The seventeen stories in this collection range from short vignettes to sprawling novellas. The characters who appear in them are ordinary folk, full of flaws and frailties, who embark upon journeys that call them to rise to unforeseen challenges. These ‘expeditions’, which variously take them to the very frontiers of life, shift their perception of themselves and the world in which they live, love, and toil. Most of these yarns are tales of redemption (and sometimes serendipitous justice) with characters who are good people at heart, yet who may seem rough-hewn with their sometimes spicy language. And they are visual stories, meant to unfold like movies in the reader’s mind. For surely everybody’s going somewhere, looking for something or someone. Often such discoveries are made in unexpected ways, and it’s how each person makes that journey that spins a good tale.

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Phil Burpee was born in Ontario in 1950. He tanked high school and failed to ignite a rock ‘n’ roll career. He did discover a useful talent for physical labour, though, and over the years worked as a fruit-picker, shovel-jockey, ranch-hand, paramedic, and carpenter. He once ran for the legislature in deep blue Alberta on the socialist ticket. Along the way, years spent as a hospice worker instilled in him a keen sense of life’s fleeting evanescence. Throughout he has fostered a love of the English language, and reckons that storytelling is foundational to the human experience. For the last twenty years he has operated a small dirt ranch in southern Alberta with his sweetheart, Esther.