Oh, god, is it really thursday tomorrow?

Hi friends,

I'm reading downtown (Vancouver, y'all) tomorrow at the launch of Maya Merrick's novel "The Hole Show" (Conundrum), which is a humdinger by all accounts! Most likely I'll be reading from "Sugar Bush" but you never know...

It's at the Eclektica gallery, in the former Sam the Record Man space. I'm eager to check out this new venue.

568 Seymour St.
November 15, 7PM

Out of hiding.

For those of you who don’t already know, I’m now a happily married woman! I guess that explains why I haven’t had time to update here for a couple of months—I had to go all mental contemplating things like tablecloths and veil lengths. And then I had to relax and enjoy a few days of hanging out with my delicious new husband.

But now it is September, and as Erin likes to say, that’s the real “New Year” for the moms of the world. I’d go even farther and say that it’s the beginning of a new year for anyone that loves shopping for blank books and pens and binders and paper and other fun stuff.

And nothing completes that back-to-school feeling like doing my grant applications! One of the unexpected bonuses of having this blog is that I can look back over it and remember everything I did—makes updating the ol’ CV that much easier.

There’s stuff coming up that I want to tell you about: a panel-thingy at Word on the Street, and an appearance at this year’s Vancouver Writer’s Fest, but it’s going to have to wait until a little later (I promised myself I’d get back to work after a teensy break, you see)…

boo and yay.

Well, I didn’t make the ReLit shortlist, which isn’t really a surprise, but a little sad nonetheless. Mostly because I just wanted to have a reason to visit Ailsa and George and Silas in Newfoundland!

I’ve been getting chastised for not updating more frequently, especially since I’ve gotten on the facebook. That thing is a time-suck. And really, I can only handle one social networking/personal journalling/quasi-promotional internet-based thing at a time. I’m old like that.

Sold a couple of copies of Sugar Bush last weekend, courtesy of Doreen. We celebrated her birthday with a slumber party/scrapbooking-a-thon. I took all the paper for our wedding invites and made some serious headway, in addition to getting a bunch of crafty things done. Anyway, Doreen must have told everyone I wrote a book when I was out of earshot, because she sold her entire stash to her friends! The best was when Diana spent most of the day sunbathing and reading my book out in the backyard. It made me happy to think of Sugar Bush as “summer reading.” (Usually the sun fries my brain so much I can barely make it through a fashion magazine.)

Short notice, but…

I'm reading this Thursday, May 3 (yep, that’s tonight!) at the Robson Reading Series with Jay MillAr and Nikki Reimer. 7pm, at the UBC Bookstore at Robson Square (800 Robson Street, between Hornby & Howe).

Good and exciting news

First off, Sugar Bush has placed third in a beauty contest.

The Alcuin Society’s annual design awards have given Sugar Bush third place honours for her snappy good looks. And who can blame them? She’s one foxy little number. The Society takes the books on a dizzying world tour, so my little baby is about to become better-travelled than I, hobnobbing with book lovers from Winnipeg to Berlin.

Unlike the Miss America contest, I don’t think that if the winning book gets drunk at a nightclub and starts flashing her pages at the paparazzi, SB will have to step in and fulfill her duties…

Secondly, I’ve been longlisted for a ReLit award! Wow, this is really neat. The odds of me making the shortlist are slim to none, but I’m just pleased as punch to be in such esteemed company. I’m so happy that someone out there read it and liked it enough to put it there.

The ReLits are the cool kids’ literary award for sure, kind of an indie-rock hug for the book set. Its mandate is “ideas, not money,” and they always pick great writing from wonderful small presses (who often get ignored during the “prestige” awards).

So hurrah!

Things are sucky, yet I soldier on.

Well, we’re into the second week of not having internet as home, and I hate everything. Seriously, what the what? I hate you Telus. Thanks for nothing. And thanks, world’s lamest coffee shop with free wifi, for playing both Foreigner and Bob Seger in the last six minutes. I can only hope that you’ll cap it all off with something by Steely Dan—oh, no wait, it’s Shania Twain. Somebody kill me.

In other news, I have a new piece up on the Tyee website about our upcoming nuptials.

An after-the-fact epigraph

"Our workman had sent word by the mail-car man that he was coming to see me on Sunday and the postman had delivered the message. Oh, what a glut of happiness. Our workman was called Carnero and I loved him too. I loved his rotting teeth and his curly hair and his strong hands and his big stomach, which people referred to as his "corporation." He was nicknamed Carnero after a boxer. I knew that when he came he would have bars of chocolate, and maybe a letter or silk hanky from my mother, and that he would lift me up in his arms and swing me around and say 'Sugarbush.'"

from "My Mother's Mother" by Edna O'Brien