Book News Vol. 7 No. 28

BOOK NEWS

UPCOMING EVENTS
Michael Chabon
September 26, 2012 at 8:00pm
St. Andrew's-Wesley United Church
Author of the New York Times bestselling novel, The Yiddish Policemen's Union, talks about his latest book, Telegraph Avenue. Details: http://www.writersfest.bc.ca/events/michaelchabon

Writing the Unthinkable: Public Workshop with Lynda Barry
September 30, 10am to 1pm
Studio 1989

Following the sell-out success of her 2010 Festival appearances, Lynda Barry is back with her extraordinary workshop for established and aspiring writers.

"Lynda Barry is inspirational, motivating and affirming"–R.L. 2010 Writers Fest Event Attendee

Details: http://www.writersfest.bc.ca/events/lyndabarry

VIRTUAL FESTIVAL

Listen to the fifteenth installment in our series of audio archives from past Festival events. This week you'll hear an exerpt from 2010's "Short Stories" featuring Ivan E. Coyote, Billie Livingston, Sarah Selecky and Terence Young. Details: http://www.writersfest.bc.ca/multimedia/audio-archives.

Special Offers

If being a member of the VIWF didn't already have enough benefits, we've added an extra incentive! Every two weeks new and renewing members will have a chance to win a book by a Festival or Incite author. At the end of August we'll have a grand prize draw for a deluxe pack of Festival tickets - two tickets to any event of your choice for each day of the Festival! Sign up now here, https://www.writersfest.bc.ca/secure/secure_membership.php.

AWARDS & LISTS

The American Library Association has awarded Anne Enright and Robert K. Massie the Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction. Enright was recognized for her novel The Forgotten Waltz; Massie, for his biography, Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman. Each author will receive a medal and $5,000.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/books/ct-prj-ala-update,0,2443459.story

During the Leacock Summer Festival in Orillia, Ontario last weekend, Richard Gwyn, Patrick deWitt, Goran Simic, and Ryan Flavelle were declared winners of The Canadian Authors Association's (CAA) 2012 Literary Awards. Full story:
http://campaign.r20.constantcontact.com/render?llr=baatlveab&v=001xdqoBdbuEqDFOmorzu9ddAU4IJR4FSXtibsCk1A-bcXci7TR5NUMVMfu_TkoJQZnH_xHix48funLbr1ITFlLQZDe6dIXOSGRd4AiQ3tamRw%3D

Rhea Tregebov's The Knife Sharpener's Bell has been nominated for Manitoba Reads 2012. 12 titles are in the running for the honour-and you can have your say! Public voting is open until August 12th and you may vote once per day.
http://us4.campaign-archive1.com/?u=43b06605efcded4816916b918&id=fd3dd4e7a9&e=78a0c54425

YOUNG READERS

At the Ministry of Stories' Children's Republic of Shoreditch, Nick Hornby got pictures of Mary Poppins and King Henry VIII. Read his story and find out how he tackled the combination, and what happened when Mary Poppins told the king to tidy his room. Up to 11 years.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/childrens-books-site/2012/jul/26/nick-hornby-mary-poppins-henry-exclusive-short-story

Sarah Garland's Azzi in Between is a picture book that introduces children to what it is like to be a refugee child. One of the most involving stories I have read in a while, writes Kate Kellaway. Everyone should read it. For all ages.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/data/book/unclassified/9781847802613/azzi-in-between

Cassie Waters' Heat Wave, one of the "Pool Girls" series, is perfect for readers ages 8 to 12. The swim team's star swimmer breaks her leg and Grace must fill in for her. The problem is that Grace isn't a very good swimmer.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/kidspost/you-might-also-like-heat-wave/2012/07/24/gJQABFaK7W_story.html

In Billie Livingston's One Good Hustle, Burnaby teenager Sammie Bell, tough but sweet, relies on her friends for survival since her parents have essentially abandoned her. But, writes Jennifer Hunter, Livingston reminds us children often love their parents no matter what. For ages 14 and up.
http://www.thestar.com/news/books/article/1231518--one-good-hustle

NEWS & FEATURES

Millions of readers around the world will miss Maeve Binchy as a writer who spoke to them so directly that they felt she was their friend, writes Felicity Hayes-McCoy. This includes Writers Festival attendees who flocked to her events here. Maeve Binchy died in Dublin Monday, at the age of 72.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jul/31/maeve-binchy-miss-you

