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Surrender
A whimsical wacky tale about a defunct school mascot, Chester the Beaver, and how he comes back to haunt the school principal responsible for his demise. It is a witty and outrageously funny book, abounding in linguistic pyrotechnics and saturated with literary and pop cultural references. But underneath the comic surface of the story are deep questions concerning the nature of free will. This is a remarkable first novel, sure to impress and entertain.
Paperback
First published October 1, 2011
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About the author
Peter Learn
7 books5 followers800 years ago in East Prussia, a tiny group of people had a revelation. Adult baptism was the one truth path! They split from their Mennonite brothers/sisters and formed a breakaway group known as the Dunkards. After having been escorted from East Prussia, Switzerland, and New York, our happy little clan ended up in Waterloo, the black walnuts having shown us the way. Even for us, the breeding pool was getting somewhat small and we decided once more to allow breeding with the formerly heathen Mennonites, enabling us to expand our choices to our 2nd and, in some cases, our 3rd cousins.
I married a Scottish/Cherokee woman. My children are thankful.
I married a Scottish/Cherokee woman. My children are thankful.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 24, 2025
I like to read and support Canadian authors but I’m kind of annoyed with myself for buying this one. Quite honestly, I bought it because I fondly remember another book I read about an explorer canoeing through the Ontario wilderness while studying family of beavers.
This book was nothing like that, at all. I didn’t understand the book. It had some interesting bits but way too far and few between. It just seemed like the guy’s stream of consciousness….whatever memories popped into his head at the time with no rhyme nor reason.
This book was nothing like that, at all. I didn’t understand the book. It had some interesting bits but way too far and few between. It just seemed like the guy’s stream of consciousness….whatever memories popped into his head at the time with no rhyme nor reason.
May 31, 2012
Peter Learn is the most unlikely purveyor of strange, dark and twisted, but the retired elementary school principal’s first foray into the literary arts is just that.
His book is well worth the journey, but it makes you look somewhat askance at your own child’s school principal.
Learn, a retired educator and relatively new transplant to Canmore from the Edmonton area (three years), has just had his first attempt at writing more than report cards and admin reports published by Quattro Press out of Toronto, a novella entitled Surrender.
The book is aptly titled, as the reader must do just that – surrender to Learn’s disturbingly hilarious imagination – to follow the thread of a plot from the innocuous dismissal of a school’s beaver mascot to the gates of hell and back (more precisely, hell’s anteroom, with a bit of limbo thrown in for colour). Along the way, we are privy to the darker side of Learn’s dreams, a First Nations storyteller and some resurrected Nazi demons guarding the gates of heaven.
It’s a pretty wild ride and well worth the time for the numerous laugh-out-loud analogies and bizarre realities one encounters along his journey. With letters to the principal from parents excusing their child’s highly aberrant behaviour, observations on enforced ‘professional development’ and wry asides on humans in general, Learn shows a keen ability to find funny where none is readily apparent.
His book is well worth the journey, but it makes you look somewhat askance at your own child’s school principal.
Learn, a retired educator and relatively new transplant to Canmore from the Edmonton area (three years), has just had his first attempt at writing more than report cards and admin reports published by Quattro Press out of Toronto, a novella entitled Surrender.
The book is aptly titled, as the reader must do just that – surrender to Learn’s disturbingly hilarious imagination – to follow the thread of a plot from the innocuous dismissal of a school’s beaver mascot to the gates of hell and back (more precisely, hell’s anteroom, with a bit of limbo thrown in for colour). Along the way, we are privy to the darker side of Learn’s dreams, a First Nations storyteller and some resurrected Nazi demons guarding the gates of heaven.
It’s a pretty wild ride and well worth the time for the numerous laugh-out-loud analogies and bizarre realities one encounters along his journey. With letters to the principal from parents excusing their child’s highly aberrant behaviour, observations on enforced ‘professional development’ and wry asides on humans in general, Learn shows a keen ability to find funny where none is readily apparent.
February 10, 2015
Hilarious view of life inside the head of a school principal with ADHD, a fine collection of students and parents of students, and a rich fantasy life.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews