Blood and Salt by Robert MacKinnon

Boularderie Island Press

ISBN: 978-1-926448-47-3

$20.95

Robert MacKinnon is an ex-RCMP officer, an armchair historian, and a world-renowned maritime salver and treasure hunter. Blood and & Salt captivates readers with more of Robert’s tales of shipwrecks, buried treasure, unscrupulous privateers and lost villages. But that’s not all. Blood & Salt also explores Robert’s own intriguing Highland Scots heritage as a member of Clan MacKinnon. This affords him a deep connection to monumental historic events such as the Highland Clearances and the Battle of Culloden, as well as a direct blood relationship to Donald 1st, 7th century King of the Picts,and a Norse princess known as Saucy Mary.

This eclectic collection of stories shares with readers many other aspects of Robert’s professional and personal experience. He tells a chilling story of being the first RCMP officer at the crash site of Air Canada Flight 621 in 1970, arriving to find the DC-8 and all of its 109 passengers and crew disintegrated beyond recognition. Another tale reveals Robert’s long-time association with Frenchie, a Mi’kmaw man who gives him, and readers, an up-close-and-personal lesson in Mi’kmaw traditions and legends. And true to his nature, Robert presents readers with his own deeply held views on a variety of topics, like unfair maritime law, government bureaucracy and Cape Breton independence. And in case you’re not already hooked, Blood & Salt revives the age-old debate: Was Captain Kidd really a visitor to the Mira River?