Chance Does Not Exist

by Richard Stanford

A journalist plunges into the underworld of Paris in 1885, searching for the elusive man who founded the International Red Cross and who has lived homeless, without a trace for twenty years. With this story, Searching For Henri, Richard Stanford opens his new collection, Chance Does Not Exist, elaborating on the themes of missed opportunities, the inevitability of change and the powerful but fragmentary quality of memory. People are on journeys in these two cousins, with temperaments so opposite they live in different worlds, drive in The Chevy Belair through a blizzard to a unique destination; in Jailbirds, a man fascinated with photography gets a job building a prison museum only to travel through time to discover the most inhumane of its acquisitions. Thieves, artists, journalists, wanderers, are the people who populate these stories, so expect the unexpected.

227 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 13, 2012

About the author

Richard Stanford is a writer, photographer and filmmaker. He wrote and directed his first film, "I Wanna Be Me", a documentary on the life of two parolees for Rogers Cablevision in 1984. He went on to produce 52 documentaries for the current affairs program, "As It Is", for CFCF-TV, and another 15 documentaries for "NOW" broadcast on CBC-TV.

Richard wrote scripts for the programs "Lassie" and "My Hometown", both for YTV. His script for the feature film "Captive" was released theatrically in 1998 and subsequently broadcast on the CTV network. He worked as a story editor for three feature films that have all be released theatrically. In 1982, Richard established the Co-Op de la Main, a bilingual film cooperative in Montréal.

Richard’s photographic works have been exhibited at Galerie A - Montreal Museum of Fine Arts; Vehicule Gallery; Critical Eye Gallery; Skelly Gallery, Arbor Gallery; and Abbey for the Arts.

Richard’s essays have been published in The Globe and Mail, Canada’s History Magazine, P.O.V, Montage, OVI Magazine, and Ani-Mag, and he is the co-editor of "What Rough Beast", a collection of essays on animal welfare. His short stories have been published in the Adirondack Review and OVI Magazine.