#1 bestselling author Spencer Sekyer has spent much of his life going where the stories are; from classrooms in conflict zones to animal rescues and Afghanistan. His work explores friendship, courage, responsibility, and what happens when ordinary people refuse to walk away.
Concept cover — working title and design subject to change.
Current Work
The Last Gate
Working title
A new work of narrative nonfiction about friendship, family, and one Afghan family’s struggle to escape Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
Narrative nonfiction with the propulsion of a thriller.
A life measured in causes, not years.
Spencer has never had just one calling. Each chapter began the same way — he saw something that needed doing, and he did it. Here is the work, newest first.
Operation N
“Some myths are buried for a reason. Some truths are too ancient to confront.”
In the unforgiving mountains of Afghanistan, an elite squad of soldiers uncovers a secret older than war itself — hunted by an ancient biblical being born of legend, a Nephilim of monstrous size and terrifying power.
As ancient myth collides with modern warfare, survival becomes more than a mission. It becomes a reckoning. How do you fight an enemy born of the gods?
Written by Spencer Sekyer · Illustrated by Gayashan Elpiyita
"Paint your masterpiece with a palette of kindness."
— Spencer Sekyer, Saving Manno
In Duhok, Kurdistan, Spencer formed an unlikely bond with Manno — a young chimpanzee kidnapped from his family in central Africa and sold into captivity. Determined to get him home, Spencer waded into the shadowy world of global animal trafficking and, with ISIS closing in, set an international rescue in motion before it was too late.
Featuring a foreword by the legendary primatologist.
On the streets of Kabul, Spencer found a street dog and her puppies born in a ditch, enduring the brutal life of strays in a war-torn nation. They looked to him for safety — so he and his wife brought seven of them home, summiting Mt. Kilimanjaro along the way. Every one of the dogs found a forever home in Canada.
A small-town kid who went looking for the hard places.
Spencer Sekyer was born and raised in Dawson Creek, British Columbia. He chased a dream of professional sport first — a role player, then four seasons as a linebacker for the University of Alberta Golden Bears — before earning his degrees and becoming a teacher.
Realizing he still had a great deal to learn about the world, he began spending his holidays where help was scarce: teaching in Sierra Leone, the Dheisheh refugee camp in the West Bank, Afghanistan, Somalia, Ethiopia and Haiti, and travelling through the Middle East, Central and South America, and across East and Central Africa — each trip sending him home a little wiser and more determined to give back.
Raised in northern British Columbia, chasing a future in sport.
The Turn
The Classroom
A teaching career that quietly became a passport to the world’s conflict zones.
Home Base
Sherwood Park
An acreage shared with his wife Dr. Christie Macdonald Sekyer, their son, and their dogs, Blizz and Tundra.
Where the work took him.
Holidays spent teaching and helping in developing nations and conflict zones across four continents.
SLE · W.AFRICA
Sierra Leone
Volunteering in a local school — the trip that started a lifelong habit.
PSE · W.BANK
Dheisheh Camp
Teaching inside a Palestinian refugee camp.
AFG · KABUL
Afghanistan
Working with street kids and orphans — and meeting the dogs who changed everything.
IRQ · KURDISTAN
Duhok
Assisting KOARP as ISIS advanced — where he met Manno.
SOM · ETH
Horn of Africa
Teaching and aid work across Somalia and Ethiopia.
HTI · CARIBBEAN
Haiti
Lending a hand far from the comforts of home.
TZA · 5895M
Kilimanjaro
Summited the roof of Africa to bring the rescued dogs home.
PER · AMAZON
The Amazon
A journey deep into the rainforest he later wrote about.
From rescuing abandoned dogs in Kabul, to saving a chimpanzee from a war zone, to telling new stories on the page — each mission has carried Spencer somewhere harder, and a little more worth it.
Firsthand writing from a life spent in far-off places
The Journal
The stories that didn't fit in a book — written from refugee camps and rainforests, in the wake of rescues and the quiet that followed. Firsthand, unpolished, and sent home since 2011.
Featuring a foreword by the legendary primatologist.— Dr. Jane GoodallBuy Saving Manno Online
