When asked what information she would like to share about herself, Lynn Manuel once told her publisher, "I am a grandmother. And I've seen Paris."
Having majored in history at university, she twice incorporated Lucy Maud Montgomery into her books. The Summer of the Marco Polo (Orca, 2007) is partially based on journal entries made by Montgomery that recall the excitement in Cavendish, Prince Edward Island, after a clipper ship ran aground near her grandparents' home in 1883. Manuel recalls how the strait-laced grandparents responded when the captain of the Marco Polo, launched from Saint John in 1851, stayed at their home following the maritime mishap. The girl who would grow up to write Anne of Green Gables was also living the house at the time.
Born in 1948, Lynn Manuel died in 2010 after a year-long battle with uterine cancer. She lived in White Rock. She published eight picture books and six chapter books, as well as ghostwriting thirteen Boxcar Children Mysteries. Her Camels Always Do (Orca) was nominated for the Chocolate Lily Awards, Lucy Maud and the Cavendish Cat (McClelland and Stewart) was a best-selling picture book. The Night the Moon Blew Kisses (Houghton Mifflin) was a CLA Notable Book.
BOOKS:
The Night the Moon Blew Kisses
Fifty-Five Grandmas and a Llama
Lucy Maud and the Cavendish Cat
The Cherry-Pit Princess
The Lickety-Split Princess
Mystery at Cranberry Farm
Camels Always Do (Orca, 2004)
The Summer of the Marco Polo (Orca, 2007). Illustrated by Kasia Charko.
[BCBW 2010] "Kidlit"
Having majored in history at university, she twice incorporated Lucy Maud Montgomery into her books. The Summer of the Marco Polo (Orca, 2007) is partially based on journal entries made by Montgomery that recall the excitement in Cavendish, Prince Edward Island, after a clipper ship ran aground near her grandparents' home in 1883. Manuel recalls how the strait-laced grandparents responded when the captain of the Marco Polo, launched from Saint John in 1851, stayed at their home following the maritime mishap. The girl who would grow up to write Anne of Green Gables was also living the house at the time.
Born in 1948, Lynn Manuel died in 2010 after a year-long battle with uterine cancer. She lived in White Rock. She published eight picture books and six chapter books, as well as ghostwriting thirteen Boxcar Children Mysteries. Her Camels Always Do (Orca) was nominated for the Chocolate Lily Awards, Lucy Maud and the Cavendish Cat (McClelland and Stewart) was a best-selling picture book. The Night the Moon Blew Kisses (Houghton Mifflin) was a CLA Notable Book.
BOOKS:
The Night the Moon Blew Kisses
Fifty-Five Grandmas and a Llama
Lucy Maud and the Cavendish Cat
The Cherry-Pit Princess
The Lickety-Split Princess
Mystery at Cranberry Farm
Camels Always Do (Orca, 2004)
The Summer of the Marco Polo (Orca, 2007). Illustrated by Kasia Charko.
[BCBW 2010] "Kidlit"
Articles: 4 Articles for this author
The Lickety-Split Princess (Coteau $7.95)
Info
A move to British Columbia in the late Seventies from her Ontario birthplace became a career move for Lynn Manuel. Since then the White Rock writer has created a juvenile mystery series, picture books and the storytelling queens, Dagny Comfort and Megan Canary, introduced in The Cherry-Pit Princess. The Lickety-Split Princess (Coteau $7.95) finds the girls entering a fairy-tale contest to get their picture in the paper. But Dagny suffers a sudden and mysterious loss of imagination. 1-55050-178-X [Louise Donnelly / 2001]
The Cherry-Pit Princess (Coteau $6.95)
Info
Dagny's best friend Anna moves away and Dagny can't decide whether Megan should be her new best friend or not. When Dagny's "Aunt Allie" invites the girls to have a holiday at her cherry orchard, Dagny comes to realize that there may be room for more than one best friend in The Cherry-Pit Princess (Coteau $6.95) by Lynn Manuel.
1-55050-118-6
[BCBW 1997]
In Camels Always Do (Orca $19.95)
Review
Camels stink. They frighten mules. They bite, kick, spit, and their feet are made for traversing sand, not rock-strewn roads of the Cariboo Gold Rush.
But businessman Frank Laumeister knew none of this when in 1862 he dreamed up the Dromedary Express. Convinced camels, with their legendary toughness and endurance, would be ideal for transporting supplies to the gold fields, he and several naïve cohorts imported 21 of the animals.
Laumeister was unaware the two-humped camels they received were, in fact, Bactrians, not the single-humped Dromedaries their venture was named for. The short-legged Bactrian, while slower than an Arabian racing dromedary, could travel much longer but that mattered not a whit to the miners who soon came to despise the foul-smelling, evil-tempered creatures. Laumeister, forced to cut his losses, simply abandoned the camels to fend for themselves in the Cariboo countryside.
In Camels Always Do (Orca $19.95), Lynn Manuel recalls this unlikely piece of British Columbia history through the eyes of young, camel-mad Cameron who has a dream of striking it rich with his gold panning father and someday crossing the ocean to see real camels. On a trip into town, he's astonished to discover camels have come to him!
Signing on as packers to take the Dromedary Express through the rocky
canyons of the Fraser River to the northern gold fields, Cameron and his father find themselves dealing with camel-sized problems. Always resourceful, Cameron fashions canvas and rawhide into camel shoes. He bathes the stinky creatures in rose water. In the end, Cameron can't make the camels adapt as pack animals in the Cariboo.
Kasia Charko, who recently illustrated Julie Lawson's Arizona Charlie and the Klondike Kid, has used watercolours and coloured pencil to fabricate the rough mining camps, the vast Cariboo landscape and 21 shaggy, toothy, double-humped camels. 1-55143-284-6
--by Louise Donnelly
[BCBW 2004] "kid lit"
The Summer of the Marco Polo (Orca $19.95)
Review
Having majored in history at university, Lynn Manuel has twice incorporated author Lucy Maud Montgomery into her books. The Summer of the Marco Polo is partially based on juvenile journal entries made by Lucy Maud Montgomery that recall Cavendish, Prince Edward Island. Specifically, the story recalls the summer when a famous clipper ship ran aground in 1883. Manuel recalls how Lucy's strait-laced grandparents responded when the captain of the Marco Polo stayed at their home following the maritime mishap. The girl who would grow up to write Anne of Green Gables was living in her grandparents' house at the time. Launched from Saint John in 1851, the Marco Polo was once the fastest sailing ship in the world. It sprang a leak on its way to England with a cargo of timber. At the end of the captain's stay, Captain Bull says, "You have left your thumbprint on my heart, Miss Maud.";
Asked to supply some information about herself, author Lynn Manuel of White Rock has replied, "I am a grandmother. And I've seen Paris."; 1-55143-330-3
[BCBW 2007]