J. B. MacKinnon

James Bernard MacKinnon, commonly cited as J.B. MacKinnon, is a Canadian journalist, contributing editor and book author. MacKinnon is best known for co-authoring with Alisa Smith the bestselling book The 100-Mile Diet: A Year of Local Eating, encouraging readers to focus on local eating as a way to address current environmental and economic issues.[1] MacKinnon and Smith also collaborated in the creation of the Food Network Canada television series The 100 Mile Challenge, based on the book. He has won six National Magazine Awards,[2] and the 2006 Charles Taylor Prize for best work of Literary Non-Fiction.[3]

As a contributing editor to Canadian magazines Adbusters, Explore, and Vancouver, and freelance journalist, MacKinnon's writings span many literary genres and topics, including travel, sports, and politics.[4] MacKinnon's first book, Dead Man in Paradise, combines family history and unsolved mystery in the retelling of the murder of MacKinnon's uncle, a Canadian priest, in 1965 in the Dominican Republic. It won the Charles Taylor Prize.[5] In 2008, MacKinnon co-authored I Live Here with Mia Kirshner, Michael Simons, and Paul Shoebridge, a collection of stories about victims of crisis throughout the globe.[6] In 2011, he wrote the script for the interactive web documentary Bear 71, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.[7][8] MacKinnon lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.[1]

In 2021 he published The Day the World Stops Shopping: How ending consumerism gives us a better life and a greener world.[9][10]