Canadian Western Novel Nominated for Award

VICTORIA, British Columbia - April 29, 2013 - PRLog -- Canadian author Chad Strong’s debut novel, High Stakes, published by Musa Publishing, has been nominated by the Western Fictioneers for Best First Western Novel.  Western Fictioneers is a group of professional writers and devoted readers of western stories.  2013 marks the third year the Fictioneers have offered their Peacemaker Awards for outstanding novels and short stories in the western genre.

With its evocative descriptions of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada as it was post-gold rush in 1877, High Stakes is a compelling tale with the grit of a western and the allure of a romance.  The novel reveals aspects of Victoria’s history unknown to most people.

The protagonist, nineteen-year-old Curt Prescott, returns home to Victoria after a three-month poker circuit on the mainland.  A new “Moral Action Committee” has sprung up in his absence.  Headed by the wife of the new preacher, the committee threatens to cast out all soiled doves and gamblers from the city. He meets the new preacher, “Bud” Andrews, Bud’s shrewish wife, Sarah, and their idealistic daughter, Mary.  Bud seeks to convert Curt while Curt plans to destroy the committee.  Pressures mount for Curt as he tries to help his young constable friend keep the peace with a notorious lowlife, while at the same time trying to ease his jealous girlfriend Del’s insecurities. As Curt falls in love with Mary, the battle for his lifestyle becomes a battle of life and death, and of love lost and found.

“While I’m happy to call southern Ontario home now, I love Victoria -- its history, architecture, its natural environment,” says Strong.  “I lived there for a great portion of my life.  My wife jokingly calls Victoria my mistress.”  High Stakes grew out of Strong’s love of western stories and his fascination with Victoria’s history. While the novel is entirely fictional, Strong did a lot of research to make the setting and circumstances as authentic as possible.  “Even with its strong British influences, Victoria in those days was a lot like other towns of the Old West. There were indeed saloons and gamblers, lumberjacks and prostitutes, all trying to make their way the only way they knew how.”

Chad Strong  reads and writes in multiple genres, mostly westerns and fantasies.  Two of his western short stories have appeared in Frontier Tales, and one of his fantasy short stories, published in Bards & Sages Quarterly, won that magazine’s Reader’s Choice Award for Best Story of January 2012.

Western Fictioneers will announce the winners in all categories on June 1, 2013 on their website: www.westernfictioneers.com

High Stakes is available as an E-book from the publisher’s website at www.musapublishing.com, as well as Amazon, Chapters/Indigo, Barns & Noble, and Smashwords.

To learn more about Chad and his writing, please visit his website: www.chadstrongswriting.weebly.com.