From ‘Reparations’ by Stephen Kimber

July 1976 He shouldn’t have been in this hellhole on a summer Sunday morning. He should have been home sleeping it off. So why was he standing here in his one, drizzle-dampened suit trying desperately not to let his brain process the smell of shit and salt that wafted up from the sewer outfall down […]

‘We found each other’

During my research for my 2009 book, IWK: A Century of Caring for Families (Nimbus), I interviewed Dr. John Crocker, a pediatric nephrologist at the Izaak Walton Killam Health Centre in Halifax. Dr. Crocker died on October 26, 2016 Dr. Crocker could be a cantankerous character — he eventually sued the hospital and the province for breach of […]

The morning after: it couldn’t get worse, and then it did

Bob Sutherland was disgusted. This wasn’t Rome or Berlin; this was Halifax. And it wasn’t Canadians fighting the enemy; it was Canadians fighting Canadians. He and some of the K of C centre staff had decided to take an early morning walk through the downtown to see for themselves what the riots had done. It […]

Rescue at sea: the sinking of the Otter, 1941

Jimmy Noade cradled the injured man in his arms. What was his name? Noade remembered him only as Walker. He was the Chief Officer aboard HMCS Otter and right now he was in bad shape, his body a limp rag, his voice a pale imitation of itself. For what seemed like days, Noade, Walker and […]

Flight 111 now available as an ebook

Flight 111: The Tragedy of the Swissair Crash By Stephen Kimber “Kimber…at his best…tightly drawn vignettes depicting the utter normality that is shattered for thousands by the disaster…gladden[s] the heart even as the tears well up. But for all the emotion Kimber doesn’t allow Flight 111 to descend into sentimentality.” The Globe and Mail “Deftly […]

Reading at the Port Medway Reader's Festival

Stephen Kimber will be the featured speaker Saturday, July 31, at the 2010 Port Medway Reader’s Festival in Port Medway on Nova Scotia’s south shore. Founded in 2002 by writers Cynthia Wine and Philip Slayton, the Festival is “an opportunity for readers to listen to and meet writers in an informal and friendly village setting. […]

“Everything Right:” IWK Review in Atlantic Books Today

"When, just 15 minutes into reading the book, I am in tears, then something’s got to be right. And I believe Stephen Kimber has done everything right in his captivating history of the extraordinary story of pediatric care that exists right here in Halifax and beyond… Kimber has given us a fully integrated account of […]

'IWK: A Century of Caring' nominated for book award

2010 Atlantic Book Awards Shortlists… Dartmouth Book Award (Non-fiction) Greg Cochkanoff and Bob Chaulk, SS Atlantic: The White Star Line’s First Disaster at Sea (Goose Lane Editions) Stephen Kimber, IWK: A Century of Caring for Families (Nimbus Publishing) Anne Murray with Michael Posner, All of Me (Knopf Canada)

Africville… a look back at the struggle for redress

Today’s announcement (February 24, 2010) of an agreement between the Africville Genealogy Society and various governments will mark the culmination of a decades-long, sometimes seemingly endless and too often hopeless struggle. The deal—like almost anything to do with Africville—will be controversial. But as we consider what it means, it is worth looking back at how […]