Darren Bernhardt is a Canadian journalist and nonfiction writer living in Winnipeg, Manitoba, who specializes in local history and the offbeat. He is co-author of the chapbook To Kerouac and Back; co-author of the play Alison's Leather Couch; and author of The Lesser Known: A History of Oddities from the Heart of the Continent. His most recent book, Prairie Oddities: Punkinhead, Peculiar Gravity and More Lesser Known Histories (Great Plains Press, November 2024) collects historical anecdotes from middle-Canada's past, stories of what was--and what could have been.
Handsell readers your book in 25 words or less:
Bizarre, buried, and lesser-known narratives that hide in the fabric of a history woven with ghost trails, gangsters, inventions, and secret places.
On your nightstand now:
Calypso by David Sedaris, who has the ability to blend quick wit and cutting insights with tenderness and relatability.
The Language of Trees: A Rewilding of Literature and Landscape by Katie Holten. It's a gorgeous book of nature and art.
John Steinbeck's Journal of a Novel: The East of Eden Letters, which gives a fascinating behind-the-scenes of a brilliant writer's mind during the creative process.
Favorite book when you were a child:
I wasn't much of a reader as a child but was captivated in school by Ernest Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea. The novella was small enough to tackle, but the struggle-connection-respect between man and beast made me want to never let it go.
Your top five authors:
Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, Jack Kerouac, Annie Dillard, Aldous Huxley. Their words have energy and beauty.
Book you've faked reading:
Henry David Thoreau's Walden. I really want to read it; I don't know why I can't get swept into it.
Book you're an evangelist for:
A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway is a romance of time and place, and of an innocence on the cusp of change, tainted by moral vices and churning emotions. It's beautiful and sad.
Book you've bought for the cover:
Jack Kerouac's On the Road. Many times, many different covers.
Book you hid from your parents:
No books. Records maybe.
Book that changed your life:
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote showed how a news story can be deepened if given the time, and how the nonfiction genre can detail the complexities of characters, relationships, and communities.
Favorite lines from a book:
"The blue-backed notebooks, the two pencils and the pencil sharpener (a pocket knife was too wasteful) the marble-topped tables, the smell of early morning, sweeping out and mopping, and luck were all you needed. For luck you carried a horse chestnut and a rabbit's foot in your right pocket. The fur had been worn off the rabbit's foot long ago and the bones and the sinews were polished by wear. The claws scratched in the lining of your pocket and you knew your luck was still there."
"I would stand and look out over the roofs of Paris and think, 'Do not worry. You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.' So finally I would write one true sentence, and then go on from there." --Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast
Five books you'll never part with:
The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck), The Dharma Bums (Jack Kerouac), Never Cry Wolf (Farley Mowat), A Moveable Feast (Ernest Hemingway), and The Bell Jar (Sylvia Plath). All have left an imprint in my psyche, heart, or soul.
Book you most want to read again for the first time:
Last Exit to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby Jr. A tough read with its harsh subject matter, but poignant and real. Plus, anytime there are efforts to ban a book, that puts it squarely on my radar.