A Buffet of True Stories

M. Wayne Cunningham is a past executive director of the Saskatchewan
Arts Board and the former director of Academic and Career Programs at
East Kootenay Community College.

Frank Mackinnon, an original member of the Canada Council and political
science professor emeritus at the University of Calgary, has provided a
cornucopia of his experiences in this slender volume of recollections,
observations, and yarns. Drawing upon his impressive
background—including stints as president of the Atlantic Provinces
Economic Council and president of the Institute of Public
Administration—Mackinnon has assembled a memorable array of pieces
about the events he has witnessed, the travels he has taken, and the
luminaries of his day (Frank Underhill, Leonard Brockington, MacGregor
Dawson, R.B. Bennett, Yosuf Karsh, and Henry Marshall Tory, among
others). Befitting his polymathic inclinations, his topics include arts,
culture, music, religion, politics, economics, and education set in
locales that include Canada, South America, India, England, Mexico, and
the United States.

More personal essays than pieces of narrative fiction, Mackinnon’s
“stories” are often witty, sometimes whimsical, sometimes serious,
but never dull or pedantic. They will appeal to amateur historians and
general readers wanting to share in the larger human experience from the
point of view of a well-informed, well-traveled personal essayist.