All About Elinor Florence
I live in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia, although I grew up on a prairie grain farm, a former Second World War training airport, and my rural roots run deep. I still own farmland in Saskatchewan and visit the Land of the Living Skies, as they call it, every summer. I also have Indigenous ancestors, and I’m a proud member of the Métis Nation of B.C.
After completing journalism school, I landed my first job as a farm reporter and went on to work for daily papers in all four Western provinces.
Weary of city life, my husband and I moved with our children from Vancouver to the tiny mountain resort of Invermere. I spent the next eight years working from home for Reader’s Digest, writing articles about subjects ranging from lost loggers to liver transplants. I then jumped at the chance to purchase my local newspaper, and turned The Columbia Valley Pioneer into an award-winning small town staple.
But my greatest challenge remained: to write a novel. Inspired by my mother’s wartime stories, I tackled my first historical novel, Bird’s Eye View, about a prairie farm girl who joins the air force during the Second World War. To my delight, it became a Canadian bestseller.
My second novel, Wildwood, tells the story of a single mother from the big city who inherits an abandoned farmhouse in northern Canada. It was named by Kobo as “One of the Top 100 Most Popular Canadian Novels of All Time.”
My newest novel, Finding Flora, describes the adventures of a young Scottish woman who leaps from a moving train in 1905 to escape her abusive husband and claims her own homestead on the Alberta prairie. That will be published by Simon & Schuster in April 2025.
I’m also deeply invested in my monthly blog called Letters From Windermere, a digital letter that I email every month to my readers describing my love of all things vintage, as reflected in my research, travels and collections. I haven’t missed a letter in eleven years!
As for my personal life, two of our three adult daughters live in our town, along with their five young children. My husband and I are blessed to share our lives with them. Like Miss Marple, I love the unending parade of village life, and can’t imagine living anywhere else.
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The Long Version
For those of you who want to take a deep dive into someone else’s past (I am one of those people who loves all the background details), here’s a summary of my adventures in three countries and five provinces, from the farm to the city and back again to a small mountain town.
My Rural Roots
I was born and raised among the vast grain fields of the Canadian prairies, on a former Second World War airfield. This was my childhood home, and I still sleep here when I visit my family farm. Read more about that in my very first blog post: Growing Up With Air Force Ghosts.
My Journalism Career
After attending one of Canada’s last one-room country schools, I earned my English degree from the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon and landed my first reporting job at my hometown paper in North Battleford.
It was the tail end of the hot lead era, and from my desk I could see the linotype operator in his green eyeshade and ink-stained apron, raising his arms to shoulder height as he hammered the keys.
I wanted more education, so I drove 3,000 kilometres to Ottawa in my Chevette Scooter, and earned an honours journalism degree from Carleton University.
Note the manual typewriter on my desk.
I then returned to my rural roots, working as an Agriculture Reporter for The Western Producer newspaper in Saskatoon.
It was a great job: I wore cowboy boots to work and dated a string of cute farm boys. I covered bull sales, rodeos and even the Calgary Stampede. This photo shows me at the Port of Vancouver grain terminal.
Still, I was longing for the bright lights. I packed my Chevy Vega and drove another 3,000 kilometres to Los Angeles, where I spent a year freelancing. I had a few small successes. I sold my column “Hollywood Happenings” to three weekly newspapers, including the Yellowknife News of the North in the Northwest Territories.
Eventually I ran out of money and started working at a one-hour photomat across the street from the famous Los Angeles Farmers Market. It was deadly dull, although I met a few minor celebrities. (And I once spotted Doris Day, trying on leather boots in a shoe store.)
But I really wanted to be a hard-hitting newspaper reporter, so I came home to Canada. My first venture into daily newspapers was at The Red Deer Advocate in Alberta. The newsroom staff was young and dedicated, and we put out a great paper. I started as the Agriculture Reporter and eventually became the newspaper’s first female City Editor.
I even rubbed shoulders with royalty (at least, I did have lunch in the same room as Princess Margaret).
From there, I took my Volkswagen Scirocco for a 1,400-kilometre trek across the prairie to Manitoba, where I worked for an upstart tabloid called the Winnipeg Sun, notorious for its scantily clad Sunshine Girls. The newsroom was full of brilliant but odd characters – like the copy editor who lived in a motel and was paid in cash. I kept this issue with Canadian hockey star Wayne Gretzky’s wedding photo on the front page.
I had always yearned to live on the West Coast, so I packed my Pontiac Grand LeMans and drove 2,300 kilometres west to Vancouver, where I lived in a beautiful seaside neighbourhood called Deep Cove and worked for the Province, another lively tabloid.
Our Mexican Adventure
In 1994 I left newspapers behind when I moved to Mexico for eighteen months with my husband and young children. My husband was contracted as the construction manager for a Canadian gold mining company.
