with all variety of folks and selling books to interested readers. Craft and trade shows on the Prairies have been part of my life every fall since 2009 when I published The Little Coat: The Bob and Sue Elliott Story by Alan J. Buick. That fall, the author and I and our spouses (Carol and Al) went on an epic author tour through parts of Saskatchewan and Alberta to launch this wonderful book about a Canadian soldier from Olds/Calgary and a Dutch girl who received his troop's wartime gift of a child's coat made from a Canadian Army blanket. 

The Little Coat is still one of our most popular titles - for good reason, including the fact that the coat is now an artifact in the Canadian War Museum thanks to Alan's writing efforts - and it launched us into the world of selling our books at trade shows and craft shows as well. We had a trade show booth at big events like Canadian Western Agribition for many years and we took our books on the road to various craft shows in all regions of Saskatchewan as well as southern Manitoba and Alberta. Fun stuff for sure.

But people do say the darnedest things sometimes.

One of the funniest - or maybe strangest - moments that happened came during a show in a Saskatchewan town in November 2012. The craft show was held in a large gymnasium-like room and there was plenty of space for craft tables and for customers to wander among them. (Sigh. Did I mention that I miss people?) 

Anyway, I returned to the room after a short break and an older woman greeted me at the door. She called to her friend to follow her and they both walked behind me, following me for the entire length of the large room until I got to my table. They stopped in front of my table and waited until I sat down in my chair behind the table.

Then the woman picked up my Never Leave Your Wingman book - about fun-loving, inspiring, seven-time cancer survivor Dionne Warner and her wingman husband Graham - and held the bright pink book up for her friend to see.

"They say this is a really good book," the woman said to her friend.

Then she put the book down and they both walked away.

What... was... that? I wondered for a long, long time - when I wasn't laughing and shaking my head, that is.

She never did buy the book. Not that weekend anyway.

At another craft show - in a city this time - a woman came up to my booth and asked if she could buy "that big book." 

I was confused. All the books I publish are of a standard size - either 6 inches wide by 9 inches high or slightly smaller. I have published only a couple of books that are 8-1/2 inches by 11 inches, so I didn't understand what she was wanting. I asked her to repeat herself.

"I want to buy that big book. There!" she said as she pointed to the 12-inch by 18-inch poster of a book cover that was hanging on the booth wall behind me.

"Um... those are just posters of the book covers. The books are here," I said as gently as I could while I motioned to all the books covering the tables between us.

I don't remember if the woman ended up buying an "actual" book or not - I think she did - but I distinctly remember that she was not the only person who asked if they could buy one of the book posters. One other person inquired at a different trade show a few years later.

So maybe there's a market out there for oversized books. Hmmm...

As my publishing business grew and my display table of books by various authors expanded during the past 10 years, my routine of briefly introducing the books on my table became more complex. Sometimes the words that came out of my mouth were confusing for craft show visitors and for myself as well. (I'm better at writing than I am at talking.)  As I honed my publishing preferences to focus only on non-fiction books and other genres related to non-fiction, it became easier for me to describe the books on my craft show tables. At least that's what I thought was happening.

"Hello. These are all books I publish," I'd say. "They're all written by Saskatchewan and Prairie authors, including me. These ones are all true stories (as I pointed out the books), these are healing and wellness, these are children's fiction and non-fiction, and these are humour and cowboy poetry over here. They're all true stories or based on true stories."

It sounded simple enough to me but, then again, this is my business and I deal with these books daily, so it should sound understandable to the person who creates the books. Let me tell you, it definitely boggles the minds of some folks who wander up to my craft show tables. Usually, I can sort out their questions and help them understand whatever it is that they want to know about the awesome books written by awesome writers. (Shout out to my authors!)

But sometimes, nothing I say really matters.

I recall spending five or ten - or maybe it was a hundred - minutes one day talking to a man about the different books he appeared to be interested in on my craft show tables. He had asked about some of the storylines, whether this one was a Saskatchewan story or not, whether these people were still alive... and more. Then came the question that floored me.

