Jim Wills

Over the years, I've had many careers. In more or less chronological order, I've been a motorcyle mechanic/race engine builder, a teacher of English Literature, a hard rock silver miner, a book editor/packager, a commercial writer in print and video, a wood-fired oven artisan bread baker and an author of short stories and many magazine articles. Some, if not all, overlap and continue. As a friend puts it, "One of these days, you'll find a hat that not only fits but stays put."

The first of my novels to appear on Amazon, A Few Men Faithful, directly reflects my life-long interest in Irish history and literature, with all their triumphs and failures. It begins the four novel series of Kavanagh stories that includes, in order: A Few Men Faithful, Philly MC, Shooter in a Plague Year, and This Hard Gemlike Flame. Set in Ireland during the tumultuous years of 1916-1924, the first is the bedrock upon which the other three titles are built; they take place in both North America and Ireland between 1948 and 2020. Throughout, the flaws and strengths, demons and angels, inherent anger and inherent gentleness of the Kavanagh clan are the central themes. Irish history ties all the threads together.

I've written other books, mostly trade paperbacks, but another recent work on Amazon is: Tools Are Made, Born Are Hands: Baking True Artisan Breads in a Wood Fired Oven. It's the direct result of many requests by the people from around the world who have come to my part of rural Ontario to attend workshops devoted to rediscovering the arts of wood fired bread baking in much the same way it was done from Pompeii to Paris. In my author photo, I'm looking out from a Napoleonic-era wood fired oven complex in Sagunto, Spain.

More information on all these titles can be found on my website: www.marygbread.com

I live in a small 19th century village amid rolling dairy farms far enough outside Toronto to stay away if I want, yet close enough to visit if I choose. My partner, Wendy Carlson, and her daughter, Kate Amies, are frequent visitors, mostly, I suspect, to visit Cujo, the superannuated, deaf, twenty year old cat.