Rum Running Author Wins Big!

It’s been a banner year for Vancouver Island writer Rick James, author of Don’t Never Tell Nobody Nothin’ No How: The Real Story of West Coast Rum Running.

James used first-hand accounts of old-time rum-runners, newspaper coverage of the day, and many archival photographs to create Don’t Never Tell Nobody Nothin’ No How, a thoroughly researched and lively history that explains what really went down along the West Coast during the American “Noble Experiment” of Prohibition.

The book has just been proclaimed the winner of the Keith Matthews Award for a Book Deserving Special Recognition, which is administered by the Canadian Nautical Research Society (CNRS), and received a gold medal in the History category of the 2019 Independent Publisher Book Awards. The Independent Publisher Book Awards is open to authors published across North America. Earlier this year, Don’t Never Tell Nobody Nothin’ No How was also shortlisted for the Basil Stuart-Stubbs Prize for Outstanding Scholarly Book published in British Columbia.

Rick James is a writer, maritime historian and photographer whose work has been published in numerous periodicals including Canada’s History Magazine, Pacific Yachting and Western Mariner. He is also the author of the bestselling book Raincoast Chronicles 21: West Coast Wrecks and Other Maritime Tales. Many people recognize him from his role in The Sea Hunters episode, “Malahat: Queen of the Rum Runners,” which aired on Canada’s History channel. He lives in Royston, BC.