"So, have you read any of them?" he asked.

Uh.... What?

"Yes," I replied, trying to keep him from seeing how astounded I was at his question. Hadn't I just told him about almost Every. Single. One. Of these books?

"I edited and published all of these books, so, yes, I've read every word in every one of them. Many times," I said.

The guy eventually walked away. I was glad to see him go. Sometimes you just can't help people.

The final memorable funny moment came when two young girls, about 10 years old, stopped at my booth one evening and began looking at the children's and young adult books. They picked up one kids' book and then another and began conversing with me.

And that's when my "I've read every word in every one of these books" line came back to haunt me.

One of the young smarty-pants girls picked up The Inquiring Reporter by Clay Stacey and randomly opened it up. "Okay, I'm on page 68. The word starts with a p and ends with r. What is it?" the youngster brazenly asked as she looked straight at me.

"Publisher," I replied, without hesitating.

The little girl's eyes opened wide as she looked at her friend in shock. "Wow! She really does know every word in the books!"

She quickly put the book down and they almost ran as they left my booth.

I smiled.

Yes, of course, I got lucky with "publisher", but it was a pretty easy guess. The book's author, Clay Stacey, was a publisher, editor, and reporter in all four Western provinces for 50 years - so "publisher" seemed like a reasonable option for a word that starts with p and ends with r - in a book about a publisher!

However, I am glad that she didn't look a little farther down the page and pick out the word starting with a u and ending with a y...

Unpredictability.

Send Us Your "Prairie Pilots' Stories"

In 2008, we released the book Prairie Pilot: Lady Luck Was On My Side – The Stories of Walter D. Williams, which contains 100 entertaining, inspiring, short stories written by the late Walter Williams of Kerrobert, Saskatchewan. Walter was an International Harvester dealer and a welder in the late 1940s and 1950s when he began using his two-seater Aeronca Chief airplane as a flying taxi service and unofficial air ambulance for many residents in his area.

This photo shows Walter Williams of Kerrobert, Saskatchewan, flying his beloved CF-EVO Aeronca Chief in the 1950s. The photo was taken from CF-DRY Piper Cub, owned by Norm Easton of Eston, Sask. 

Walter Williams flew pregnant women, doctors, RCMP officers, criminals, teachers, books, corpses, and friends to hospitals and other destinations – often in horrible weather or at night when he wasn’t supposed to be flying. Walter’s stories tell of him flying into storms and fog, landing in farmers’ fields, hunting coyotes from the air, and saving people’s lives by being the only available mode of transportation at the time. He had little regard for the rules of Transport Canada and often ignored common sense, thanking Lady Luck many times for helping him through risky situations.

Walter's CF-EVO struck a fence near Altario, SK on a failed takeoff in Fall 1948.

A snowplow clearing a road near Kerrobert, SK in the 1950s.

The late Walter Williams with his son David, standing by Walter's plane, about 1950.

Walter and Romona Williams, about 1975.

The Prairie Pilot book has been popular and went into a second printing in 2012. Men especially love this book - I tease them that they live vicariously through Walter’s crazier adventures - but it is a great read for men and women and anyone over age 12. Walter was definitely an unsung hero for that region of west-central Saskatchewan and east-central Alberta in the 1950s. He saved many lives and his short stories are proof of his heroism.

Since that book was published, for the last seven years, my husband/publishing partner Al Driver and I have enjoyed listening to the stories of other Prairie pilots. They have inevitably come back to us after reading Walter’s book to tell us about some of their own precarious flights and marvellous flying adventures. So we have decided to compile some of these stories into a new book that we hope to release in 2016.

Thus, if you are a Prairie pilot, or a Canadian pilot, or you know someone who is and has a story or two to tell, DriverWorks Ink invites you to share those short stories (or poems) for this non-fiction book tentatively titled Stories of Prairie Pilots.

We know that there are some incredible stories of flying danger, heroism, helping, joy, adventure, silliness, and more out there. We want to record and share these stories with our readers.

