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Pickle Me This

April 9, 2013

Books For Sale!

booksOn Saturday morning, Harriet’s playschool (Huron Playschool Cooperative) will hold their annual Book/Toy/Bake Sale to raise funds for the Jenna Morrison Family Trust. This event nicely coincides with my need to rid my house of much of its contents, and so I will be donating a huge pile of adult books to the sale, and some of them are really good.

Good books at good prices for a good cause–what could be better? Come out on Saturday April 13 from 10:00-12:30, 383 Huron St.

March 14, 2013

Fake books and orange books

turretsI am a little too excited about my latest blog post at 49th Shelf, which is a list of Fictitious Can-Lit: The Books that Never Were. I’ve made a list of fictitious books mentioned in several Canadian novels, cribbed book descriptions, and Stuart created book covers to accompany each one. Check out the post, and see how many of these books-in-books you’re familiar with.

I’m also very excited about the Orange Prize longlist. I rarely read books based upon such nominations but I am also happy to have my own tastes confirmed when the books I’ve read already turn up on these lists. And with the Orange Prize, which is of course Orange no longer, but alas, my own tastes are confirmed more than with any other award. I haven’t read Kate Atkinson’s new one yet (I have pre-ordered it from my local, and waiting for the release day. New Kate Atkinson is an event, you see…), but am glad to see it there. And I have read Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl, Barbara Kingsolver’s Flight Behaviour, Emily Perkins’ The Forrests, and Zadie Smith’s NW, and they were among my top reads of 2012. Though I’m rooting for The Forrests in particular, because it’s a book that deserves so much more attention.

January 27, 2013

We visit the Intergalactic Travel Authority to meet Gabby

IMG_0244We ventured westward today for our first visit to the Intergalactic Travel Authority, an out-of-this-world cafe at Bloor and Dufferin. The cafe was inspired by the 826 storefronts in America , which run literacy programs for young people. Apart from the usual coffee and baked goods, customers at the Intergalactic Travel Authority can also purchase black holes in cans, robots and monsters, plus BOOKS, the proceeds from which fund the cafe’s literacy programs.

IMG_0243Which take place through the cafe’s magical spaceship doors…

And we got to walk through those amazing sliding doors today because we were there for the launch of Joyce Grant‘s picture book Gabby, illustrated by Jan Dolby. (Joyce, a longtime literacy advocate, contributed a wonderful post to 49th Shelf this week for Family Literacy Day with tips for raising a reader.)

IMG_0242Gabby is a fabulous book about a funny little girl who must deal with the consequences when she drops her book on the floor and all its letters fall out upon impact. When she starts picking up the letters now scattered all around her room, she is amazed to discover that the letters, when assembled in a precise manner, start taking on a life of their own. With the C, A and a T, Gabby makes a cat, but then it needs feeding, and trouble starts brewing when the next letters she picks up happen to spell “bird”.

IMG_0245It’s a perfect book for Harriet, who is just beginning to understand how letters get together to make words. (Her partiality to the letter H, however, means that she’s not really bothered by the other 25 in the alphabet. Perhaps this book will help her get over that?) How letters with their individual sounds each have their own particular powers. Older readers will delight in guessing which words Gabby’s errant letters spell, as attested to by these kids’ reaction when Joyce was reading to us. The illustrations by Dolby are bright and fun, and subsequent readings reveal all kinds of hidden surprises.

IMG_0239Though we in our family have a tendency to like any place where the cake is particularly abundant, we had an especially wonderful time today at the Gabby book launch. We were happy to pick up a copy of the book and have it signed by author and illustrator (who kindly noted with her autograph that H is indeed for Harriet!). And a book launch at such an extraordinary venue? It isn’t every day when you get the privilege of walking through a pair of sliding spaceship doors.

Isn’t reading wonderful?

Gabby page 8

November 4, 2012

Wild Writers in Waterloo

I took all the wrong pictures in Waterloo yesterday at the Wild Writers Festival. The pictures that I should have taken included one of a room full of about 30 students (with such friendly faces!) who’d turned out to listen to me talk about blogging for an hour and a bit; the Wild Women Writers panel with Miranda Hill, Alison Pick, Carrie Snyder and Kerry-Lee Powell, which was such a joy and inspiration to listen to; Miranda Hill’s book Sleeping Funny, which I had to buy because its author enchanted me; photos of all the people I know from online only and was so thrilled to meet in person finally; and pictures of The New Quarterly staff and their terrific volunteers who worked so hard to make things run smoothly and make the day so enjoyable for us.

