Alex W. MacLeod novelist holding launch in Tata
The Tracks – a new novel published by Alex W. MacLeod of Caledonia, will be launched in Wolfville on
July 23.
MacLeod said in a recent interview Refuge, a that he has been living with the idea of this book for 15 or 20 years.
“I loved hanging out with these people,” he says of his cast of characters.
The central one is 23- yearold Juliette Cameron, a troubled young woman living in a fictional town on Nova Scotia’s Eastern Shore.
“There was a silver mine in this town, but it closed World War II,” says MacLeod. “It starts in 1951 and there are five abandoned railway cars that people are living in.”
Juliette has skippered one of her father’s fishing boats and she tried university, but at the outset of the novel she just found out she’s pregnant.
The plot continues, according to MacLeod, up to 1965 and the book runs 460 pages.
“It’s episodic and there are different minor characters,” he says.
MacLeod chose a female protagonist like Juliette, he thinks, because women are more interesting characters than men.
Something of the year Mac- Leod lived in West Jeddore and the beautiful Eastern Shore must have stayed with him now.
The fledgling author has had an eclectic working career. He spent time teaching in Newfoundland and worked in Ontario and across the Maritimes as a musician. In fact, he played piano for the Liverpool launch of The Tracks – a Refuge, along with Phillip Harding on guitar. It took place in the lobby of the Astor Theatre.
At the age of 40, MacLeod went back to school and qualified as a lawyer, but “I only practiced for a while,” he said. Now he is focused on writing and self- publishing.
Friesen’s in Manitoba printed his novel after Kevin Estey of Timberlea designed it. Currently, the bookstore in Liverpool is the only place the book can be purchased, but MacLeod hopes it will be widely available soon.
MacLeod will be at the Box of Delights Bookstore in Wolfville from 1 to 3 p.m. Saturday, July 23.