Please write your story or invite someone you know to share their story with us. Stories should be from 500 words to 1,500 words. Photos may be submitted upon acceptance of your story. Please provide details including your name, address, phone number, and email address, as well as the names, dates, location and other details of the people and places in your story.

It would be best to ask the permission of the people you are naming in your story before you send us the story, but it is most important that the story be true and not libellous. You can get around using real names by using phrases such as "a man I'll call Jim" or "a man I know." I'll help you with that process once we accept your story for publication in our book.

Please send your submissions before January 31, 2016, by email to: ddriver@sasktel.net or by mail to: DriverWorks Ink, 110 McCarthy Blvd. N., Regina, SK S4R 6A4.

Please phone DriverWorks Ink at 306-545-5293 if you have a story to share but you do not wish to write it yourself. I will be happy to do the writing and help you share your story in that way.

Please note that all submissions will be accepted but not all submissions will be published. Those whose stories are published will receive two complimentary copies of the book and will be able to purchase more copies at a 40% discount.

We may decide to make a donation from the book proceeds to a worthwhile charity, but we have not yet discussed that concept for this project.

Thank you in advance. We look forward to receiving your stories.

Happy Flying and Happy Writing!

Send Us Your "Fun On The Farm" Stories

Your farmer brother has an unusual way of feeding the cattle and it makes you laugh every time you see it.

Your farmer cousin follows a specific, curious ritual when she drives the grain truck or takes lunch to the men in the field, and it cracks you up.

You yourself have had more than your share of funny mishaps and adventures on the farm where you grew up, and you're dying to tell someone about them! Well, this is your chance.

With the successful launch of our Cream Money book and the talk in the community that this book has already inspired among Prairie people who have heard about it, DriverWorks Ink is pleased to invite you to share more of your short stories (or poems) for the Fun ON the Farm non-fiction book we plan to publish in Spring 2016.

Fun ON the Farm is the working title for our planned book about funny things that have happened on Canadian farms. We invite you to tell us about TRUE events, interactions, people, or pranks that have happened to you or someone you know related to life on a farm in Canada. We want names, dates, and all the funny details.

We want to make readers giggle, shake their heads in wonder, or downright belly-laugh when reading this book.

Did you get the tractor stuck in a muddy field and spend an hour weighing the options of walking home to get help versus staying with the tractor to postpone the inevitable reprimand? Did you fall into a sewage-filled slough to retrieve your glasses while playing a game of tag with a younger sibling? (Both of these happened to me, by the way.)

Please write your own Fun ON the Farm story or invite someone you know to share their story with us. Stories should be from 500 words to 1,500 words. Photos may be submitted upon acceptance of your story. Please provide us with your name, address, phone number, and email address, as well as the names, dates, location and other details of the people and places in your story.

It would be best to ask the permission of the people you are naming in your story before you send us the story, but it is most important that the story be true and humorous - and not nasty or libellous. You can get around using real names by using phrases such as "a woman I'll call Betty" or "a neighbour of mine." I'll help you with that process once we accept your story for publication in our book.

Please send your submissions before May 27, 2016, by email to: ddriver@sasktel.net or by mail to: DriverWorks Ink, 110 McCarthy Blvd. N., Regina, SK S4R 6A4.

Please phone DriverWorks Ink at 306-545-5293 if you have a story to share but you do not wish to write it yourself. I will be happy to do the writing and help you share your story in that way.

Please note that all submissions will be accepted but not all submissions will be published. Those whose stories are published will receive two complimentary copies of the book and will be able to purchase more copies at a 40% discount.

We may decide to make a donation from the book proceeds to a worthwhile charity, but we have not yet discussed that concept for this project.

The family farm where I toiled as a child (Woe is me!) in Alberta.

Thank you in advance for your interest in this book. We look forward to receiving your stories. 

Have fun with it! 

