Book News Vol. 5 No. 33

BOOK NEWS

Virtual Festival

The latest recording in our recently launched series of archived events from Festivals-past features Alberto Manguel in conversation with Hal Wake. Renowned bibliophile Alberto Manguel renovated a medieval presbytery in France to house his collection of more than 30,000 books. This interview tells the story of his library and many more past and present. http://www.writersfest.bc.ca/multimedia/audio-archives

Special Events

Alexander McCall Smith
The Cellist of Sarajevo author Steven Galloway talks with Alexander McCall Smith, bestselling author of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency about his forthcoming book, Corduroy Mansions. Complete details on our website, http://www.writersfest.bc.ca/events/mccallsmith. A review of Coruroy Mansions in the Washington Post, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/27/AR2010072705064.html?wprss=rss_print/bookworld.

John Vaillant
The author of the multi-award-winning The Golden Spruce will discuss his new book The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival, a gripping tale of man and nature in collision, that leads inexorably to a final showdown in a clearing deep in the Siberian forest. Details here, http://www.writersfest.bc.ca/events/vaillant.

Alissa York and Richard Harvell
Please join us as Giller-shortlisted author Alissa York and debut novelist Richard Harvell read from their new works. Details at http://www.writersfest.bc.ca/events/yorkharvell.


2010 FESTIVAL AUTHORS
The following authors will be attending the Festival in October or participating in special events in the fall.

Emma Donahue, Andrea Levy, and David Mitchell, are among the dozen authors on the Man Booker longlist.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2010/jul/27/booker-prize-longlist

Sarah Selecky's This Cake is for the Party is a dandy debut collection.
http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/books/article/839575--this-cake-is-for-the-party-a-dandy-debut-collection

Adam Lewis Schroeder's In the Fabled East is a "marvelous and compelling tale" "a novel to lose yourself in", writes Nancy Wigston.
http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/books/article/839764--in-the-fabled-east-a-novel-to-lose-yourself-in

The San Francisco Chronicle adds its praise to the accolades already given David Mitchell's The Thousand Autumns of Jakob De Zoet.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/06/27/RV811E1KAT.DTL

As well as an interview with the author.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/07/22/NS271EFGM2.DTL&type=books

We've read that endlessly skimming short texts on the internet is making us stupider, that we are becoming less attentive book-readers. Gary Shteyngart, one of the New Yorker's "20 Under 40" luminaries assumes that as a given in Super Sad True Love Story.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703724104575379562245765930.html?mod=WSJ_Books_LS_Books_5

The NY Times describes the book as "supersad, superfunny, superaffecting".
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/27/books/27book.html?ref=gary_shteyngart

AWARDS & LISTS

Toronto poet Christian Campbell is on the shortlist for Britain's Forward Prize for best first poetry collection.
http://www.cbc.ca/arts/books/story/2010/07/27/forward-prize-poetry.html

The Margaret Hewson prize for new writing talent, chosen by Beryl Bainbridge shortly before her recent death, has been presented to London student Laura McClelland for her story about a group of Pre-Raphaelites.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/21/prize-judged-beryl-bainbridge-london-student

R.J. Ellory's A Simple Act of Violence has won the £3,000 Theakstons Old Peculier crime novel of the year award.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/23/rj-ellory-wins-crime-novel-year

Swedish author Johan Theorin has won the Crime Writers' Association's International Dagger award. Last year's winner was French author Fred Vargas.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/26/johan-theorin-crime-writers-award

Ariana Franklin has won The Dagger In the Library for her body of work.
http://www.thecwa.co.uk/daggers/2010/library.html

Complete list of daggers:
http://www.thecwa.co.uk/daggers/2010/index.html

The top winner of this years TLS (Times Literary Supplement) poetry competition is Peter Daniels of London. Other prize-winners are from elsewhere in Britain and from the U.S.
http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/tsl-pdfs/poetrycompetition.pdf

NEWS & FEATURES

Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore has launched a review of the Revised Foreign Investment Policy in Book Publishing and Distribution.
http://www.cbc.ca/arts/books/story/2010/07/21/book-publishing-policy-review.html

Can gross-out humour convince reluctant readers to crack open a book?
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/family-and-relationships/can-fart-jokes-get-boys-to-crack-open-a-book/article1648590/

