Book News Vol. 10 No. 11

BOOK NEWS

A Dram Come True-This Friday!

It's summertime and the living is easy. Join us at Scotch o'clock (7:30 pm) for A Dram Come True at Hycroft this Friday June 5. Sample 44 rare and distinguished single malts plus select spirits, Tinhorn Creek wine and appetizers, while supporting the Vancouver Writers Fest.

For a preview of what to expect check out A Dram Come True whisky expert Dave Mason on Global TV's Morning News BC:
http://globalnews.ca/video/2023038/a-dram-come-true-scotch-tasting

Details and tickets: http://writersfest.bc.ca/events/dram-come-true

AWARDS & LISTS

Rivka Galchen has won the 2014 Danuta Gleed Literary Award for her short-fiction collection, American Innovations. Her debut novel, Atmospheric Disturbances, was a finalist for the Governor General's Literary Award and the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize.
http://www.quillandquire.com/awards/2015/06/01/rivka-galchen-wins-2014-danuta-gleed-literary-award/

Margaret Atwood and C.C. Humphreys are among the winners of this year's Arthur Ellis Awards for Crime Writing. The awards were judged by a panel of twenty-one writers, reviewers, librarians, booksellers, and academics specializing in the crime genre.
http://www.quillandquire.com/awards/2015/05/29/margaret-atwood-c-c-humphreys-among-2015-arthur-ellis-award-winners/

The Lambda literary awards, a "celebration of queer culture and queer literature," were handed out this week in New York City. The big winner of the night was John Waters, the filmmaker and writer who called his award "the Imperial Margarine crown of queer royalty".
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/jun/02/lambda-literary-awards-lgbt-literature-john-waters

The shortlists for the government of Ontario's Trillium Book Awards have been announced, recognizing "excellent works of literature by the province's writers published the year prior." Margaret Atwood, Thomas King and Dionne Brand are among the finalists.
http://www.quillandquire.com/awards/2015/05/27/margaret-atwood-dionne-brand-thomas-king-among-2015-trillium-book-awards-finalists/

Meanwhile, in Atlantic Canada, Carmelita McGrath and Andrew Peacock have won the 2015 Newfoundland and Labrador Book Awards. McGrath is the recipient of this year's E.J. Pratt Award for her collection, Escape Velocity, and Peacock won this year's non-fiction award for his debut title, Creatures of the Rock: A Veterinarian's Adventures in Newfoundland.
http://www.quillandquire.com/awards/2015/05/27/carmelita-mcgrath-and-andrew-peacock-win-2015-newfoundland-and-labrador-book-awards/

Ali Smith has won The Baileys women's prize for How to Be Both.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/jun/03/ali-smith-wins-baileys-prize-with-how-to-be-both

YOUNG READERS

A new children's book, Sweep Up the Sun, salutes birds in flight. Unlike many high-quality nonfiction picture books, however, it uses photography rather than traditional illustration.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/27/books/review/winged-wonders.html

NEWS & FEATURES

The New York Times has sparked criticism after releasing an all-white summer reading list. "According to Gawker, past volumes of the esteemed publication's summer reading list have also had a diversity problem."
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/news/the-new-york-times-sparks-criticism-after-releasing-an-allwhite-reading-list-10274663.html

A proof copy of The Bell Jar has been unearthed. Attributed to Plath's pseudonym Victoria Lucas, the early version of the novel reveals many last-minute changes to the text.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/may/28/the-bell-jar-proof-copy-found-sylvia-plath

Philip Larkin once described literary parties as his idea of "hell on earth." For Philip Hensher, however, things felt very different. "You never knew what would happen next at an old-style literary gathering. Where else could you argue with Doris Lessing about underpants from M&S?"
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jun/01/philip-larkin-doris-lessing-literary-party

And if you do get invited to such a gathering, here are some great tips for how to survive! Headphones, books and cigarettes are just a few of many helpful tools that can be employed.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2015/jun/02/how-to-survive-literary-parties-author-francis-plug

"Is it good poetry where every other line rhymes, instead of having each line rhyme with the one before it?" What about a "name of a book that dramatizes bedbugs?" Before Google, these were just a few of the questions asked in a now-revealed cache of New York Public Library question cards.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/may/28/librarian-new-york-public-librarys-quirkiest-enquiries

BOOKS & WRITERS

Several years ago, Hilary Mantel's novel, Wolf Hall, won the Man Booker Prize for Fiction. Now it's a success on the London Stage. Hilary Mantel discusses taking the book from page to stage, here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/31/theater/hilary-mantel-on-taking-her-wolf-hall-novels-to-the-stage.html

Kamel Daoud's "stunning" debut novel, The Meursault Investigation, retells Albert Camus's existential classic, The Stranger, from an Algerian point of view. "This is not just a clever, playful conceit...it provides the architecture for an intricately layered tale that not only makes us reassess Camus's novel but also nudges us into a contemplation of Algeria's history and current religious politics."
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/29/books/review-kamel-daoud-interrogates-camus-in-the-meursault-investigation.html