We lived in a big, dusty northern city named Chihuahua, Chihuahua (I love saying that name), but spent much of our time in the remote Sierra Madre mountains where the mine was located. Sometimes we flew out to the mine in this tiny aircraft.
Our Mountain Home
After returning to Canada, we decided to raise our kids in a small town, so we settled in the mountain resort of Invermere, British Columbia and built my dream home on the edge of town, next door to the wilderness, overlooking beautiful Lake Windermere.
I wanted to buy an old house but my husband wouldn’t hear of it, so I tried to make my new house look old instead. Read about my efforts here: Ten Ways to Make a New House Look Old.
My lovely home office with a view of Lake Windermere is surrounded by the alpine forest, and deer often peek at me through the windows! Read more about my home office here: Home Office Love.
Writing for Reader’s Digest
When I ran across a local guy whose propane truck had gone off a cliff, the words “Drama in Real Life” sprang to mind, and I fired off the story idea to Reader’s Digest. The editors published “Under the Death Cloud” and I became a regular contributor to the magazine for the next eight years.
My favourite assignments were the “heart” stories, as the Digest called them, like the one called “Bradley’s Last Hope,” about a little boy whose father gave him a liver transplant.
Publishing My Own Newspaper
When an opportunity arose to purchase a fledgling weekly newspaper, I couldn’t resist the challenge. For the next six years I practically lived at the office, writing articles, selling classified advertisements over the counter, and sweeping the floor.
I had a winning business model because I know what local folks want to read about: their friends and neighbours. The Columbia Valley Pioneer thrived. We called it “The People Paper.” One man even proposed to his girlfriend on the front page.
My Debut Novel, Bird’s Eye View
I still hadn’t fulfilled my lifelong dream of writing fiction. My heart had always been captured by my mother’s tales of life on the home front, and my father’s stories about serving overseas in the air force, so I sold my newspaper and tackled my wartime novel.
My young heroine Rose works for Allied Intelligence, spying on the enemy from the sky by deciphering aerial photographs. I immersed myself in the Second World War period to the point where I went to bed each night braced for an air raid!
To my delight, Bird’s Eye View was published in 2014 and became a Canadian bestseller.
Lest We Forget
While researching my wartime novel, I interviewed people who lived through the Second World War, both on the home front and overseas, and uncovered some truly inspirational stories. They are published here on this website, categorized under the heading Lest We Forget. Please feel free to read, reflect, and share.
This is one of many veterans I interviewed, Jessie Lee Middleton. Read her story here: Nursing Sister Healed the Wounds of War.
My Second Novel, Wildwood
I drew on my own farming background for my second novel Wildwood, about a single mother from the big city who inherits an abandoned farmhouse in northern Alberta, and must learn the pioneer arts in order to survive — including cooking on a wood stove. It was named by Kobo as One of the Top 100 Most Popular Canadian Novels of All Times.
My fans loved it, too. Here I am with book fan Kim Schlieper of Victoria, B.C.
My New Novel, Finding Flora
My latest novel will be published by Simon & Schuster in April 2025. was inspired by my homesteading grandparents and my indigenous ancestors. Flora is a young Scottish woman who jumps from a moving train in 1905 to escape from her abusive husband and finds herself alone on the Alberta prairie. She decides the best way to disappear is to claim a homestead. She is helped in her quest by several other women, all of whom have their own struggles with a hostile government.
This photograph shows the style of clothes Flora would have worn. Read more here: What Homesteaders Wore.
Read a synopsis and find out how to preorder the book here: Finding Flora.
Letters From Windermere
My monthly blog titled Letters From Windermere is a monthly letter to my readers that reflects my love for people and their stories. My love of history and all things vintage is reflected in my novels, my collections, my travels, my home on Lake Windermere, and the monthly letter that I have been sending to my dear readers for the past eleven years.
Here’s a recent example: Queen Mary 2: Ten Things to Know.
My Personal Life
I’ve been happily married for three decades to a mining construction manager. He works with a Canadian company that builds gold mines all over the world. I was lucky enough to accompany him to a few exotic locations, such as a mining camp on the windswept tundra of Far Eastern Russia. He still does some consulting work from home. He’s also a big help when it comes to lugging books around to events!
Two of our adult daughters live right here in Invermere, and the third one lives in Calgary, Alberta, just three hours away.
We also have five grandchildren who live in our town. We love them dearly and see them almost every day. My husband and I are blessed to share our lives with them.
My Friends Near and Far
I keep up a lively correspondence with all the lovely people who write to tell me they enjoy reading my books, subscribe to my blog, or visit me along the book trail.
Please email me, or write me an old-fashioned letter! I answer every message and letter. My contact information including my mailing address is here: Contact Elinor.