Marsha Lederman describes how Maeve Binchy taught her how to find a happy ending.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books-and-media/how-maeve-binchy-helped-me-find-a-happy-ending/article4452821/

US writer and contrarian Gore Vidal, one of the towering figures of American cultural and political life for more than six decades, has died aged 86. http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/aug/01/gore-vidal-dies-aged-86

Every summer, everyone and their uncle wants to tell you what to read at the beach. As the summer hits mid-stride, the LA Times offers the anti-beach reading list: nine books that you need not, nay, that you SHOULD not read at the beach.
http://www.latimes.com/features/books/jacketcopy/la-jc-9-books-not-to-read-at-the-beach-20120717,0,441020.story

Mobile services company Orange announced in May that it was ending its 17-year sponsorship of the Orange Prize. A new sponsor for the Prize will be announced in September, after 18 companies expressed an interest in backing the prize. The £30,000 prize recognizes English language fiction written by women.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-18856829

Tales of an Inuvialuit girl's resistance and triumph in Fatty Legs: A Residential School Story has become a best selling sensation among 'middle' readers., writes Robyn Smith. A follow-up book, A Stranger at Home, was published last year. Authors Margaret Pokiak-Fenton and Christy Jordan-Fenton plan to turn these stories into a picture book for young children.
http://thetyee.ca/Books/2012/07/30/Fatty-Legs/?utm_source=mondayheadlines&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=300712

Mystery solved. It had begun with the decision to use a pen name for some poetry and a pseudonym for some other writing. Michael Redhill has now revealed that Inger Ash Wolfe is a pseudonym he has used in the past.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books-and-media/the-real-inger-ash-wolfe-stands-up/article4444252/

A collection of rare books, including an illustrated copy of Paradise Lost, has been discovered in a hidden cupboard in a Scottish library. The collection includes a 1538 edition of letters by Roman philosopher Cicero and an 1827 illustrated edition of John Milton's Paradise Lost – one of only 50 copies.
http://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/books/features/rare-books-discovered-in-hidden-cupboard-1-2438900

A theatre director's mother rescued Michael Morpurgo's young-adult novel War Horse from obscurity, and along with the work of South Africa's Handspring Puppet Company, set it on course to become the most popular new play of the 21st century.
http://www.sfgate.com/performance/article/How-War-Horse-became-a-puppet-3723057.php

The combination of The Penguin Group's acquisition of upstart vanity publisher Author Solutions Inc., that earns most of its income by charging amateur authors hefty fees to produce unsellable books, and sales shifting to heavily discounted, royalty-poor and easily pirated ebooks leads John Barber to predict that there will be no professional writers in the future.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books-and-media/there-will-be-no-more-professional-writers-in-the-future/article4441060/

Hanging on the coattails of Fifty Shades of Grey, a U.K. publisher is releasing R-rated versions of Pride and Prejudice, Jane Eyre and A Study in Scarlet. Reader response, to date, is mixed.
http://www.thestar.com/news/books/article/1231238---mommy-porn-opens-door-for-erotic-retelling-of-jane-eyre-pride-and-prejudice

From his new home base in Brooklyn, Martin Amis talks to David Wallace-Wells about sex, porn, rioting, the difference between London and New York, his new novel Lionel Asbo, and the dwindling fortunes of postmodernist literature and American empire.
http://nymag.com/arts/books/features/martin-amis-2012-7/

Arts, along with athletics, were a part of the Olympics nearly from the start. From 1912 to 1952, juries awarded a total of 151 medals to original works in the fine arts inspired by athletic endeavors, alongside those for the athletic competitions.
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/When-the-Olympics-Gave-Out-Medals-for-Art-163705106.html#ixzz21rHsVFAC

Poet Priscila Uppal will reprise the role she played as the first Olympic poet-in-residence to Canadian athletes at Vancouver, where she tested her own endurance and performance skills by pumping out two sports poems a day.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books-and-media/poet-priscila-uppals-olympian-challenge/article4445289/

Oppal's daily poetic feed can be found here:
http://games.reviewcanada.ca/

In a conversation on a life in writing, Tim Parks says to Sarah Crown, "I couldn't really see a painting or a film or a game of football until I had thought about it in words, or preferably talked about it, or better still, written about it."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2012/jul/27/tim-parks-life-in-writing

