Go Green

There's an important article on Quillblog today about publishing and protecting the environment.

http://www.quillandquire.com/blog/index.php/2007/11/27/uk-publishers-go-green-sort-of/

One thing I love about Brindle & Glass is that they are committed to protecting the environment. My book will be printed on 100% post-consumer recycled and ancient-forest-friendly paper. Which makes me very happy.


We should be proud of our Canadian publishers, who are leading the way in this. Unlike Stephen Harper, who is a national embarrassment. Don't get me started....

Giving it away for nothing...

A friend of mine, a fellow writer, sent me this rant. If you're a writer, you should watch it.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mj5IV23g-fE


He's got a point.

My cover!!

We have a cover for Things Go Flying, and I LOVE it!!
I will try to insert it here.
Damn. This is hard.

*!%&!~*

There must be a way to do this!


Anyway, it's a great cover.

Later...

Yay! My genius tech guy figured it out...

Elyse Friedman launch

I'm looking forward to Elyse's launch of her new collection Long Story Short, on Thursday night, Nov. 1. It will be at Type Books, 883 Queen St. West, starting at 7:30. Open to everyone.
Anansi is publishing it. She is a very good and funny writer.

I can't seem to get a picture of the cover to go in here. Damn. You'll have to check it out on Elyse's site!

http://www.elysefriedman.com/

Rick Mercer!

I am SO going to watch Rick Mercer tonight!!! Mercer is absolutely brilliant.

Get a sneak peak: http://www.cbc.ca/arts/tv/story/2007/10/02/mercer-black-premiere.html

Word on the Street was really good. Great events in the tents. Russell Smith did not disappoint. He did mention that fiction doesn't pay. The Giller panel was highly entertaining--I didn't know that Austin Clark, Richard Wright and Vincent Lam were such wits. Also, Quarrington's info about how a novelist's skills translate better to TV than to film might come in handy...

Word on the Street

Word on the Street is on this weekend and I know what I want to see: Paul Quarrington talking about Writing Across Genres. Also, Russell Smith. I loved Muriella Pent. And Gil Adamson, who wrote the fabulous The Outlander.
And lots more, as long as the kids stay happy in the kids' tent....

Michael Redhill and Winston Churchill

You may wonder, looking at the title of this post, what Michael Redhill and Winston Churchill have in common. Well, I've been thinking about things lately, specifically, about how terrifically tough it is out there for writers of literary fiction.
Which made me think of Michael Redhill. Now, he is a real talent, but he is also modest and seems to be a genuinely nice person. I remember reading an interview in the newspaper in which he admitted quite frankly that the reviews for his latest book Consolation were not particularly glowing, that the book "tanked" in Canada and the U.S, and that it had sold 75 copies in the U.K. And then it made the Booker long list. Since then, Consolation won the Toronto Book Award, and will get new life from that.
Which brings me to Winston Churchill. Churchill gave a famous speech, I don't remember where or to whom, but presumably to the British people during the blitz, although it would work just as well for a room full of writers, which went as follows:

Never give up. Never give up. Never give up.