Publisher, poet, pacifist, singer and songwriter Tuli Kupferberg has died.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/26/poetry-usa

Hodder Children's Books, the British publisher of Enid Blyton's Famous Five children's book series has announced it is updating the language used in the first ten books in the bestselling series.
http://www.cbc.ca/arts/books/story/2010/07/24/blyton-famousfive-updated.html

A court in Oslo has ordered a Norwegian journalist and her publisher to pay damages to an Afghan woman portrayed in the book The Bookseller of Kabul for breaching her privacy.
http://www.cbc.ca/arts/books/story/2010/07/24/bookseller-norway-fine.html

Claims of distortions endangering the bookseller's family has led the bookseller's two wives into exile in Norway and in Canada.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/27/asne-seierstad-the-bookseller-of-kabul-damages

More charges are expected.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/27/bookseller-kabul-author-lawsuit

Guy Dixon interviews Margaret Atwood on whether the fictional dystopias she's described could actually happen.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/arts/before-the-flood/article1651889/

Andrew Wylie's Odyssey Editions has made an exclusive e-book arrangement with Amazon.com, bypassing now-angry publishers and book stores, claiming better royalties for authors.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/27/authors-guild-amazon-andrew-wylie

The Independent is not convinced this arrangement will benefit authors, except those with Wylie, most of whom, apparently, are dead.
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/andrew-franklin-parasites-on-the-back-of-real-books-2036234.html

The Bookseller outlines how some American booksellers are responding.
http://www.thebookseller.co.uk/news/124201-wylie-splits-the-trade-over-odyssey.html

BOOKS & WRITERS

The NY Times focuses attention on seven new collections of poetry.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/23/books/23book.html?_r=1&nl=books&emc=booksupdateemb5

Ursula K. Le Guin acclaims the wise comedy of José Saramago in The Elephant's Journey.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/24/elephants-journey-jose-saramago-review

Bologna's fiction-writing collective Wu Ming have published Manituana, a provocative saga set in British America prior to 1776, through the eyes of the Mohawk nation.
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/manituana-by-wu-ming-2033010.html

In its review of Inger Ash Wolfe's The Taken, the LA Times continues to wonder who is the author of this pseudonymous crime novel.
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-rutten-20100721,0,5370588.story

Octogenarian Liam Dwyer started his literary career with Murder in Muskoka. His sixth book will be out this fall.
http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/books/article/839797--laptop-birthday-gift-launches-author-liam-dwyer-at-80

Donna Bailey Nurse writes that in Annabel, Kathleen Winter "exerts superb control over material that could easily turn exploitative".
http://www.montrealgazette.com/entertainment/books/Kathleen+Winter+powerful+debut+novel+Annabel+about+being/3309798/story.html

Damon Galgut's In a Strange Room is on the Booker longlist and shows the author "at a superb new high", knowing one big thing (hedgehog) vs. knowing many things (fox).
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/25/in-a-strange-room-review

Paul Greenberg's Four Fish is a study of overfishing and the rise of industrial sea-farming that is "enlightening without being preachy".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/25/four-fish-paul-greenberg

In a world of tweet messages, Howard Norman has written an epistolary novel, What is Left the Daughter.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/books/review/Wallace-t.html?ref=books

An excerpt from the novel is here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/books/review/excerpt-what-is-left-the-daughter.html?ref=review

"Lives like loaded guns", a line from an Emily Dickinson poem, is the title of the most recent biography of Dickinson, by Lyndall Gordon.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/23/AR2010072302549.html

Stieg Larsson becomes first author to sell 1m ebooks on Amazon.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/28/stieg-larsson-1m-ebooks-amazon

COMMUNITY EVENTS

GEORGE WOODCOCK LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
Vancouver Public Library and BC BookWorld are pleased to present the sixteenth George Woodcock Lifetime Achievement Award for an outstanding literary career in British Columbia to acclaimed writer Anne Cameron. Thursday, July 29 at 7:00pm, free. Alma VanDusen & Peter Kaye Rooms, Lower Level, Central Library, 350 W. Georgia Street. For more information please contact the VPL at 604-331-3603.

