Book News Vol. 9 No. 6

BOOK NEWS

INCITE

Join us on April 16 for readings by Kim Fu (For Today I Am a Boy), Brian Payton (The Wind Is Not a River), and Audrey Thomas (Local Customs). Details on this and other upcoming Incite events here, http://www.writersfest.bc.ca/events/incite.

Margaret MacMillan Audio
At Incite on March 28, 2014, Margaret MacMillan appeared before a full house of 300 to talk about her latest book, The War that Ended Peace. You can listen to a recording of the event here, http://www.writersfest.bc.ca/multimedia/audio-archives.

SPECIAL EVENTS

A Dram Come True
There are still a few days left to get early bird tickets for our famed A Dram Come True scotch tasting event. Join us at the legendary Hycroft-a magnificent Edwardian mansion in the heart of Shaughnessy - and enjoy the superb, complex flavours of a variety of rare and distinguished single malts. New this year: Heighten your experience at an exclusive VIP reception before the main event - a private tasting tour of some of the special
malts, guided by whisky experts.

Friday, May 30, 2014
7:30–9:30pm
Earlybird tickets $110; after April 15: $120
VIP Tasting 6:30–7:30pm; Tickets: $75 (limited quantities, only available with a main event ticket)

Hycroft
1489 McRae Avenue, Vancouver

Click here for details and to purchase tickets, http://www.writersfest.bc.ca/events/dram-come-true.

A Dram Come True is a fundraiser for the Vancouver Writers Fest.

Miriam Toews and Steven Galloway
Meet two of Canada's most engaging writers as they talk about their hotly anticipated new books. Click here for event details and to find out more about our special offer for bookclubs: http://www.writersfest.bc.ca/events/gallowaytoews.

AWARDS & LISTS

The shortlist for the Baileys women's prize has been announced, with Donna Tartt (author of The Goldfinch) at the head of the pack. The Baileys prize is the UK's only annual book prize for fiction written by women.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/07/donna-tartt-baileys-womens-prize-fiction-2012-shortlist

Adam Johnson's short story, 'Nirvana', has won the Sunday Times short story competition. It is a tale of "a woman confined to her bed by an auto-immune disease and a man struggling to come to terms with his fears that she might kill herself", and includes a ghostly appearance by Kurt Cobain.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/04/sunday-time-short-story-prize-nirvana-adam-johnson-kurt-cobain

The shortlist for the Griffin Poetry Prize has been announced. Both Anne Carson and Anne Michaels made the cut. The $65,000 prize will be announced in early June.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/arts/griffin-poetry-prize-shortlists-anne-carson-anne-michaels-1.2602225

Debut novelists and authors of international acclaim appear on the shortlist for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/11/impac-literary-prize-shortlist-knausgaard-vasquez-ryan

Arthur Black and Wayne Johnston, among others, are on the shortlist for this year's Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour in Canadian literature.
http://leacock.ca/2014/04/09/2014-leacock-medal-shortlist-announced/

YOUNG READERS

Paddington Bear is back! "Postage costs to Lima have not deterred Michael Bond's ursine icon from penning letters to Aunt Lucy relating his London adventures–to be published by HarperCollins in the autumn."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/08/paddington-bear-letters-new-book-michael-bond

NEWS & FEATURES

We all know about young-adult fiction, but what about "new-adult" works? As it turns out, books aimed at (and written by) millenials have provided a much-needed boost to the publishing industry, filled with characters who are "attracted to the siren song of freedom but wilfully naive about the associated responsibility."
http://thewalrus.ca/never-never-land/

While there's serious reason to believe that we're in a golden age of young people's literature, it's also the case that we live in a time of great second novels. It has long been claimed that the second novel is harder to write than the first, but the success of Rachel Kushner, Jonathan Miles and Charles McNail may be proving that the opposite is true.
http://www.themillions.com/2014/04/are-we-entering-a-golden-age-of-the-second-novel.html

A German publisher is aiming to put all four million Wikipedia articles into print. "We all know that Wikipedia is huge...but can you imagine how large Wikipedia really is? We think that the best way to experience the size of Wikipedia is by transforming it into the physical medium of books."
http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-publisher-aims-to-put-all-4-million-wikipedia-articles-into-print-20140402,0,4089905.story

William Faulkner will forever be associated with Mississippi...but did you know that he spent a large portion of his life in Hollywood too? Learn why he believed that "Abandon hope, all ye who enter here" would be a fitting road sign for drivers to see as they crossed the border into California, here:
http://gardenandgun.com/article/william-faulkners-hollywood-odyssey

Are we losing the war against jargon? "Sixty years ago, civil servant Sir Ernest Gowers's guide to plain English became an unlikely hit. As a revised edition is published, why are windbags still thriving?"
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/10710840/Speak-plainly-are-we-losing-the-war-against-jargon.html