A Thank-You Note for the Cream Money book

A thank-you note came in the mail the other day, from a woman in Alberta who received our Cream Money book as a gift from a friend.

As this book has already done many times since it was launched on May 23, 2015, Cream Money: Stories of Prairie People prompted this woman to remember her years on the farm and to share them with us:

"I was also raised on a mixed farm and surely can relate to my mum hand-milking 6-8 cows & shipping cream with a cream truck picking up the cream. Also I married a mixed farmer & we, like a lot of neighbours, milked a few mix-breed cows until we became fluid milk shippers and increased the herd to 50 or more, at times, Holsteins.

“After finding it so difficult to hire help for winter chores, we sold the quota before the price rose. Then I went back to shipping cream but had to deliver it to Vermilion, where a cream truck met the few cream-shippers left. After it stopped, we left the calves on the cross-breds we now had and even bought the odd calf to put on the heavier milkers. I milked one, with the first milkers we had used earlier, until March 2014, when the old favourite dried up – just couldn’t sell her so I had her put down mercifully.

“Thank you again. I’ll write a thank-you to (my friend) for thinking of me.”

This lovely thank-you note came with another pleasant surprise – a cheque made out to the Saskatchewan Lung Association,“in appreciation of the work of DriverWorks Ink in publishing Cream Money.”

We were delighted to pass that cheque on to the Lung Association and to express our thanks for her thanks. Win Win Win!

Cream Money book launch among the best for DriverWorks Ink

We recently launched our newest non-fiction book, Cream Money: Stories of Prairie People - and it was the most fun book launch ever. At least that's what the people in attendance said, and who are we to argue with them? It definitely was a great time!

Thirteen of the 30 people who contributed stories to this fascinating book were at our launch. Some of them drove almost three hours to be there! It was the first time I had met a number of these folks in person - I'd only talked to them by phone or email when editing the stories they submitted - so I was thrilled to shake their hands and thank them in person for contributing to our book. 

The launch began with a happy, casual atmosphere that continued throughout the afternoon. But first I'll bring you up to speed on what the book is about and why we published it.

Cream money was an important source of income for farm families on Canada's Prairies in days gone by. Farm women in particular - including my mother - milked the cows, separated the cream from the milk, then sold that cream and/or milk to neighbours, friends, and townspeople to earn a little extra cash. The money earned was used to purchase groceries, fabric, farm supplies, and other items that could not be produced on the farm. 

DriverWorks Ink, our publishing company based in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, produced this book to record some of this Prairie history and pay homage to this long-ago way of life. We're also making a donation to the Lung Association of Saskatchewan from some of the book's proceeds, by the way. I thought I'd add that detail before I forgot.

In the book's introduction, I wrote that my mother sold cream in pint and quart jars to families in town and in cream cans to the local creamery about once a week from the 1950s to the 1970s. With this money, she paid bills and purchased sugar, salt, fresh fruit, canning supplies and other grocery items that could not be grown or made on our farm. She bought fabric and sewing notions and, if we children happened to make a rare trip into town that week, we were sometimes allowed to spend 10 cents in any way we wished. As we grew older and farm finances allowed, we were sometimes each given a shiny quarter, which led to lengthy deliberations about whether we should spend it on bubble gum or chewy Mojo treats. Or should we spend our entire allowance on one bag of potato chips or one chocolate bar? Often we would make deals with each other and share our purchases after we returned to the farm with our bounty. (From Cream Money, "Introduction - My Family's Story" by Deana J. Driver)

The Cream Money book contains 29 short stories and two poems written by a variety of Prairie folks who talk about events on their farms during the 1920s right up to the mid-1980s. There are stories of hard work, fun, and adventure that honour family and community. You'll read humorous tales of children falling into full milk pails or mice falling into cream cans, and explanations of cream money well spent or other adventures during those years on the farm.

