• Age: 12 to 15
• Grade: 7 to 10
• Reading age: 12 to 15

A crab boat off Newfoundland catches fire, and a rescue is undertaken by helicopter. A child goes missing in a New Brunswick forest, and a desperate hunt is mounted. A climber falls on a British Columbia mountain, and a helicopter rescue is attempted. A civilian chopper crashes in Nunavut, and a search-and-rescue team braves a savage snowstorm to find survivors.

True Stories of Rescue and Survival features the above true stories and many more from across the country, past and present. Its heroes are to be found in the RCMP, city police forces, the Canadian military, and among all the rescue workers and specialists of the Canadian Coast Guard. Volunteers, too, risk injury and even death to help others.

Sidebars spotlight the equipment search-and-rescue teams use, how search dogs are trained, how long-line rescues work, how navy divers are making a difference in the deserts of Afghanistan, and much more.

Carolyn Matthews was born in the Antipodes but has lived her adult life in Toronto. She is married with grown children. She has published the non-fiction Heroic Rescues at Sea: True Stories of the Canadian Coast Guard (Nimbus, 2002), award-winning short fiction, and feature articles in such newspapers as the Globe and Mail and the National Post.

Carolyn Matthews' profile page

In a society where media has cheapened the term 'bravery,' Matthews makes an argument for redefining our society's heroes ... In chronicling each story Matthews deftly extracts the key details, capturing the urgency and dangerousness of each situation ... Beyond a showcase for unsung bravery, the book also acts as a valuable resource. Each of the 10 accounts in True Stories is a concise case study that instructs as it entertains ... Matthews populates each story with helpful sidebars that serve as useful reference material, while acting as primers on technical details ...

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