New Brunswick Author Portal

Source: Author / auteur

D.K.R. Boyd (aka, David Boyd and David Collins) is an award-winning Canadian author residing in St. Stephen, NB, who has published more than 25 books for children, young adults, and adults. Educated and raised in St. Stephen, he attended Mount Allison University in Sackville, NB. He was awarded a Prime Minister of Canada's Excellence in Teaching Award in 1998 for the development of creative writing e-courses. From 1996-1999, he was the chairman of the board of The READ-IN!™, the world's largest online telecommunications project for children at that time, involving dozens of international children's authors connecting via live texting with students in schools around the globe.

In 1996, the second book in his critically acclaimed trilogy for YA readers, Bottom Drawer, was nominated for the Governor General's Award for Children's Text. His YA trilogy (Looking for a Hero, Bottom Drawer, Closer to Hamlet) was recently republished for iPad and Kindle e-books. David was also a regular contributor to The Master Teacher, and to Apple Computer Inc.'s educational resource sites. In 2002, he led a U.S.-Canadian IT team to Singapore for a ministry-sponsored conference to teach educators how to bring digital technologies into their classrooms. As a playwright, Boyd adapted Shakespeare's Macbeth to create Macbeth: A Multimedia Event (1995) and Julius Caesar to create Caesar: A Multimedia Event (2005) staging both events in Mississauga, Ont.'s Hammerson Hall.

David's four-volume Adventures of Wordsy & Jess series (The Face in the Flames, Spellbound!, The Danger Beneath and Earthwatch), for middle schoolers has been reprinted several times, and his six-volume The Adventures of Milo the Wonderdog historical-humour-mysteries (Leonardo's Wings, Little Sure Shot, Khan of Khans, Suleyman's Library, Good Queen Bess, and Heart of a Lion) were recently republished as e-books for iPad and Kindle.

With Kathy Douglas, a Massachusetts educator and artist, the first book in a new series of sports poetry for children and adults, My Mom Always Yells Too Loud in the Arena and Other Poems about Hockey is now available exclusively for iPad readers. Writing as "David Collins," his dystopian thriller for adults, The Grief Team, is available as a Kindle book on Amazon.

After retiring from Appleby College in 2007, David returned to St. Stephen to write a major work of historical fiction for adults. In July 2013, Volume One of his five-volume historical fiction series about how World War II actually began was published in e-book and trade paperback formats. The Reflecting Man is widely and deeply researched, employing hundreds of non-fiction accounts, journals, and diaries of actual participants and observers of the darkening clouds over Europe and the descent into war. With the publication of the final volume, Five, on April 15, 2024, the series is complete.

How has New Brunswick influenced your work?

[It inspired] Champlain Summer

by David Boyd. A novel for middle schoolers set in St. Stephen, NB. When Max Bonney's father and stepmother experience marital difficulties, 12-year-old Max and his older sister, Sara, are sent to St. Stephen, NB, to spend the summer with their paternal grandparents.

What is your favourite New Brunswick book, and why?

Ragged Islands and The Wise and Foolish Virgins by Don Hannah, playwright/author born in Shediac, NB.

What do you consider to be the highlight of your career so far?

1996-1999, Chairman of the board of The READ-IN!™, the world's largest online telecommunications project for children at that time, involving dozens of international children's authors connecting via live texting with students in schools around the globe.

Literary Prizes
Prime Minister's Awards for Excellence in Teaching - 1998
Nomination - Governor-General's Literary Awards. Young People's Literature - Text - 1996	In recognition of: Bottom Drawer

Featured Publication

The Reflecting Man. (Vol. 1) (2017)

Excerpt: A 5-volume historical fiction series set in multiple locales in Canada, America, France, Germany, and England, before and during the Second World War, The Reflecting Man is the antic, ribald journey of a loquacious and unreliable narrator, Kurtis De'ath, from the Maritimes in Canada, whose unusual talents lead him into the innermost circles of Hitler's Third Reich and Churchill's British government. Kurtis' journey through the roots and branches of actual historical figures and events is, at its heart, in meticulous detail, an examination of how Europe went to war in 1939. The Reflecting Man is himself a reflection of his times. The novel is widely and deeply researched, employing hundreds of non-fiction accounts, journals, and diaries of actual participants and observers of the darkening clouds over Europe and the descent into war.

Source(s): Author.