Set in Vancouver in 1907, Better the Devil You Know is the outrageous tale of three unique and curious characters: the small-time con man who passes himself off as an evangelical preacher, the scrawny street-worker whom he reluctantly befriends, and the five-year-old hellion left in his care by a former lady friend. In the course of their adventures, these three misfits become involved with a larcenous lingerie salesman, a Klondike miner bent on recovering his stolen poke, a madam intent on revenge for past wrongs, a pugilistic lady barkeep, two doctors determined to acquire a cadaver of their own, a handful of incompetent and corrupt cops, and a piano teacher with reforming zeal. The pace is riotous, the action continuous, and nobody -- good or bad -- ever gets a break.
Betty Keller has lived in Vancouver, BC's Fraser Valley, the Okanagan and Kootenay areas, as well as in Nigeria. She taught in BC secondary schools, at Simon Fraser University and the University of British Columbia. A founding member of the SunCoast Writers Forge, she was the producer of the Sunshine Coast Festival of the Written Arts and the Sunshine Coast Writers-in-Residence Program for 12 years. Author and co-author of sixteen books of non-fiction and fiction, Betty has been the recipient of many awards, including The Canadian Biography Award (1980), The Lescarbot Award (1991), The Queen's Golden Jubilee Medal (2002), The Bill Duthie Booksellers' Choice Award (2003), and The Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize (2005). Please visit www.quintessentialwriters.com/keller.html.