The Smiling Land

Name: The Smiling Land
Price: 60 AUD
Availability: OutOfStock
ISBN: 9780385694414

All Around the Circle in My Newfoundland and Labrador

Alan Doyle

$60

Paperback

Not in-store but you can order this
How long will it take?

Availability Information

We source books from suppliers in Australia and overseas. For books we don't currently have in stock, the time it takes to get them from our suppliers can vary widely - from a few days to a few months - so we check each book with each supplier to determine the expected time it will take to be supplied to us.

We will update you on expected arrival time to us. If this delay is too long, please let us know within 2 business days and we can give you options regarding cancelling or adjusting your order. More details on cancelling your order can be found in our Terms of Trade.

To find out the anticipated arrival time for specific items prior to ordering, please contact us by phone or email:

Phone +61 2 9264 3111, or 1800 4 BOOKS (1800 4 26657) if outside Sydney:
option 1 Abbey's Bookshop (Crime, History, Science, Kids & more) • info@abbeys.com.au
option 2 Language Book Centre (ESL & Foreign Languages) • language@abbeys.com.au
option 3 Galaxy Bookshop (Sci-fi, Fantasy, Romance, Graphic Novels) • sf@galaxybooks.com.au

QTY:

English

Doubleday Canada
04 November 2025

Memoirs

From one of Canada's most beloved and celebrated Newfoundlanders comes a rollicking insider's guide to the province, told as only Alan Doyle can tell it.

From one of Canada's most beloved and celebrated Newfoundlanders comes a rollicking insider's guide to the province, told as only Alan Doyle can tell it.

Few Canadian musicians are as synonymous with their home province as Alan Doyle is to his-and even fewer once worked as tour guides. In The Smiling Land, Alan reprises his tour-guiding role to welcome the rest of Canada to his home and take readers on an adventure- a freewheeling road trip through Newfoundland, its history, and its culture. From Fogo Island to the Southwest Coast, Labrador to Ferryland, and everywhere in between, Alan's Newfoundland awaits you.

There are visits to windswept coastlines and towering crags, ancient Viking and Basque fishing settlements, and more lighthouses than you can shake a foghorn at. More recent settlements are also part of the itinerary, from burgeoning arts venues and communities to more humble but no less world-class locales, such as Foley's Shed, a jaunty live-music pub that-as its name suggests-happens to be in some guy named Foley's shed. Alan provides savvy insider tips for visitors to St. John's, like how to score fish and chips and a free ride by hopping into the delivery person's car as they drive your food to your desired destination. Or, for the aspiring rum smuggler visiting the Burin Peninsula, how to sneak bottles from the French territory of Saint-Pierre and Miquelon to the shores of Newfoundland. There are dolphin sightings, cliffside hikes among flocks of ocean-plunging puffins, and a pilgrimage to the home of the (late) great auk. And what tour of Newfoundland could be complete without a short history of what can best be described as ""icebergs that look like things,"" an illustrious history that includes an exact replica of the Virgin Mary that once washed into St. John's harbour, and the more recent-and far less holy-""Dickie Berg,"" which made international headlines for looking like . . . well, not the Virgin Mary.

Wildly entertaining, informative, and brimming with Alan's classic brand of storytelling and romping good fun, The Smiling Land is a celebration of Newfoundland-both its storied past and its ever-vibrant present.

By: Alan Doyle
Imprint: Doubleday Canada
Country of Publication: Canada
Dimensions: Height: 235mm, Width: 158mm, Spine: 16mm
Weight: 475g
ISBN: 9780385694414
ISBN 10: 0385694415
Pages: 264
Publication Date: 04 November 2025
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

ALAN DOYLE is a Canadian musician, an actor and a writer. His albums as a solo artist and as front man for the Newfoundland Celtic-rock band Great Big Sea have sold over a million copies. He has starred in such features as Ridley Scott's Robin Hood and CBC's Republic of Doyle. He has written three books, Where I Belong, A Newfoundlander in Canada, and All Together Now, each of which were national bestsellers. He has recently co-written and starred in a box-office-breaking stage musical, Tell Tale Harbour. Alan lives in St. John's, Newfoundland.