Calling the Prairies Home: Origins, Attitudes, Quirks, and Curiosities. 2nd ed.

Janet Arnett is the former campus manager of adult education at Ontario’s Georgian College. She is the author of Antiques and Collectibles: Starting Small, The Grange at Knock, and 673 Ways to Save Money.

This would be an interesting gift for anyone moving to Manitoba,
Saskatchewan, or Alberta. It’s the second edition of a brag book for
“next-year country,” a surface cruise over the three provinces’
history, food, weather, crops, entertainment, tourist attractions,
sports, and famous personalities. This bits-and-snippets mix is
sprinkled with stats and quotes, myths and legends, and notes on
characters, politics, dinosaurs, RCMP, Metis, cowboys, world heritage
sites, Hutterites, hockey, and so forth. The objective is to present
Prairie society as based on co-operation and compassion: “the only
ship on the Prairies [is] friendship.” The work promotes the attitude
that the Prairies are “so much more than combines and wheat fields,”
an area where people are a “little more caring,” a recognition that
the generosity of the people dominates the culture.

The style is light and informal, with an occasional somewhat strained
attempt at humour. The absence of an index diminishes the value of the
work. The layout adds to the disjointed approach to the material,
strengthening the impression that the book was assembled quickly from a
fat file of miscellaneous notes. Although these are definitely
weaknesses, anyone with an interest in Canada’s “flatlands” will
nonetheless enjoy dipping into the potpourri for interesting anecdotes.