Man-tay-seepee (River of Strangers) is the Cree name for the Churchill River in Manitoba, where this novel takes place. The title sets the tone for this dramatic story, which tells the tale of men and women driving for place and survival in the rough frontier atmosphere of the early 20th century fur trade. Probing the mystery and loneliness of this landscape, the novel tells a complex story of complex men and women -- Innu, Inuit, and those of European ancestry drawn from clashing Maritimes and old-world backgrounds.

A fanatically reformist clergyman challenges the unlicensed ways of a primitive frontier; a Highland Cape Breton hero tries to find purpose and meaning in self-exile from his old life; women struggle for recognition and dignity in an isolated world dominated by both weak and powerful men; and a secret romance threads its way through the story. Frank Parker Day is best known for the broad canvas of his novel, Rockbound, and in this lead-up to his finest work we find common elements and themes playing out on another isolated, powerful stage.

Frank Parker Day was an author, athlete, and academic born in Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia, in 1881. He grew up in various coastal Nova Scotian towns, and attended Oxford University on a Rhodes scholarship. Day served the Canadian Army in WWI, wrote for Harper's Magazine and Atlantic Monthly, and taught English at the University of New Brunswick and Union College in Schenectady, New York. Rockbound, which won Canada Reads in 2005, is widely considered Day's best work.

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Born and raised in Nova Scotia, ALAN WILSON earned his Ph.D in Canadian history from the University of Toronto, and taught at Acadia and Western Ontario, where he was co-Head of History. In 1965 he became
founding Chair of History and later of Canadian Studies at Trent. He specializes in social and cultural history with special reference to the Maritimes and Newfoundland.

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