Title Living History Chronicles

Thirty-three veterans of the Second World War and Korean War share their memories and make history come to life for us. The vignettes are varied and range from tragic to comic.


 Gwilym Jones says, "Choosing my most memorable wartime experience is, to me, like attempting to select the most palatable strawberry in a basket. . . . I accumulated many memories some were precious, some were unforgettable, others I would much rather forget."



 Here you will read about how it felt to liberate Holland, to entertain the troops, to be torpedoed, to thread your way through a minefield, to lose your best friend in an instant. You will read about the D-Day Landing at Juno Beach, the Italian Campaign, the Korean War. You will follow an RAF pilot as he is shot down, taken prisoner, and then exercising considerable ingenuity attempts to escape six times! All of these veterans are members of the Royal Canadian Legion Branch 258 Living History Speakers Bureau, an organization whose primary objective is to ensure that today s history students become aware of, and take pride in, their Canadian heritage.

Race Without Rules

Helping a friend becomes a life-or-death matter in Race Without Rules, a thrilling one-thing-leads-to-another tale of robbery, neo-Nazism, murder and terrorism in the quiet, everyday life of Megan Brodie, a woman whose dedication to uncovering the truth is both refreshing and endearing, Beginning writers are often told to “write what they know.” If Grant had followed this maxim, we would have missed this thriller about a neo-Nazi biotechnology conspiracy that moves rapidly from WW II Berlin to modern-day Westmount, with a stop in the jungles of Brazil along the way.

It would be a shame to give away too much of the plot, but the major characters include Karl Treiger, an unwilling member of a group of neo-Nazis who hatch a plan to conquer the world through genetic engineering, and Megan Brodie, a Cree-Scottish woman who had been on trial for murder after killing the biker who raped her and threatened her daughter. Megan’s friend Fiona is attacked by a thief who is hell-bent on getting some old plans of her Westmount neighbourhood and is willing to commit murder and arson to get them. In the meantime, Trieger is escaping a trap set by Stoltz and Higler, two young Aryans who are the results of genetic engineering. Race Without Rules has a complex plot unfolded by a natural storyteller.

French explorator Alexandra David-Neel

Who was Alexandra David-Neel ?

Early life

Born in Paris in 1868, she moved to Ixelles (Brussels) at the age of six. During her childhood she had a very strong desire for freedom and spirituality. At the age of 18, she had already visited England, Switzerland and Spain on her own, and she was studying in Madame Blavatsky's Theosophical Society.

 Travel to India in 1890

In 1890 and 1891, she traveled through India, returning only when she was running out of money. In Tunis in 1900 she met and lived with the railroad engineer Philippe Néel, marrying him in 1904.

 Travel to Sikkim in 1911

In 1911 Alexandra left Néel and traveled for the second time to India, to further her study of Buddhism. She was invited to the royal monastery of Sikkim, where she met Maharaj Kumar (crown prince) Sidkeong Tulku Namgyal. She became Sidkeong's "confidante and spiritual sister" (according to Ruth Middleton), perhaps her lover (Foster & Foster). She also met the 13th Dalai Lama twice in 1912, and had the opportunity to ask him many questions about Buddhism—a feat unprecedented for a European woman at that time.
In the period 1914-1916 she lived in a cave in Sikkim, near the Tibetan border, learning spirituality, together with the young (born 1899) Sikkimese monk Aphur Yongden, who became her lifelong traveling companion, and whom she would adopt later. From there they trespassed into Tibetan territory, meeting the Panchen Lama in Shigatse (August 1916). When the British authorities learned of this—Sikkim was then a British protectorate—Alexandra and Aphur were forced to leave the country.

Travel to Japan in 1916

Unable to return to Europe in the middle of World War I, Alexandra and Yongden traveled to Japan.

 Travel to Tibet in 1924

In Japan Alexandra met Ekai Kawaguchi, who had visited Lhasa in 1901 disguised as a Chinese doctor, and this inspired them to visit Lhasa disguised as pilgrims. After traversing China from east to west, they reached Lhasa in 1924, and spent 2 months there.

 Return to France in 1928

In 1928 Alexandra legally separated from Philippe, but they continued to exchange letters and he kept supporting her till his death in 1941. Alexandra settled in Digne (Provence), and during the next nine years she wrote books. In 1929, she published her most famous and beloved work, Mystiques et Magiciens du Tibet (Magic and Mystery in Tibet).

 Travel to east Tibetan highlands in Tibet 1937

In 1937, Yongden and Alexandra went to Tibet through the former Soviet Union, traveling there during the second World War. They eventually ended up in Tachienlu, where she continued her investigations of Tibetan sacred literature.
One minor mystery relating to Alexandra David-Neel has a solution. In Forbidden Journey, p. 284, the authors wonder how Mme. David-Neel's secretary, Violet Sydney, made her way back to the West in 1939 after Sous des nuées d'orage (Storm Clouds) was completed in Tachienlu. Peter Goullart's Land of the Lamas (not in Forbidden Journey's bibliography), on pp. 110–113 gives an account of his accompanying Ms. Sydney partway back, then putting her under the care of Lolo bandits to continue the journey to Chengdu. Mme. David-Neel evidently remained in Tachienlu for the duration of the war.
While in Eastern Tibet Alexandra and Yongden completed circumambulation of the holy mountain Amnye Machen.

Return to France in 1946

The pair returned to France in 1946. Alexandra was then 78 years old. In 1955 Yongden died at age 56.

Death in France in 1969

Alexandra continued to study and write at Digne till her death at age nearly 101. According to her last will and testament, her ashes and those of Yongden were mixed together and dispersed in the Ganges in 1973 at Varanasi, by her friend Marie-Madeleine Peyronnet.