While I was compiling and editing the stories for the book, those who contributed their family's stories often expressed their gratefulness that these pieces of family history will be preserved through the book's publication. It has been a central piece to the work I do as a non-fiction writer and Prairie books publisher, so it was nice to hear that they understood the reasons that my husband Al and I published the book. Our contributors brought this grateful attitude and their excitement to our book launch and we were off to a great start when we saw two of the contributors at the launch venue, raring to go, as we were arriving to get set up!

We were fairly busy during the launch so we didn't take a lot of photos, but here are a few to give you a flavour of that great afternoon:

We set our Cream Money cake and a few lemon tarts on a table in between two old, empty cream cans. Just looking at those cream cans brought back a lot of memories and began some storytelling for folks.

I welcomed everyone and shared a bit of my family's story and the reasons we published this book. Some of what I said was similar to what you'll hear in this CTV Regina interview I did leading up to the launch.

Eleanor Sinclair of Fort Qu'Appelle, SK, (author of Our Lamps Were Heavy) spoke about the dairy cooperative's strike in the 1970s, which led to their farm having to get rid of vast quantities of milk and cream in any way possible while the strike was on.

Bryce Burnett, a rancher and cowboy poet from Swift Current, SK (who published his award-winning book Homegrown and other poems with DriverWorks Ink), shared his poem "Cream Cans," outlining the many uses these cans have had throughout their long lives. (Later, one of our other contributors told us that he had heard Bryce speak before but was excited to meet him at our launch. We were happy this event enabled the two of them to have a visit.)

Next, Dexter van Dyke of Regina, SK, shared his story of being involved in the milking process and benefiting from cream sales proceeds when he was a child.

Above are some of the people at our Regina launch. Janice Howden, a contributor from Saskatoon, spoke about the book on Saskatoon's Global TV. Here's that interview for you to enjoy.

Among the connections that were made between the people at the launch were some priceless moments that occurred between these two contributors. Roy Tollefson of Moose Jaw, SK, born in 1926, met Clara Puddell of Moose Jaw, born in 1924, at our launch. Their daughters work together in Swift Current, but these two had not met before. They quickly discovered that Clara knew one of Roy's siblings. They enjoyed talking about mutual acquaintances and much more. Amazing.

When the speeches and readings were finished, we asked all the contributors who were present to please get together for a group photo. As family and friends stood in front of us and snapped photo after photo with their cellphone cameras, we proudly held our books and grinned like the happy authors we are!

Back row l to r: Dexter van Dyke, Truus de Gooijer, Irene Bingham, Jerry Holfeld, Glenn Swallow, Maurice Giroux, Marlene Hunter, Bryce Burnett.

Front l to r: Roy Tollefson, Deana Driver, Clara Puddell, Ruth Wildeman.

(The cream cans on the book's cover came from Allan and Elisa Jackson and the book's cover design is by Erika Folnovic of Regina, SK. We also thank Creative Saskatchewan for assistance in producing the book.)

At one point in the afternoon, my husband and publishing partner, Al Driver, asked 89-year-old Roy Tollefson, "What does it feel like to be a published author?"

Roy replied, "I never thought that would happen. I helped with a community history book and I wrote a little piece for that but that doesn't count. This is really special."

We couldn't agree more.

Thank you to Roy and all the other contributors to our Cream Money book.  We hope all of you enjoy it as much as we enjoyed writing our stories and getting the book published.

Don't forget, you can purchase a signed copy from us here.

Happy reading!

World TB Day, the Lung Association and our Cream Money book

March 24th is World TB Day - the day to raise public awareness about tuberculosis and the fact this disease is still a threat in many countries of the world. According to the World Health Organization, tuberculosis (TB) is one of the world's top infectious killers.

The theme for World TB Day 2015 is 'Reach, Treat, Cure Everyone', to draw attention to the estimated 3 million people worldwide with TB who are not treated and cured. The Lung Association of Canada notes that in Canada, we have many world-class researchers working to find ways to treat and cure this disease. I am thankful for that.