Books have a history of influencing politics, but how often are they used as actual weapons? Declassified documents have now revealed that the CIA used copies of Doctor Zhivago to provoke dissent in the Soviet Union during the Cold War. According to the CIA, the novel had "great propaganda value."
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/04/07/300144121/book-news-cia-tried-to-use-doctor-zhivago-to-weaken-the-ussr

What are the greatest meals in literature? From Alice in Wonderland's tea party to On the Road's apple pies, here's a compilation of the ten best.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/10405256/10-great-meals-in-literature.html

BOOKS & WRITERS

Short stories may be synonymous with brevity, but according to Helen Oyeyemi, Lydia Davis' new collection, Can't and Won't, could just as well make up a library. "As you move among the pages, there is an effect of sampling the distinct contributions of quite a few writers."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/04/cant-wont-stories-lydia-davis-review

Peter Matthiessen, author of The Snow Leopard and At Play in the Fields of the Lord, has died at the age of 86.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/arts/peter-matthiessen-snow-leopard-author-dies-1.2600119

Akhil Sharma's semi-autobiographical new novel, Family Life, tells the story of a family "shattered by loss and disoriented by a recent move from India to America." It is a devastating work that reveals how love becomes "warped and jagged and even seemingly vanishes in the midst of huge grief."
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/06/books/review/akhil-sharmas-family-life.html

Akhil Sharma is also featured in this week's New York Times podcast, along with Julie Bosman (looking back at her four years on the publishing beat). Leslie Jamison also appears to talk about The Empathy Exams, and Gregory Cowles discusses best-seller news.
http://podcasts.nytimes.com/podcasts/2014/04/04/books/review/06books_pod/04bookreview.mp3

It's a hat-trick for Akhil Sharma this week! He has also been featured in the New Yorker Fiction podcast, though in this case reading someone else's work. He reads 'The Night in Question' by Tobias Wolff, "a story within a story about the relationship between a self-destructive brother, Frank, and his tenaciously devoted sister, Frances."
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2014/04/fiction-podcast-akhil-sharma-reads-tobias-wolff.html

You know something's up when a critic begins a book review with: "Damn. Another writer I have to care about." The writer in question is Lawrence Osborne, whose new book, The Ballad of a Small Player, is set in the gambling tables of Macau.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/06/books/review/the-ballad-of-a-small-player-by-lawrence-osborne.html

Teen angst can be hard. But what about grappling with the welfare system, a violent father and traditional religion? Danish-Palestinian poet Yahya Hassan's first collection has already sold more than 100,000 copies, and he's only 18 years old.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/03/books/young-immigrant-in-denmark-lashes-out-in-verse.html

Emma Donoghue's new novel, Frog Music, is based on a very specific historical incident: an 1876 San Francisco murder that was never conclusively solved. A world away from the glittering tech-town of today, Frog Music's San Francisco is a dusty, frontier town, populated by prostitutes, gangsters and thieves.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books-and-media/book-reviews/frog-music-a-gripping-whodunnit-about-the-death-of-a-cross-dressing-woman-in-19th-century-san-francisco/article17833037/

Joseph Boyden is on a "Revision Quest", both to explore his own First Nations roots and to change the national conversation. Charles Foran explores his story, here:
http://thewalrus.ca/revision-quest/

In celebration of National Poetry Month, here's a list of the 50 essential books of poetry that everyone should read. "There's something for everybody here, from the deeply established canonical works to riveting, important books by newer poets, from the Romantics to the post-modernists, from the goofy to the staid."
http://flavorwire.com/449473/50-essential-books-of-poetry-that-everyone-should-read/view-all/

COMMUNITY EVENTS

NORTH SHORE WRITERS FESTIVAL
15th annual literary weekend. Featuring Vincent Lam, Douglas Gibson, Jen Sookfong Lee, Sandra Gulland and others. April 11 and 12, 2014. North Vancouver City Library, 120 14th St. W., North Vancouver. More information at northshorewritersfestival.com.

CHRISTOPHER LEVENSON
The Vancouver poet and co-organizer of the Dead Poets Reading Series will launch his eleventh book, Night Vision, at 3 p.m. on Saturday 12th April in the Alice MacKay Room of the Central Library, 350, West Georgia Street. As well as reading from the new book he will be interviewed about his poetry by local short fiction writer Ken Klonsky. More information at vpl.ca.

ROBERT HIRZER
Author hosts a book launch of his recently published novel The Last Plane. Saturday, April 12 at 3:00pm. New Westminster Public Library, 716 - 6th Avenue, New Westminster.

DARD HUNTER: THE GRAPHIC WORKS
Lawrence Kreisman will give a talk on Hunter's evolution as an artist, and on what identifies and distinguishes his work from others. Monday, April 14 at 7:00pm, free. Emily Carr Auditorium, Granville Island. More information at blog.alcuinsociety.com.

