Dave Preston

Biography

Dave Preston is a writer and musician, born in North Yorkshire where he lived on a farm and was raised by a mother who worries too much. After studying agriculture, engineering, and computer science he leapt across the ocean to live and work in Canada.

He is the author of five books (and contributor to several others) and four plays, as well as hundreds of newspaper and magazine articles and columns. He's an award-winning brewer and winemaker, and also admits to writing poetry.

Weekends often find him playing guitar and singing in a rock and roll band (though his mother worries that he's getting too old for all this, and his knees often agree).

He lives on Vancouver Island, BC, with too much garden, and almost too many dogs.

Where to find Dave Preston online

Books

Try and Stop Me - A Daughter's Challenge, A Father's Poetry
Price: $2.99 USD. Words: 4,830. Language: English. Published: October 17, 2016 . Categories: Poetry » Contemporary Poetry, Nonfiction » Parenting » Psychiatric disorders
My daughter, fifteen years old and apparently coping with life, was not coping at all. She tried to kill herself seven times. She was in desperate need of medical help and serious parenting. Try and Stop Me was the terrifying message I read daily in her face, in her actions, and in a loud, angry silence that fiercely grew between us. It was a challenge I had to accept. The poetry is our story.
Yorkshire's Christmas Recipes
Price: $2.99 USD. Words: 6,690. Language: English. Published: October 13, 2016 . Categories: Nonfiction » Cooking, Food, Wine, Spirits » Seasonal
Enjoy these traditional Yorkshire Christmas foods and a few yuletide drinks to go with them! The recipes are simple to make and call for ingredients found in most local markets and grocery stores. Delicious food from the lusty moors and dales and the bustling towns and cities of this great county will fill your kitchen with Christmas cheer and nourish you and your guests throughout the season!
The Story of Butchart Gardens
Price: $2.99 USD. Words: 32,970. Language: English. Published: October 15, 2013 . Categories: Nonfiction » Home & Garden » Gardening » Landscape, Nonfiction » History » North America » Canada
How did Jenny Butchart turn an ugly, disused limestone quarry into the world’s most famous private garden? Over 100 years later, Butchart Gardens still attracts almost a million visitors from around the globe, to enjoy a world created by an unrivalled green-thumb visionary. Filled with myth, legend, and love, this is a cheerfully told story, as colourful and unique as the gardens themselves.
Take Three
Price: $1.99 USD. Words: 7,680. Language: English. Published: August 13, 2013 . Categories: Plays » Canadian
Take three women and listen to the stories they tell here for the first time. Hear how unremarkable lives can become quite remarkable when they strip away the hair, the clothes, the makeup, the smile and reveal themselves for who they really are. Mixing their laughter with tears, each one struggles, each one wrestles with the past and fears the future. But which one of them has true hope?
Waiting for Godonlyknows
Price: $1.99 USD. Words: 6,350. Language: English. Published: August 13, 2013 . Categories: Plays » Canadian
Godot revisited by two luckless pilgrims camped out in the disappearing wilderness. Equal shots of humour and pathos fuel this look at rampant consumerism and a society that threatens to bulldoze everything into the ocean, for the price of creature comforts.
Personals
Price: $1.99 USD. Words: 7,290. Language: English. Published: August 8, 2013 . Categories: Plays » Canadian, Fiction » Humor & comedy » General
Love, hate, passion, need, lies and lust... and somewhere in there is the truth. The crazy, painful world of personals, where people advertise themselves for emotional sale to the highest bidder. Sometimes a no-rules, bare-knuckle brawl, and sometimes a match made in heaven (or in fine print). Personals had a sellout premier at the Victoria Fringe Festival - "Dark, biting, timeless humour."
Rails & Rooms - A Timeless Canadian Journey
Price: $2.99 USD. Words: 72,660. Language: English. Published: February 12, 2013 . Categories: Nonfiction » Travel » Essays & Travelogues, Nonfiction » History » North America » Canada
From Halifax to Victoria, clear across Canada, Dave Preston rode the rails, exploring what was once the most popular mode of transport in the country. Days and nights spent rollicking across the amazing and diverse geography of Canada were punctuated by stays at some of the country's oldest and most prestigious hotels; those built by the railway companies to entice the most affluent of travellers.
It's Time I Told You
Price: $1.99 USD. Words: 3,910. Language: English. Published: February 3, 2013 . Categories: Poetry » Canadian Poetry, Nonfiction » Relationships & Family » Emotions
Love can be a fleeting moment of deepest joy, or the journey of a lifetime. Here's a collection of love poems from all stages of the journey, some illustrated by the author's photography and artwork. The pieces range from finding and nurturing love, creating romance, through riding out the storms of a relationship, to acceptance of the relationship as being beyond control. Love hurts and heals.
All is Bright - A Yorkshire Lad's Christmas
Price: $2.99 USD. Words: 39,360. Language: English. Published: November 10, 2012 . Categories: Fiction » Humor & comedy » General
Derek Bradley’s just like any other daft young lad growing up in the 1960s - unique. Through his brutally honest eyes and ears we see what a Yorkshire village Chtistmas was. It’s how Christmas used to be – real, fun, and real funny. “We like it!” BBC Radio Award-winning author Dave Preston was born and raised in rural Yorkshire. This is his funniest book. Also includes Yorkshire recipes.