In our immediate family, we have been affected by numerous health conditions affecting the lungs, including a TB scare faced by my mother-in-law, who was a nurse for all of her work life. My husband, Al, was hospitalized many times during his first few years of life because of severe asthma. As a child, he was so ill that he asked his mother if he could go back underneath the oxygen tent in his hospital room - so he could breathe better. I developed allergies and asthma as an adult - which are still a struggle for me - and both of our daughters have had difficulties with asthma over the years.

The scariest times were those which took any of us to the hospital. Being unable to breathe properly is frightening, and we would not wish that on anyone.

Last October, our eldest daughter, Lisa Driver, posted a message on her Facebook page in which she shared a music video that has a truly inspiring story attached to it. This is what Lisa posted:

     I was going to share this song anyways, because I love its message of living each day to the fullest.
     Then I watched the video and was truly touched by the dedication of the song to those with Cystic Fibrosis. When I was three, I had such severe asthma the doctors were worried it was CF. I haven't thought of that a lot and until this moment, didn't realize how close I came to a terminal diagnosis. I am so grateful for my health and this life.
     This video is worth the watch. Lisa

Al took our little Lisa to the hospital that day when she was struggling to breathe. He vividly recalls that moment when the doctor said that Lisa might have cystic fibrosis. It still shakes him to the core. We are so thankful that CF did not become a reality for her.

For months now, we have been working on producing a book called 'Cream Money - Stories of Prairie People', which will feature short stories told by people in Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta, who grew up during a time when farmers collected and sold cream to subsidize their family's income. I am one of those Prairie people from that era. Part of my family's story will be in this book, which we plan to release in the next few months.

Our publishing company, DriverWorks Ink, has donated to various charities for years, from the proceeds of many of our books. Last fall, we were been mulling over the idea of whether to donate from Cream Money or not. Publishing is a tough business in which "every penny counts," as an industry person recently advised us at a Saskatchewan Publishers Group /SaskBooks conference. Still, we are Christian people and we give in gratitude for the gifts we have received. So money is nice, but sharing it is nicer.

After seeing Lisa's post and that incredible video last fall, we decided that we would give an annual donation from our Cream Money book sales to The Lung Association of Saskatchewan.

We look forward to releasing our Cream Money book in the next while (in which the cream can image below will play a central role), and to helping further raise awareness about lung diseases and find cures and treatments for diseases like TB, asthma, and many more.

We are in the final stages of editing the 30-plus stories that have been contributed to our Cream Money book. If you or someone you know still has a story to share about those days on the farm, please contact me by March 31 so we can make room for your submission.

Never Leave Your Wingman's Excellent European Adventure - Part 6 - Monaco

Hi, again. It's me, the Never Leave Your Wingman book. I haven't written to you for a long time because... well, because I'm a book for starters, but mostly because my author (who is actually helping me type this blog post) has been very busy this last while doing some travelling and speaking in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. She and her husband, whom I like to call Publisher Al, barely unpacked me from her backpack in early September when we returned from our fabulous vacation in Europe (see my first blog) ... and they were immediately on the road again to a trade show in Yorkton, Saskatchewan, quickly followed by trips to Weyburn, Estevan, Carlyle, Estevan again (a different trade show), Regina (where we live but to a trade show there), Swift Current, Brandon, Winnipeg, Vibank, Avonlea, Moose Jaw, Herbert, Saskatoon, Hague and Prince Albert. Whew! I'm dizzy just thinking about it. And they're not done yet.

You see, my publishers received a wonderful grant from the Saskatchewan Arts Board (thank you, Saskatchewan Arts Board!) to help them market and distribute their books this fall - including me, of course. I'm their 'pink book'... and I just became even more wonderful (if I do say so myself). I am now a National Bestseller in Canada, and I have been recognized with an Honorable Mention award in the Biography/Autobiography category of the 2013 Great Midwest Book Festival. Nice, huh? My friend Letters to Jennifer From Maudie & Oliver won an award this week, too - an Honorable Mention in the Cats category of the 2013 Animals, Animals, Animals Book Festival. Yay!