Alan Bissett raises several issues on the apparent bias of the Booker prize. A disproportionate number of English prize-winners; a storm of controversy when a prize went to one Scot. Bissett's provocative article can be found here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2012/jul/27/booker-prize-bias-english

BOOKS & WRITERS

Liza Klaussmann is the great-great-great-granddaughter of Herman Melville, but it's her grandmother who inspired her first novel, Tigers in Red Weather, written from the point of view of five different characters, offering a fractured portrait of truth within one family.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/arts/story/2012/07/25/liza-klaussmann-video.html

In the summer, it isn't easy being German, writes Hector Tobar. For a few weeks, the famously efficient German work routine grinds to a halt. In Summer Lies, Bernhard Schlink's new collection of short stories, characters suffer through the forced intimacy of their family vacations.
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-ca-bernhard-schlink-20120729,0,737108.story

Mario Vargas Llosa's The Dream of the Celt writes of Roger Casement, whose work on human rights abuses in Congo and Peru led to his discovering Ireland was subject to the same abuse—and his arrest for treason. A brilliant exploration of conflicting moral claims, says Luis Alberto Urrea.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/mario-vargas-llosas-the-dream-of-the-celt/2012/07/23/gJQAKAiJ5W_story.html

While Grace is cross-country skiing, she comes across a man lying face down in the snow. Someone is suffering, and someone else must decide just how far their duty to help goes. Alix Ohlin's Inside is both easily accessible and demanding, writes Ian McGillis.
http://www.montrealgazette.com/entertainment/books/does+duty+help/6996206/story.html

Deborah Harkness welcomes readers back to the world of Diana Bishop with Shadow of Night, which picks up moments after the cliffhanger ending of the earlier book. Diana and Matthew flee into the past to escape witches who want Diana under their control — or dead.
http://www.vancouversun.com/entertainment/books/Shadow+Night+escapes+England+1590s/6994480/story.html

Linda Holeman's fifth historical novel The Lost Souls of Angelkov takes place in 19th C. Russia, with the characters flung into the immense social changes of the time, especially the emancipation of the serfs. Plot is the driving force, writes Candace Fertile.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books-and-media/book-reviews/serfs-up-a-novel-of-angst-in-19th-century-russia/article4438746/

Meaghan Delahunt's To the Island creates yearning for the Greek Islands and creates connections between individuals whose hearts had been broken (due to abandonment and imprisonment). Delahunt deftly reflects how people sometimes cannot remove those spaces even when they want to, writes Tracy Sherlock.
http://www.vancouversun.com/entertainment/books/Greek+island+home+family+ties/6994482/story.html

COMMUNITY EVENTS

QUEEROTICA
Readings by Ken Boesem, Kate Bornstein, Tony Correia, Amber Dawn, C.E. Gatchalian, Hiromi Goto, Elaine Miller, Micheal V Smith, and Charlie Spats. Tuesday, August 7 at 8:00pm. Admission by donation. Roundhouse Community Arts, 181 Roundhouse Mews. More information at queerartsfestival.com.

ANAKANA SCHOFIELD
The Vancouver Book Club will host Anakana Schofield in conversation about her novel Malarkey. Thursday, August 9 at 7:00pm, free. Prophouse Cafe, 1636 Venables Ave., Vancouver. More information at vancouverisawesome.com/bookclub.

Upcoming

SUNSHINE COAST FESTIVAL OF THE WRITTEN ARTS
Canada's longest running summer gathering of Canadian writers and readers. Features Wayson Choy, Charlotte Gill, Patrick Lane, Ami McKay, Richard Wagamese and many others. Tickets on sale now! August 16-19, 2012. Sechelt, BC. Complete details at www.writersfestival.ca.

SUMMER DREAMS LITERARY ARTS FESTIVAL
Annual family-friendly celebration of literary arts features two stages, a kids' area, a marketplace, and over 90 performers, including headliner Barbara Adler and Fang, a local spoken-word artist who combines poetry with music. Saturday, August 25, 2012, free. Trout Lake Park, 3350 Victoria. More information at www.summerdreamsfest.com.

A POETIC WALK THROUGH NATURE
Join Vancouver's 100,000 Poets for Change on an Earthwalk. Poets will read select poems calling for the preservation of our beautiful forests and shorelines. A guest speaker will also present a narrative tour of the cultural history and natural habitat of Stanley Park. September 29 at 10:00am, free. For more information and to register, visit http://earthwalks11poets.eventbrite.com/.