THURSDAYS WRITING COLLECTIVE
SFU writer-in-residence Madeleine Thien and members of the Thursdays Writing Collective reading from their work. Tuesday April 15 at 12:30 pm, Bennett Library Special Collections/Rare Books (Room 7100), Bennett Library, SFU Burnaby. Free, refreshments. For more info, phone 778-782-6676.

EVENT NON-FICTION CONTEST
Writers are invited to submit manuscripts exploring the creative non-fiction form. $1500 in prizes available, plus publication. Contest Judge Deborah Campbell. Maximum entry length is 5000 words. $34.95 entry fee. Deadline April 15, 2014. Entrants will receive a one-year subscription to EVENT (or extension). Complete contest guidelines can be found at www.eventmagazine.ca/contest-2014/.

LUNCH POEMS AT SFU
Readings by Susan McCaslin and Reg Johanson. Wednesday, April 16 at 12:00 noon, free. SFU Harbour Centre's Teck Gallery, 515 W. Hastings St. More information at sfu.ca/publicsquare/lunchpoems.

TREVOR CAROLAN
Author launches his new book Cascadia: The Life and Breath of the World. Thursday, April 17 at 6:30pm. Banyen Books & Sound, 3608 4th Ave. W.

text bites & textual vishyuns: a reeding & dialog with bill bissett
Reading by renowned Canadian poet bill bissett, followed by a discussion of his work by publisher Karl Siegler, author Carl Peters and artist/writer/educator Jerry Zaslove. Organized in conjunction with the exhibition textual vishyuns: image and text in the work of bill bissett at The Reach Art Gallery and Museum in Abbotsford, on April 17–June 30. Friday, April 18 at 8:00pm. The Western Front, 303 8th Ave. E., Vancouver.

Upcoming

AUTHORS IN OUR MIDST
Author of American Exodus: Climate Change and the Coming Flight for Survival, Giles Slade, discusses the environmental impact of climate change. Tuesday, April 22 ar 7:00pm. Brighouse branch, Richmond Public Library, 100-7700 Minoru Gate, Richmond. More information at yourlibrary.ca.

MEET THE AUTHOR
Roberta Rich discuses her novel The Harem Midwife. Thursday, April 24 at 7:00pm. Christianne's Lyceum. 3696 W. 8th Ave. $20 (includes refreshments). To reserve your space call 604.733.1356 or email lyceum@christiannehayward.com. More information at www.christiannehayward.com.

TWISTED POETS LITERARY SALON
Featuring Pamela Porter, teen and children contest winners, and Eric Hamber Writers in the Making. Thursday, April 24 at 7:00pm. Suggested donation: $5 at the door. The Cottage Bistro, 4468 Main Street, Vancouver. More information at www.pandorascollective.com.

CATHY ACE
Author signs her new book The Corpse with the Emerald Thumb. Saturday, April 26 at 3:00pm. Triple Tree Nurseryland, 20503 Lougheed Highway. More information at blackbondbooks.com.

2014 LITFEST NEW WEST
April 26, 2014. A day of free workshops at LitFest New West. To see the list of workshops and to register go to: http://artscouncilnewwest.org/litfest/program/workshops/.

DIANE TUCKER BOOK LAUNCH
Join Diane Tucker for the Vancouver launch of her fourth book, Bonsai Love, a collection of poems about the sensual delicacy of love. Sunday, April 27 at 7:00pm, free. Cottage Bistro, 4470 Main St. Will also feature a musical performance by Vancouver-based sing/songwriter Rodney DeCroo. For more information, visit
www.harbourpublishing.com.

TALES FROM FUN CITY
Authors Aaron Chapman and Lani Russwurm share tales from Vancouver's lively cultural history. Wednesday, April 30 at 7:00pm, free. Alma VanDusen & Peter Kaye rooms, Lower Level, Central Library, 350 W. Georgia St. More information at vpl.ca.

FLYING DUCHESSES
Patricia McCuaig's biography of her father's adventures flying a Grumman Goose in Canada from 1964/65 for England's Duke of Westminster. Wednesday, April 30 at 7:00pm. Welsh Hall West, West Vancouver Memorial Library. For more information, call 604-925-7403.

JANIE CHANG
Reading and discussion by the author of Three Souls. Tuesday, May 6 at 7:00pm. White Rock Library, 15342 Buena Vista, White Rock. More information at 604-541-2201.

SKAGIT RIVER POETRY FESTIVAL
A celebration of poetry featuring readings, workshops, and storytelling. Access to internationally famous poets through intimate venues and workshop sessions. May 15-18, 2014. Various venues throughout La Conner, WA. More information at www.skagitriverpoetry.org.

THE PEN AND THE PALETTES
A three day weekend for the cultural and culinary arts enthusiast on Haida Gwaii. Includes the launch of Rachel McMillen's new novel Dark Moon Walking. June 27-30, 2014. More information at haidahouse.com or by email at info@haidahouse.com.