BURNING WATER
The W.A. Deacon Literary Foundation is pleased to announce a 12 hour marathon reading of George Bowering's award winning novel. The general public is invited to participate by taking turns reading from the novel. Friday, July 30 starting at 8:00am. 700 block Granville Street (between West Georgia and Robson Street). For more information, visit deaconfoundation.com.

EVELYN LAU
The Intrepid Pens DTES Book Club and Writing Group presents a reading, talk, and question-and-answer session with Vancouver writer Evelyn Lau. All proceeds go to Intrepid Pens and the Downtown Eastside Women's Centre. Saturday, July 31 at 7:00pm. Admission by donation. Downtown Eastside Women's Centre, 302 Columbia. For more information, visit www.dewc.ca.

HARMONY ARTS FESTIVAL
Join poets Trevor Carolan, Daniela Elza and English guitarist Andrew Collins as they perform new and favourite poems and songs on the themes of Love and Art. Monday, August 2 at 1:00pm. Art Tent at the Ferry Building Gallery, Ambleside, West Vancouver. For more information, visit www.harmonyarts.ca.

VANCOUVER POETRY SLAM
Van Slam featuring Clint "Father Goose" Wilson. Monday, August 2 at 8:00pm. Admission: $5/$3. Cafe Deux Soleils (2096 Commercial). More information at www.vancouverpoetryhouse.com.

TADDLE CREEK LAUNCH
Launch of Toronto-based literary magazine's first out of towner issue with an evening of readings by Lee Henderson, Peter Darbyshire, Marguerite Pigeon and Michael Christie. Tuesday, August 3 at 9:00pm, free. Brickhouse Late Nite Bistro and Bar (730 Main Street). More information at www.taddlecreekmag.com.

SAD MAG ISSUE 4 LAUNCH
Sad Mag presents a launch party for its fourth issue featuring dancing and entertainment hosted by the Terminal City Roller Girls. Wednesday, August 4 at 9:00pm. Cobalt, 917 Main Street. More information at www.sadmag.ca.

SUNSHINE COAST FESTIVAL OF THE WRITTEN ARTS
Join Canada's longest-running summer gathering of Canadian writers and readers, featuring established literary stars and exciting new voices, with opportunities for writers and readers to mingle amidst Rockwood's heritage gardens. August 12-15, 2010. Tickets are now on sale by phoning 1-800-565-9631 or 604-885-9631. Details at www.writersfestival.ca.

Upcoming

SUMMER DREAMS AWARDS CEREMONY
Celebrate those in the writing community who deserve to be honoured. Friday, August 20 at 7:00pm. Jacana Gallery (2435 Granville Street).

SUMMER DREAMS LITERARY ARTS FESTIVAL
Annual one day event showcasing and celebrating the on-going literary events, programs and resources available to the community. Features Evelyn Lau, Brad Cran and many others. Saturday, August 21. Complete details here, http://sites.google.com/site/summerdreamsfest/home.

JILL EDMONSON
Author reads from her new novel, Blood and Groom, part of the Castle Street Mysteries. Saturday, August 28 at 1:00pm. Indigo Marine Drive (1025 Marine Drive).

GARY GEDDES
Reading by the author from his latest book of poetry, Swimming Ginger. Monday, September 13 at 7:00pm, free. Alma VanDusen Room, lower level, Central Library, 350 W. Georgia Street. For more information, phone 604-331-3603.

SUSAN BOYD
Join the author as she reads from her book Hooked: Drug War Films in Britain, Canada and the United States. Wednesday, September 22 at 7:00pm, free. Alma VanDusen room, lower level, Central Library, 350 W. Georgia Street. For more information, phone 604-331-3738.

EVOLVE: VAMPIRE STORIES OF THE NEW UNDEAD
Listen to Vancouver writers Mary Choo, Sandra Wickham and Celdae (Colleen) Anderson, 3 of 22 Canadian authors featured in this most unusual and compelling collection as they re-imagine the future of vampires. Monday, September 27 at 7:00pm, free. Alma VanDusen & Peter Kaye rooms, lower level, Central Library, 350 W. Georgia Street. For more information phone 604-331-3691.

MICHAEL NICHOLL YAHGULANAAS
Reading by the author of Red. Thursday, September 30 at 1:00pm, free. Lillooet Room (level 3), Irving K. Barber Learning Centre, 1961 East Mall, Vancouver. More information at www.ikebarberlearningcentre.ubc.ca.