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Blank bookcover with clipping pathIn Confessions of a Mountie: My Life Behind the Red Serge, we are offered a rare glimpse into the everyday life an RCMP officer. The author, Frank Pitts, dedicated 32 years as an RCMP officer honouring the motto, “Maintiens le droit (defending the law).”

The main storyline of the book revolves around one incident involving a machete-wielding, foaming-at-the-mouth suspect who is demanding to be shot. Arriving at the scene with his backup still minutes behind, Pitts tells the story through a series of flashbacks as he tries to defuse the situation. He recounts his childhood and growing up in the community of Freshwater, Bell Island, Newfoundland and Labrador, with his ten siblings. He also weaves into the stories of some of the other cases he worked on.

Pitts writes openly and candidly of his work, how the role of police officer changed over his three decades years of service and how no amount of training can prepare you for the realities of the trauma faced on the job. The stark realities of children being raped and/or killed, the devastation of car accidents or attending a domestic dispute are all part of a police officer’s life. Pitts tells these stories with candour in the hopes that people will better understand that police officers are just ordinary people doing the job they were trained for.

Confessions of a Mountie: My Life Behind the Red Serge is written with clarity, wit and self-effacing honesty, bringing Pitts’ stories to life for the reader. He received many commendations and long service medals; there are bound to be more stories from Frank Pitts.

Confessions of a Mountie: My Life Behind the Red Serge
by Frank Pitts
Flanker Press

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Flanker Press is pleased to announce that its books, The Bay Bulls Standoff by Chris Ryan (2014), has been optioned by Unstoppable Urges Productions in Toronto.

On December 4, 2010, Leo Crockwell, fifty-five, an electrical technician and lifetime resident of Bay Bulls, barricaded himself in his mother’s house in Bay Bulls after an altercation with his sister involving a firearm. Chris “Dutch” Ryan, a friend and neighbour of Leo’s, watched as for the next eight days the RCMP utilized every tool at its disposal to extract Leo from the house and bring the standoff to a peaceful end. The Bay Bulls Standoff is a dialogue-driven account of the eight days in Bay Bulls that made national headlines in 2010. Chris Ryan’s memoir takes the reader on a ride-along tour and, for the first time, shares the frustration and worry the residents of the town felt for the safety of their friend Leo Crockwell.

Unstoppable Urges Productions producer Kelli Kieley says the production team plans to adapt The Bay Bulls Standoff as a movie that will be released and distributed serially as a web series. Unstoppable Urges Productions will co-produce The Bay Bulls Standoff  with a Newfoundland-based company. Award-winning Newfoundland filmmaker Mary Lewis will write the screenplay adaptation and direct the project. Newfoundland filmmaker Brad Gover of Mad Mummer Media is also a producer on the project. A Toronto studio, Wanted! Sound + Picture, will provide sound recording and design. A trailer starring Joel Thomas Hynes and Sean Panting was filmed last week in Newfoundland by Roger Maunder. The trailer launched on March 2 and can be viewed here.

“We’re very excited about this project,” says Jerry Cranford, co-owner of Flanker Press. “When we initially read Chris’s manuscript, we felt that this dialogue-driven story would make a spectacular movie, so we’re really looking forward to seeing what Unstoppable Urges Productions does with it.”

Flanker Press began as a self-publishing venture in St. John’s in 1994 with the release of Garry Cranford’s book, Newfoundland Schooner Norma & Gladys: Her Story of Industry, Mutiny & Triumph. Now located in Paradise, the company has eight full-time employees and has published over 200 books, including many award-winners and bestsellers. Last year Flanker Press celebrated 20 years of publishing quality books in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Unstoppable Urges Productions is a Toronto-based production company which produces documentary and scripted productions and recently launched NOW magazine’s first documentary series called Lovers & Fighters. Unstoppable Urges Productions is owned by filmmaker Kelli Kieley, who is from Newfoundland.

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The Bay Bulls Standoff Chris Ryan Flanker Press

One of the best parts about being the editor of Atlantic Books Today is the steady stream of great regional books passing through our office. When The Bay Bull Standoff  by Chris Ryan (Flanker Press) landed on my desk in December, I’ll admit I was intrigued to read an account of this story that I remember first seeing in, of all places, a morning newspaper in Montreal back in 2010.

Ryan’s story offers his recollection of an eight-day, armed standoff between Leo Crockwell, a 55-year-old electrical technician, and the RCMP that played out in the fishing community of Bay Bulls, Newfoundland and Labrador.

The story begins with what the author describes as “an altercation with his younger sister,” which ended with Crockwell following his mother and sister out of the home the three shared while carrying a rifle. What followed was a week many in Newfoundland, especially the town’s 1,200 residents, will remember forever.

The book is broken up into chapters covering each of the eight days, which helps the reader follow the story as it unfolds. But what makes it unique is its stylistic approach. Rather than telling the story in a narrative form, Ryan takes a documentary-like stance by recounting the events of each day through the dialogue of the people he encountered during the standoff.

As an avid birdwatcher, Ryan had the scopes and binoculars to keep a close eye on the Crockwell family home from an SUV parked nearby in an elevated gravel pit. Ryan, his brother Joe, and a large cast of locals discuss the events of the standoff as it plays out, drawing readers into the action. Ryan openly admits in an author’s note that the dialogue is “as valid as memory allowed” and that some “has been changed, added to or altered for the benefit of the reader,” but for the most part it feels very natural.

The constant coming and goings of the many bit characters who punctuate the book can get a little confusing at times, but overall the story is presented in an easy to follow fashion. The action waxes and wanes, and some of the scenes featuring Ryan and his brother mulling over the situation can get a little dry, but there’s more than enough here to keep you reading. When RCMP officers send in a remote Explosive Disposal Unit robot to flush Crockwell from the house or, their final salvo, shooting 227,000 liters of cold water into the house to freeze him out, the reader has a front row seat in the SUV with Ryan and Joe.

Overall, I enjoyed the book and Ryan’s ability to capture the small-town vibe in Bay Bulls during the standoff that made national news and inspired a folksong or two. While its most likely audience is those living in the tiny satellite towns surrounding St. John’s, it can easily capture the interest of those outside the region.

The Bay Bulls Standoff
by Chris Ryan, $19.95 (pb)
9781771173551, 211 pp.
Flanker Press, November 2014

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