Taylor Colby grew up in the tiny Nova Scotia fishing village of Nickerson Harbour, but his guitar-playing skill led him to become a much sought-after studio musician in Los Angeles. Along with him went Laura, his childhood sweetheart and soulmate. In L.A., Laura becomes enamoured with the dark side of rock and roll life, leaving Taylor lost, distraught and deeply damaged. Taylor realizes he has to go back home to Nickerson Harbour, to confront Laura’s parents, to reunite with his father and to understand the truth of his own dysfunctional family.
Back in Nova Scotia, Taylor learns that his mother, who had abandoned him as a child, wants to come home to reconcile with her own past. Taylor is haunted by his loss and grief but must also come to terms with some hidden truths about Laura. As he begins to make sense of his past, he befriends an American feminist professor who is trying to start life anew in Canada with her troubled twelve-year-old son.
Cold Clear Morning is a novel about dreams realized and dreams shattered. It is about love and loss, hunting and healing, grief and forgiving. Taylor Colby speaks his story of what it takes to pick up the remains of a shattered life and find renewed purpose and hope. It is the story of going back to the home that you thought you could never return to. In his odyssey from Nova Scotia to British Columbia, Los Angeles, Philadelphia and back home, he attempts to find real meaning to his life of adventure and despair.