To Every Thing There Is a Season: A Cape Breton Christmas Story
Alistair MacLeodwas born in North Battleford, Saskatchewan, and raised among an extended family in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. He has published two internationally acclaimed collections of short stories:The Lost Salt Gift of Blood(1976) andAs Birds Bring Forth the Sun(1986). In 2000, these two books, accompanied by two new stories, were published in a single-volume edition entitledIsland: The Collected Stories of Alistair MacLeod. In 1999, MacLeod’s first novel,No Great Mischief, was published to great critical acclaim, and was on national bestseller lists for more than a year. The novel won many awards, including the prestigious International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Alistair MacLeod and his wife, Anita, have six children. They live in Windsor, Ontario.Peter Rankinwas born in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. He specializes in illustrating the traditional way of life there. A fisherman as well as an artist, in 2004 he illustratedMaking Room, a children’s book by Joanne Taylor that was published by Tundra Books, for which he won the 2004 Lillian Shepherd Memorial Award for Excellence in Illustration. He lives in Mabou Coal Mines with his wife and their five children.