This Makes Me Happy

Lorna Crozier, one of my favourite poets, was named to the Order of Canada. Her citation reads: "For her poetry and for her mentorship of the next generation of Canadian poets."

Totally badass.

I dig the Order of Canada (I am a sucker for ceremony and tradition) and I'm happy to see a great writer be recognised for her amazing work. I think my favourite early-in-my-publishing-life moment was working on Crozier's Blue Hour of the Day collection as an intern at M&S (and by "working on", I should clarify that I was doing things like indexing -- the real editor was doing the actual work). But I already knew and loved Crozier's poems and it was so exciting to be touching manuscripts with her pencil marks on them.

Those moments of shivery reader-pleasure should always be that exciting, no matter how long you've been around books and the strange and interesting people who write them.

All of which is a long and convoluted way of saying: Congratulations Lorna!

CanLit is Sexy

There's a website called CanLit is Sexy that has been getting lots of attention lately. Reactions have been mixed (some find it funny, others deem it tasteless), but I definitely laughed over a lot of the pick up lines posted over various author photos.

Check it out and judge for yourself. Happy Friday!

Photo courtesy of CanLitisSexy.Tumblr.com

JM Frey + TATAS: The Toronto According to Authors Survey

Remember TATAS (my interview series asking Toronto authors to tell me about their favourite local spots)?

Well, TATAS is back, in all its Toronto-loving glory. Today I welcome JM Frey, who kindly contacted me to fill out the TATAS survey some time ago (my apologies to JM for taking such a long time to post!).

JM is a science fiction writer, poet and short fiction writer, as well as a pop culture scholar and commentator. She is the author of Triptych and has a second book, The Dark Side of the Glass, forthcoming in June 2012. She also recently published a piece in the anthology When the Hero Comes Home. Read on for JM's Toronto favourites!

The Toronto According to Authors Survey - Answers from JM Frey

Your favourite...

Place to see a movie?
Toronto Underground Cinema, Spadina Ave.

Writing spot?
The Sweet Escape Patisserie, the Distillery (Mostly because the head chef is my friend and I get free cupcakes).

Bookstore or library branch?
Bakka Phoenix, Harbord Street.

Grocery or food store?
T&T on Cherry Street (I lived in Japan for two years and this is the only place I've found the mochi and green tea ice cream I adore).

Park or outdoor spot?
The Beach, walking the boardwalk.

Little-known hangout?
Withrow Park, just south of the Danforth on Carlaw. (Fantastic Saturday morning farmer's market with amazing bread from St. John Bakery.)

Booze-serving establishment?
The Old Nick, Danforth Ave (beer and board games!).

Annual or recurring event?
Ad Astra Science Fiction and Fantasy Literary Convention, April.

Gallery/theatre/reading/concert venue?
I appreciate all the theatres, I just wish places like Factory were more accessible. Everyone deserves the chance to catch a show.

Underrated/usually reviled spot?
Greektown: the food is fantastic, the atmosphere is relaxed, the little shops are always fascinating to browse through, and potential is always in the air.

Thanks for JM for her responses, and be sure to drop by for more TATAS soon!

Look Mom, I'm Listed!

It's preview season and I'm absolutely chuffed to be included in several round ups and lists of us soon-to-be-published folks.

Here is the National Post's 12 Most Anticipated Book of 2012 (swoon - this actually made me squeak with delight. Can one swoon and squeak simultaneously?)

Quill & Quire's Spring Preview (more swooning)

and Canadian Bookshelf's Most Anticipated Books of the Season (swoon, rinse, repeat)

Being listed along so many great writers is a trip. I guess all first timers go through this, but sharing a season with the likes of Steven Heighton, Emily Schultz and Linden MacIntyre is a bit head-spinning. It makes me think of the quote from Margaret Atwood's Cat's Eye where the narrator says "Another belief of mine: that everyone else my age is an adult, whereas I am merely in disguise."

(Seriously, give me a situation, and I'll give you an Atwood quote. I'm like the dad from My Big Fat Greek Wedding who tries to explain every word as having a Greek root. Only more successful. Because there really is an Atwood quote for everything.)

Research and Contemporary Fiction

Recently a few people have asked me about what (if any) research I did for my novel. It's easy to assume that a book set in a roughly contemporary period in the city where I currently live would not require much of a library card workout in terms of research materials.

