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This one comes with a warning.

If you like the fun, almost cosy Greenland Missing Persons stories, don’t pick up Broken Braid.

If you like the Greenland Crime stories, and even if you “liked” We Shall Be Monsters, think twice before picking up Broken Braid.

Sometimes I need to let go and to just embrace the darkness. Broken Braid is one of my grittier novels. And readers who enjoy spending time with Petra and the gang in Greenland may not appreciate quite so much grit.

Broken Braid is different. I don’t know whether I “like” it, but I like it, if that makes sense?

No apologies.

Good luck, folks!

Broken Braid is out today!

Shameless link.

Chris

I’ve been bingeing the Kevin Costner series “Yellowstone” recently. It does me no good whatsoever. I look at the mountains and think thoughts such as if it wasn’t for all the murder and killing, it would be a lovely place to live. Yeah, I know, dramatic license and all that. So I took a walk in the backyard instead.

I may have walked you through this before, but believe it or not, that’s a “river” in the foreground in the picture above. It’s called Gejl Å and I think it runs all the way to the west coast of Denmark. It’s more of a stream, really. But we’re comparing it to Yellowstone (really, we are) so we have to think BIG! This is where the cranes wander and eat, and come close to the house.

And then I went deeper into the backwoods. It was between hunting season, so I was less likely to get shot. (Unlike in Yellowstone!)

And “deep” in the backwoods, it gets a little Tolkienesque, which is fabulous. Here be orcs and all that!

And then it’s back to the ranch, you know, just in case Kevin pops in for a coffee! And if I could just figure out how to take photos with my mum’s camera, all would be well!

Chris (at the Petersen Ranch)

So I’m posting photos of classes from the past, all good kids, and now young professionals.

This was taken on the steps of the stone church in Uummannaq in 2010.

This has to be one of the last moments of an ice camp. You can see the anchor chain attached to the ice and the dogs tethered to the chain. There are sledges and some gear to the left. But you can also clearly see how thin and patchy the sea ice is. If you look to the horizon then you can see two small grey dots halfway between the peninsular on the left and an island in the right. We’ll come back to them in a moment.

From this angle the ice actually looks okay, but rookies like me stopped walking and sleding on it at least a week earlier. The “crop circles” on the ice are made by the chains and the dogs walking around their territory. There are some pallets that they sleep on to stop them freezing to the ice. This is really is last minute stuff.

And then the “grey dots” arrive, plowing a channel through the ice to bring the first supply ship of the year to Uummannaq. If you look at the line of small grey dots in front of the bow of the ship… Yep, that’s a dog team, racing the ship to the docks.

Don’t do this at home, folks!

Makes the stars of ice road truckers look like weekend warriors! 😉

Chris

Well, digging through “ye olde hard drive” can be fun. Yesterday I posted about Lars’ expedition from Copenhagen to Istanbul, and I found my folders of everything related to my solo kayak expedition in Greenland. Earlier this year I suggested I would return to the Yukon in my blog this summer. But now that I have rediscovered my kayak expedition, and a backup of the blogs… Well! It’s like hot noodles! Instablog! 🙂

So if you’re up for following me on a blast from the past, then starting on June 26, I’ll post my expedition blog from 2010. I’ve always wanted to turn it into a book. Maybe reposting the blog on what I think my be a dead blog now, will renew my enthusiasm for that project?

I’m going to post the blogs “as found”, worts and all.

Here’s a teaser photo – you can expect lots! I might post the originals as the photos on the blog were resized to cope with the horrendously expensive cost of the Internet in Greenland, and the 2GB monthly limit.

Yes, that’s right, 2GBs total, up and down. 😉

More later – June 26 to be exact.

Chris

Back in 2016 I finished writing my friend’s book. It remains my longest book to date, and my only work of non-fiction. It clocks in at a little over 92,000 words and charts the journey of Lars and his young family paddling two Hobie Kayaks from Copenhagen to Istanbul.

A few days before the final edit, I gifted Lars the book and all rights and royalties connected to it. We never had a contract, but you might say we “shook on it” as I printed my pledge on my hand.

Lars and his family travelled 7,300 kilometres over one and a half years. The book is very faithful to Lars’ diary that I used to reconstruct their story. Jane and I saw them off and met them again on their return. Very emotional.

This is their story, and here’s that Amazon link. 😉

Chris