The pictures I did take were of my gourmet lunch box, which I’d been ridiculously looking forward to and which surpassed all my expectations and then some. The box was massive, and the food was so so good. I also took a picture of (part of) the booksale table (by Words Worth Books), because they’d brought in Best Canadian Essays 2011 (with my essay in it!) and put it on display beside all the other festival presenters’. I am sure it sold like hotcakes, but yes, it was kind of the honour of my life to be a little old blogger up there beside some of Can-Lit’s finest. A thrill I will never, never forget.

Rumour has it that the event was a success, and they might put it on again next year. Here’s to the beginning of a fantastic literary tradition!

October 24, 2012

On the Rosalind Prize

So thrilled to read about the advent of the  Rosalind Prize, Canada’s new literary prize for fiction by women. Which is not to say that Canada needs more literary prizes in general, but I think we need this one. Two years ago, I shared my thoughts on the Orange Prize, and I haven’t changed my mind. Oh, and you know my feelings on women and the Leacock Prize. Anyway, it turns out that the stats for women and Canadian literary prizes are as pathetic as all the others.

In a week during which the same old (justified) woes about women’s representation were aired again, and a venerable Canadian publisher faces peril, it is refreshing to see action for positive change and it’s really nice to be inspired.

October 9, 2012

Wild Writers in Waterloo, November 2-3

I’m looking forward to the Wild Writers Literary Festival next month in Waterloo, where I will be running a class called “The Art of Blogging”. Other excellent events are scheduled throughout the festival, featuring readers including Terry Fallis, Merilyn Simonds, Alison Pick, Miranda Hill, Carrie Snyder, Diane Schoemperlen, Helen Humphreys, Alexander Macleod, Elizabeth Hay, Michael Redhill. and Michael Crummey. You can check out the full schedule here. Hope to see you there!

June 14, 2012

A Page From the Wonders…

This is the book I bought tonight in celebration of the Literary Press Group having their funding restored— Stephanie Bolster’s A Page From the Wonders of Life on Earth. The news was a surprise, and I’m only one of many readers who are overjoyed. You should be too, and your reading life will be better for this news, even if you don’t know it yet. And if you’d like to have a celebration of your own, I’d recommend any of the ones I mentioned in my original post, and also Sheree Fitch’s extraordinary new picture book Night Sky Wheel Ride, which Harriet shouts along to when we read it to her. Please also read Sheree’s gorgeous post on LPG funding and I dare you not to be moved.

May 15, 2012

I'll be shindigging tomorrow

The Short Story Shindig takes place tomorrow evening at Type Books with three great writers and three great books– Heather Birrell’s Mad Hope, Daniel Griffin’s Stopping for Strangers, and Carrie Snyder’s The Juliet Stories. And I’m hosting the event, which I’m very excited about. You couldn’t ask for a better line-up. I hope to see you there.

May 15, 2012

Malarky Giveaway. Because you really have to read it.

I have this problem wherever books are being sold, I always think it’s kind of rude not to buy one. So this is how I ended up in possession of a spare copy of Anakana Schofield’s Malarky after attending her book launch tonight. Her reading was wonderful, the novel’s opening and its most terrible, hilarious, devastating sex-scene. I love this book so very much, and I’m not the only one– over here, the book is celebrated by the likes of Lynn Coady, Annabel Lyon, Jenny Diski and ME (which is the best crowd I’ve ever hung out in). Malarky has been chosen as one of Barnes and Noble’s Summer 2012 Discover Great New Writers selections.

“If Hagar Shipley met Stella Gibbons…” is how I called it in my review. “Malarky is a journey beyond the limits of love, an equally sad and hilarious portrait of motherhood.” I finished with, “This is a book that will leave you demanding more of everything else you read.” And it has.

So now I’d like to send you a copy. Leave a comment below before Saturday for a chance to picked in a draw, postage paid by me because I want you to read it this much. And yes, of course, the book is autographed.

UPDATE: And the winner is Julia, whose comment number was randomly selected by a toddler from a sunhat. And now the rest of you should track down copies of your own. You won’t be sorry.

May 13, 2012

Malarky Launches

Malarky, which I loved madly, launches in Toronto on Tuesday. And since Rebecca Rosenblum has other plans that night, I’m going solo, which is terrifying. I don’t think I’ve ever been to a literary event without Rebecca. So here’s hoping that you’ll decide to come along, and I don’t feel altogether lonely.

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