In fact, I got to do quite a bit of reading while writing the book. I say "got to" because I really enjoyed my research. My protagonist, Maggie, runs a store which sells (among other things) New Age paraphernalia, so I read books about Tarot cards and healing crystals, as well as some shorter articles on auras and aura reading. It wasn't something I knew anything about prior to the novel, but I needed to know what Maggie knew in order to write her, and having that knowledge became integral to the book.

The other subject on which I did a lot of reading was significantly more challenging. Maggie's mother, Carol, drowns herself in the Don River at the beginning of the book (literally the beginning, so no spoiler alert needed), and I felt I owed it to Maggie to read some non-fiction accounts by people who had lost loved ones to suicide. It was difficult, to say the least, but enlightening.

My favourite part of the process though was researching Toronto, where the book is set, where I live, and which I love. I double-checked even things I assumed I knew, just to make completely sure I didn't have Maggie standing at the corner of two streets that don't actually intersect or eating in a restaurant that didn't exist at the time, and I learned things I hadn't known at all, much of which didn't make it into the book but which was of great value to me as a mental backdrop (and as geeky municipal know-how).

There was one day in particular that sticks out, where I decided I needed to check the physicality of the river scenes, particularly Maggie's memory of her mother's death. I rode my bike up and down Bayview and tramped around in the weeds near the train tracks, trying in vain to locate an entry point to the river. I skulked around the Humane Society building and under the Don Valley Expressway. Finally, I remembered the staircase down from the Queen Street bridge. Locking up my bike, I went down to the river with the sun setting, using my bike light as a flashlight, still wearing my helmet in my rush, and undoubtedly looking completely insane. While high school kids calmly drank their surreptitious beers on the path, I dropped rocks into the water and tried to gauge the distance from ledge to river and various points of depth. I climbed down the bridge supports and noted the kinds of garbage on the shore, the buildings in the distance. A few days later I came back, this time riding up the pathway from the south, and I took 52 reference photographs (a few of which accompany this post). All to write two scenes, one of which is less than 650 words long. A friend called me during one of my excursions and we had the following conversation:

Me: "A drink tonight? I'd love to, but I'm in the middle of something."

My friend: "What are you doing?"

Me: "I'm trying to figure out the logistics of drowning myself in the Don River."

My very understanding friend: "...Writers are weird."

I may have been less nerdily enthusiastic about research if it had been necessary for me to slog through thousands of pages of social history in order to convincingly write about another century or something similarly demanding, but things being as they are, I am happy to say that I loved the research process. I like the chance to learn about bizarre things I might not otherwise be motivated to explore, and I like incorporating things I learn on my own into my writing.

For instance, I took sailing lessons while writing the book, so you'll notice a few sailboats and sailors manage to creep in. And for my story in The Walrus, I had good reason to research foley artists and their practices and terminology, which I might not otherwise have done. In some ways, I think research is a bonus for a writer and can really bring a character to life -- it's almost as if you are listening to them talk about their interests, like a new friend or lover. And if nothing else, maybe it will help with my Jeopardy skills. (Final photo: my trusty bike, Billy. I may have combined my research trip with a grocery shopping excursion, ahem.)

I'm in Found Press!

So I'm very excited to announce that one of my stories, Mike Mike Mike Mike, has been included in Found Press' Fall 2011 quarterly collection.

You can see a preview of the collection here, which features stories by three other fantastic writers (Lee Kvern, Andrew Forbes and Pauline Holdstock, all of whom I'm very pleased to be appearing alongside).

The title of the collection, You Can't Go Home Again, is taken from my story, a fact about which I was really excited. And I need to find out who designed that cover, because it is AMAZING.

Please check out the collection and the good work that Found Press is doing.

National Post interview

Thanks to everyone who came out to the Literary Death Match last night! I had a great time, especially in the finale where the lovely Dani Couture and I were forced to spell authors' surnames in order to pick a winner. Ms. Couture bravely prevailed after I failed to spell Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (and by failed, I mean managed to get the first letter wrong).

Anyway, Dani and the other readers, Carolyn Black and Rebecca Rosenblum, were gracious and fantastic and I didn't trip and fall in my high heels, so really, the whole evening was a success.

I realized though that I forgot to post the fun interview the National Post did with each of the Death Match contestants. Here is mine, for your reading pleasure. Thanks to Mark Medley and the National Post!