Bernard D. Fardy

This book really needs to have its title turned around.

I'm referring to the fact that the title is "Ferryland: The Colony of Avalonia," but there is far more about the Newfoundland colonial era than about the more recent history of Ferryland (which is almost completely ignored). Given that my interest is mostly in Ferryland and the history of independent Newfoundland, I found that very disappointing. You may well disagree -- there is no question but that the colonial era was a more exciting time in Ferryland, featuring clashes with the government in London, pirates, conflicts with the French over who controlled Newfoundland, and more. The flip side is, you can get most of that from a general history of Newfoundland -- or even from a history of the long conflict between France and England.

And I have my doubts about the accuracy of the book. This is hard for me to verify a lot of this stuff -- but it wasn't at all hard to verify that Elizabeth I of England and Mary Queen of Scots were not sisters! (A claim made on page 26.) Elizabeth and Mary were first cousins once removed. And this wasn't a one-time glitch, since author Fardy calls Mary's son James VI and I Elizabeth's "nephew"; he was Elizabeth's first cousin twice removed. To be sure, Fardy might well know more about Newfoundland than about Tudor-era British genealogy -- but any book that lets howlers like that get through clearly wasn't very well edited.

Bottom line: This is often an exciting book. I did not find it at all useful. But what you need may be very different.… (more)