Anyway, my publishers are marketing and distributing their books this fall through extensive book tours that include trade shows and a pile of author/publisher presentations and events at schools, libraries, book stores, seniors' homes and more. My author Deana told me she has 22 presentations to make this week alone in east central Saskatchewan. They have the Canadian Western Agribition trade show and one in Saskatoon still plus some promotion planned in Alberta still. Pretty exciting, huh?

So before I get back to talking about my wonderful trip to Europe this summer, I want to show you what my author/publisher Deana and Publisher Al have been up to this past month and a half.

Here's Deana, ready to speak at the Weyburn Public Library.

She's talking to students at an elementary school in Estevan, Saskatchewan here.

Here's Deana and Al with a customer at an Estevan trade show.

They also helped Regina author Shae Therrien launch his book Interrupted with Bipolar. Shae has received more than 150 electroconvulsive therapy treatment to help his mental health stay stable. His book includes his journal entries and tips on understanding mental illness. My publishers had a lot of fun at Shae's launch. He has a great sense of humour, so you should check out one of my new friends, Interrupted with Bipolar by Shae Therrien.

The older students at Avonlea School were an interested bunch, listening to Deana talk about her writing career, the writing process, the books that she has written and the books that DriverWorks Ink has published and helped other authors self-publish.

Deana and Al travelled to Brandon, Manitoba in October and happily reconnected with Audrey Hanlon (on the right) and Elaine Rounds during Deana's presentation at the Daly House Museum. Audrey's late husband John Hanlon is the subject of Deana's book The Sailor and the Christmas Trees. You should really put this book in someone's Christmas stocking this year. It's a wonderful true story that will bring tears to your eyes.

And last but not least.... they've spent some time with our beautiful Dionne Warner - our favourite eight-time cancer survivor. (She was fighting her fifth, sixth and seventh cancer diagnoses when I was written. She's a walking miracle, for sure.)

Here, Dionne joined Al and Deana to sign and sell books at the Moose Jaw Whistlestop craft show.

The Riders lost that day, but that didn't stop them from having fun with Dionne's head gear (she had soft balls, I was told).

Here they are in Saskatoon, where they promoted me, the Never Leave Your Wingman book. They're having a little fun before their CTV Noon News interview (above)...

... and with host Jeff Rogstad, who enjoyed their pink get-ups in celebration of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, of course. 

They signed books at Coles Midtown Plaza and then ...

... Deana and Dionne talked with the audience after Dionne spoke at an event at the Alice Turner Library.

And finally, Deana spoke to elementary students in Hague, Saskatchewan one morning. She says she is looking forward to the many other presentations yet to come this fall.

But now it's time to put the focus back on me and my Excellent European Adventure...

When I last left off, we were in Nice, France and I was loving the water and sand. From there, a day trip to the municipality of Monaco was one of the best days we'd had to that point. 

Some of the world's wealthiest people own yachts that they dock in Monaco's harbour. The fees can be ridiculously expensive, but Monaco is home to more millionaires per capita than any other place on Earth.

 

 I was so excited when the tour guide on our Hop-On-Hop-Off bus told us that we were travelling the same route that the Formula One race cars drive for the Monaco Grand Prix! I know that our friend Graham Warner (the Wingman of my story) loves NASCAR, so I could only think of him and how much he would have enjoyed being with us as we turned corners, went up and down the hills of Monaco... albeit quite a lot slower than the actual Grand Prix cars.

 It was pretty darn awesome!

And speaking of AWESOME... Publisher Al could hardly believe his eyes when he saw this red Rolls Royce convertible just sitting out there on the street in Monaco.

He asked my author to take a photo of me and the angel hood ornament so we could show our angel Dionne and her wingman Graham the cool car we saw. Imagine Al's surprise when he lifted his head up after this photo was taken, only to see two more Rolls Royce convertibles within a few seconds. You don't see that on the streets of Regina... or too many other places really. Wow.

Well, that's enough for this post. I'll get back to you soon with the next adventure in this series. Take care, everyone.