This fall, feminist icon Gloria Steinem will be publishing her first book in more than 20 years. My Life on the Road has been described as "a candid account of how her early years led her to an on-the-road kind of life traveling, listening to people, learning, and creating change."
http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/books/2015/05/27/gloria-steinem-book-my-life-on-the-road/28008947/

Sara Novic's first novel, Girl at War, explores "how the experience of war can be conveyed to those who don't know it." Narrated by a former child soldier at the end of the Yugoslavian civil war, Girl at War‘s language is charged with enough vitality that "its story wil be remember by readers a world away.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/books/review/girl-at-war-by-sara-novic.html

"At first glance, poets Claudia Emerson and Philip Metres have nothing to say to each other. Maybe that's the point." Emerson's The Opposite House and Metres' Sand Opera are looked at side by side, here:
http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/books/2015/06/the_opposite_house_by_claudia_emerson_and_sand_opera_by_philip_metres_reviewed.html

Make it True: Poetry from Cascadia, is a poetry anthology that celebrates sustainability and "harmony with nature... From Alaska to Arcata, from Nanaimo to Missoula, the 89 poets in this Cascadian collection explore, preserve and celebrate the mind's wilderness and the wilderness of this place."
http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Anthology+poetry+from+Cascadia+celebrates+sustainability+harmony+with+nature/11093961/story.html#ixzz3bxAzRA8F

COMMUNITY EVENTS

MELIA MCCLURE
Author reads from her book The Delphi Room. Wednesday, June 4 at 7:00pm. Vancouver Public Library, 350 W. Georgia St., Vancouver. More information at vpl.ca.

TWS READING SERIES
The Writer's Studio at SFU presents writer, filmmaker, and wilderness guide Calder Cheverie, director of The Peel Project. Thursday, June 4 at 8:00pm. Cottage Bistro, 4470 Main Street, Vancouver.

BOOKS & BISCOTTI
Features readings by British Columbia writers Diego Bastianutti, Robert Pepper Smith, and Anna Ciampolini Foschi, and the premiere of a documentary movie by Ornella Sinigaglia. Tuesday, June 8 at 7:00pm, free. Il Centro Italian Cultural Centre, 3075 Slocan St., Vancouver. More information at italianculturalcentre.ca.

JANIE CHANG
Reading by the author from her new book Three Souls. Tuesday, June 9 at 7:00pm, Bob Prittie Metrotown. More information at bpl.bc.ca.

JOHN VAILLANT
Local, best-selling author reads from his latest book The Jaguar's Children. Wednesday, June 10 at 6:30pm. Carnegie Reading Room, 401 Main Street, Vancouver. More information at vpl.ca.

W. RUTH KOZAK
Canadian travel journalist and local author reads from her novel Shadow of the Lion. Wednesday, June 10 at 7:00pm. Vancouver Public Library, 350 W. Georgia St., Vancouver. More information at vpl.ca.

TWISTED POETS LITERARY SALON
Features Alex Leslie and Robin Susanto plus open mic. Wednesday, June 10 at 7:00pm. The Cottage Bistro, 4468 Main Street, Vancouver. Suggested donation at the door: $5. Sign up for open mic at 7pm. More information at
www.pandorascollective.com.

AIR INDIA MEDITATIONS
Award winning poet Renee Saklikar and renowned composer John Oliver present the Vancouver premiere of Air India Meditations-a sequence of soundscapes interwoven with poems from Children of Air India, about the bombing of Air India Flight 182. Saturday, June 13 at 1:00pm. Vancouver Public Library, 350 W. Georgia St., Vancouver. More information at vpl.ca.

Upcoming

ELIZABETH RENZETTI
National columnist with The Globe and Mail, presents her debut novel, Based on A True Story. Monday, June 15 at 7:00pm. Vancouver Public Library, 350 W. Georgia St., Vancouver. More information at vpl.ca.

DEE HOBSBAWN-SMITH
Author reads from her first collection of short fiction, What Can't Be Undone. Tuesday, June 16 at 7:00pm, White Rock Library. More information at fvrl.bc.ca.

SPOKEN INK
Melia McClure reads from her debut novel, The Delphi Room. Tuesday, June 16 at 8:00pm. La Fontana Caffe, 101-3701 East Hastings Street, Burnaby. More information at burnabywritersnews.blogspot.ca.

LUNCH POEMS @ SFU
Featuring Kevin Spenst and Louis Cabri. Wednesday, June 17 at 12:00 noon. Teck Gallery, SFU Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street, Vancouver. More information at sfu.ca.

NOVEL NIGHTS
BC Book Prize winner Aislinn Hunter in discussion of her award-winning novel The World Before Us. Wednesday, June 17 at 7:00pm. Book Warehouse, 4118 Main Street. For further details please call 604 879-7737.

HEATHER HALEY
Author reads from her debut novel The Town Slut's Daughter. Thursday, June 18 at 7:00pm. Storm Crow Tavern. More information at howesoundpublishing@gmail.com.

TWISTED POETS LITERARY SALON
Features Adrienne Gruber and Raoul Fernandes with open mic. Thursday, June 25 at 7:00pm. The Cottage Bistro, 4468 Main Street, Vancouver. Suggested donation at the door: $5. Sign up for open mic at 7 pm. More information at
www.pandorascollective.com.